Well, I guess this is where the blog really gets going. I'm imagining it will be part travelogue and part reflections on Buddhism. This post is of the former sort. I set out from Kansas on May 1st, departing at 3:50pm, flying first to Chicago, then Abu Dhabi, and finally arriving in Columbo, Sri Lanka at 4:30am on the 3rd (Sri Lanka is 10.5 hours ahead of Kansas).
My main worry along the way was dealing with Etihad Airways' 15lb carry-on restriction. I had read accounts from people who said nobody paid attention to their carry-on and others who said they were asked to remove 20 grams from their bag! I was carrying 30lbs of stuff, including my laptop, its power cord, and a few books that I was studying. My strategy was to carry the laptop outside my bag and stick the heaviest stuff in the pockets of my jacket. When I got to the check-in counter, they were indeed weighing the bags, so I approached with 20lbs under my arm and placed my bag on the scale. What remained therein was only 10lbs, so they were happy and let me pass. Wacky.
When I got off the plane in Sri Lanka's capital, Columbo, this friendly fellow was waiting to pick me up. His name is Tisya (sp?) and he had brought the former residents of my house, Mark and Elaine, to the airport the previous evening, then slept in his van, and drove me back in the morning. His English was spare, but his attitude was great, and it was a relief to not have to worry about arranging transportation on my arrival.
We drove down a two-lane highway that was being used as if it had up to five lanes. Here's the best video I got of a typical vehicle passing another. The action starts about half-way through. I believe the honking in cases like this is intended to mean something like "I'm going to pass you no matter the circumstances. So if there's an accident, it will be your fault for not having gotten out of my way." Luckily, Tisya was a relatively conservative driver, so I wasn't overly concerned for our lives.
Although we presumably went from one 'big city' to another through the 'countryside', I could never distinguish the beginning or end of any city, even the largest. The entire highway was crowded on either side with stalls and shops, with only an occasional break. As the sun came up, I did see that there was lots of rice growing along the side of the road though. Ok, I guess in those pictures I can tell we're not in a city - but it felt like the road was developed from one end to the other.
Here's a typical vendor along the way. The little pottery bowls are for placing oil and a wick to make lanterns for Vesak. The hanging lanterns in the background are also for this festival, celebrating the Buddha's birth, enlightenment, and parinirvana (or death.) More on Vesak later.
A neat looking house we passed.
These are perhaps more typical.
Tisya stopped to show me these giant bats resting for the day in these trees. He called them 'owls'. These things had a wingspan of 3 or 4 feet.
The bats are in the tree in the upper left.
These picture above were taken to either side of a bridge that we crossed. Here's a video where I tried to capture them flying.
We stopped again for a view of Adam's Peak (which Tisya called "Bible Peak"). There is a temple on top with a footprint that Buddhists claim is Buddha's, Muslims claim is Adam's, and Christians claim is St. Thomas's. That's definitely a trip I'll have to take sometime while I'm here.
Not too long after this, we arrived 'home'. Below are my hosts, in whose house I am renting the 'annex'. Rane and Dilani. Rane is a Professor Emeritus of Civil Engineering at the neighboring Univeristy of Peradeniya, with a PhD from Cambridge. Dilani is a fantastic gardener and cook. She provided me with a tasty chick pea breakfast on my arrival.
Here I am standing awkwardly in front of their beautiful indoor garden. What are you supposed to do with your hands in a picture like this. Nothing feels natural. Finally, below I've provided a tour of the annex where I'm staying. I already have many more pictures and things to tell, but I'm not sure about this whole blogger layout deal. This post was a lot more difficult to create than I had hoped. We'll see what I can come up with next.
Although we presumably went from one 'big city' to another through the 'countryside', I could never distinguish the beginning or end of any city, even the largest. The entire highway was crowded on either side with stalls and shops, with only an occasional break. As the sun came up, I did see that there was lots of rice growing along the side of the road though. Ok, I guess in those pictures I can tell we're not in a city - but it felt like the road was developed from one end to the other.
No comments:
Post a Comment