The deiters had a "Lanka-fun" In Sri Lanka

 

Hey all, hope you guys are doing well and are staying out of all those storms. We are currently enjoying the height of luxury at the Double Tree in Goa India. Tash got it for free on points and it has completely ruined us. Down comforters, high speed internet and the best shower I've had since we left the states, getting back out on the backpacker trail is gonna be rough. India's been wild and we'll tell you all about it real soon. Till then here is a Sri Lankan breakdown complete with pic's and vids. Lastly we want to wish a belated happy birthday to My Aunt Tete. For those who don't know, she was a great nurse, she always got me the biggest pile of presents at Christmas, and She is an avid reader of our little blog. Happy Birthday Tete! Love Sean and Tash.

 

 

After another stop in our favorite south east asia transit city Kuala Lumpur (we spent a night this time, a Japanese man stole my flip flops for a brief period, not much else happened) we landed in Colombo in Sri Lanka. We were brimming with excitement because we felt like this next leg of our trip through Sri Lanka and India will be totally different than anything we have ever done. Whether it’s the culture, cuisine, people, customs you name it, we are fired up to experience something totally new. After landing in Colombo we made our way to our guest house and dropped our bags before walking down to the beach to see the Indian Ocean around sunset. It was sort of brownish because the water was a little rough but it was beautiful. Kids played on a fishing boat and hundreds of crows flew by in huge flocks before shooting down into the trees all at once. Once the sun dipped down we headed back home and had some homemade “rice and curry” which is Sri Lanka’s main traditional dish. Essentially you get a bowl of delicious curry with your meat of choice and several other side dishes that can change based on what is available to the chef at any given time. We were treated to shredded beets (way better than it sounds) Abrugine (an eggplant mix) Dahl (a lentil mash mix) and some Jasmin rice. It was absolutely out of this world and dethroned the F.O.B sandwich from way back in Rarotonga as the best thing we have eaten on the trip so far. After some wine on the balcony we had a good night sleep before starting our journey down the south western side of the island, around the southern tip before heading up into the central highlands and back to Colombo. This first leg had us taking a train south. Buses were also available but our hostel manager/awesome curry chef friend advised us that the train was a pleasant and scenic way to head down to our initial destination, a beach town called Unawatuna (it means no worries). On the way to the train station we were giddy as a walk through a market provided an into to Sri Lanken Market culture which differs from other market cultures in the apparent goal is to berate potential customers through rickety loud speakers until they rush into your stall like its black Friday at best buy. Because we are white and therefore rich as hell and probably dumb to boot our presence kicked these dude’s into overdrive. I’m sure I will come to loathe this ritual (especially if I have to face it with a hangover) but for now it was new and quaint.  At the train station we had a few firsts. We got our first “short eats” which are fried little mystery treats sold anywhere and everywhere, some are spicy, some have egg, or potato, or who knows. If you’re hungry you buy like 4 or 5 for a dollar and hope you get lucky, which most of the time you do. Another hilarious note about short eats is that they are sold in sheets of what is clearly someone’s homework stapled into a bag shape. (and you thought you were recycling by separating out the plastic and glass? Step it up a notch America) The next first was an introduction to the very modest Sri Lankan/Indian dress code. A woman walked by Tash with her 12 year old son who was staring at her like she was washing a car in a wet t-shirt and daisy dukes (early 90’s rock video style). The woman was so thrown off by the sight of tash’s shoulders that she literally covered her sons eyes with her hand and crossed the street. When the train came people boarded in a manner similar to getting on the last life boat on the titanic. It was a knife fight, and it was made infinitely more difficult by our big bulbous bags. The ride was beautiful…we’re told…but as we stood the whole 4 hours our view was limited. What we did see was a hilarious parade of touts who thought that a jam packed standing room only train was the best place to sell goods ranging from fried shrimp to comically large (like 5 foot long) balloons (“ya know what I could go for right now, a huge balloon”) All’s well that ends well however and before long we ended up on the beach in beautiful Uniwatuna. We found a pretty good room right off the main drag and settled in for 2 days of sun and fun. Activities included eating our first “kotthu roti” where a big piece of roti bread is frantically chopped up on a griddle and mixed in with chicken and veggies and cheese. It is fantastic and the roti chopping process reminded us of how they chop up cheese steaks in our fair Philadelphia. We also saw a turtle while swimming in the ocean before stopping for a libation at a beach bar and meeting our first American friend of the trip. Her name is Jill and she is from NYC and we had a blast together. We laid on loungers drinking beers and swimming while touts went by offering a bunch of stuff you don’t want (what, no balloons?) The strangest was an old man who grabbed tash’s feet and with great concern offered a massage that would reduce “the water in your feet” which if left untreated would be fatal. Tishy’s ankles we’re a little swollen from all the standing/travel, and when I disagreed with his prognosis, he brushed me off like an attending physician saying, “I’ve been doing this massage for thirty years” with an ominous (she’s not gonna make it style) shake of his head. His credibility was undercut later that evening when he came to our dinner table on the beach and asked very politely if we wished to purchase a whole range of street drugs (note to future employer’s and our mom’s, we said “no thank you”). Our afternoon with Jill soon turned into an evening where we laughed at a 50ish German woman who clearly had taken our masseur friend up on his offer and was dancing like a slow motion version of the wacky inflatable arm flailing tube man that you may have seen outside of a car dealership. We were trying to pin down her age and Jill got the bright idea to go around and ask everybody their age, dutifully recording it in her iphone like it was just “totally normal stuff” until she got to our dancing queen and this super awesome plan completely came off the rails. Apparently they don’t do random informal age surveys in bars where this lady is from. She was less than pleased and made this clear to everybody until whatever “medicine” the good Dr had prescribed got her back into the beat. Her mood improved to the point that later on I would win a free beer from Jill by dancing with this lady for a whole song. After that we ran into some Estonians who had served with the US in Iraq and some interesting/crazy/sad stories. I won’t get on my soap box for more than this sentence but it’s important that we don’t forget about people from tiny countries like Estonia who made tremendous sacrifices on our behalf when we went looking for all those weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.  Anyway, things were going swimmingly until one of the guys got super excited about pictures we were taking on tash’s Iphone. Apparently they register excitement in Estonia by biting things and this dude chomped down on her phone and cracked the whole screen…..and the Estonian-American friendship bridge we were building. It was an accident but still. The next day had us moseying on down the road to a place called Marissa were we went whale watching and saw a turtle, a bunch of dolphins and 3 or 4 huge blue whales. It was amazing, and super cheap at $30 each. The whales are in the area year round and the Sri Lankan’s do a good job of respecting their space so they don’t get spooked and leave. Basically some boat will spot a whale and the rest of the boats will line up on either side of it and chug along as it comes up to breath and shoots off a huge water jet (just like in the cartoons) before diving to find food for like ten minutes. Having completed the main Marissa activity we hopped a bus and headed down the coast to another beach town called Tengale. Upon arrival we conducted and exhaustive search for accommodation on this one stretch of beach that is littered with hotels and restaurants. We haggled a guy down for a room in a place with a beautiful garden and a nice beach bar, but because the grass is always greener we decided to give him a firm maybe and check out some of the other places. After about an hour of searching we decided to book the first room which had of course been snatched from under our noses about 10minutes before we came back. We decided to try our luck in the town proper which is a few minutes from the beach and all’s well that ends well cause we found a great room with an amazingly friendly staff. We spent our time in tangale eating delicious rice and curries from restaurants perched above a different beach across the street from our hotel and sipping wine on our balcony while listening to a remembrance vigil for tsunami victims at a Buddhist temple across the street from our place. At night you had to keep your head on a swivel between sips because giant bats were flying around everywhere, doing their best to protect us from the hoard of mosquito’s intent on Deiter’s for dinner. One day in Tangale we decided to take our lives into our own hands by renting a moped to tour around. We have done this before and find it to be an awesome way to find out of the way spots and activities and generally take in the sights. In Sri Lanka this turned into a white knuckle death ride of giant busses blaring their horns and friendly Sri Lankans “sharing” each others lanes as they loosely observed the speed limit. To add some spice to the journey you also have dogs and giant lizzards who wander on the road to take a nap, blanketed in the knowledge that you’re skilled enough to drive around them. I was less confident in my abilities than they were, I was also not sold the protective value of my plastic street hockey style helmet. But as I always say, we’re Deiters, and therefore indestructible and we survived our journey with minimal trouble, stopping at a beach for a dip and getting some wine at a wine store. A quick note on that. In Sri Lanka “wine stores” are horrible opium den-ish places where the dregs of Sri Lankan society go to exchange an empty pint of moonshine for a full one with vendors who are safely protected from these rogues by big iron bars. Because most Sri Lankans don’t drink and alcohol is prohibited in many places, booze has been pushed down to the social status of liquid meth drank by glassy eyed men with red teeth (from chewing the buzz inducing beetle nut). It’s bizarre, and also hilarious to elbow your way through these walking dead zombies to enquire about which types of red wine are on offer.  On the third day in Tengale we arranged an awesome elephant safari to Uda Walawe national park. Riding up in the afternoon, we passed some trees that were absolutely covered in giant bats before switching into an open top safari vehicle and heading into the actual park. Right out of the gate we drove up on an elephant having a bath beside the road, sucking up water with his trunk and tossing it onto his back. Over the next few hours we would see many more elephants as well as birds, a few jackal, and a crocodile. Or favorite part was by a big lake where a herd of elephants charged into the water and played around before getting out together, trunks blaring as if they were joking about what a great time they just had. After that it was back home for some more rice and curry before packing for the bus up north into the central highlands. The bus was $2 each which is a great bargain for a four hour ride. The downside was that once again we had to stand the whole way which is way harder on the bus on windy mountain roads than it is on the relatively straight railroad. Once again if you wanted a fried shrimp snack, a piping hot chai, or a ridiculously large balloon you could be certain that some tout would be forcing his way through the standing room only crowd to give you whatever you needed. Up and up we went on a winding mountain road until reaching our destination in a town called Ella, which is a fun little place with some good eats and many hikes into the surrounding mountains. Our guest house was also home to the number one restaurant on trip advisor which was convenient and the owner was another in the long line of super friendly Sri Lankans that we have met. Honestly the delicious food and the friendly people have been the two things to really stood out about Sri Lanka for us Deiters. As for Ella we spent our days hiking up into the mountains and our nights relaxing on our porch with a bottle of red wine. One hike took us up “little Adams peak” where the weather was very cooperative and we got great panoramic views of the countryside that stretched out all the way down to the sea. Another day we hiked up to a place called Ella Rock which turned out to be a big sweeping hillside that reminded me a bit of something from the sound of music. To get there we were told to “hike on the train track” which we thought meant hike on the safe, and clearly marked path next to the train tack but meant hike for 2K on the actual train track including a “Stand By Me” section of elevated bridge. Thankfully the track remained train free and the views were amazing. That night we looked at the rest of our Sri Lankan itinerary and decided to audible and head back down to Unawatuna on the beach rather than extending our time in the north. We figured that some more relaxing beach time would be nice before we headed off to India and most of the north would be similar and probably less spectacular than Ella, with the biggest draw being a temple where they have a tooth from Buddha…seriously…but you don’t even see it cause its locked in like a tiny tooth coffin…so the beach it is. Despite some backtracking this turned out to be a great decision. We stayed at a hostel with a beautiful courtyard and a pool and were made to feel like family by Melanie and Christian who owned the place. We made quite an entrance when the tuk tuk driver tried to double the agreed upon fare and Tash and I gave him a verbal thrashing as Melanie and Christian awkwardly stood by holding our welcome flower Lei’s. They took it in stride though and would later treat us to a free cooking class after I schooled Melanie’s little brother in badminton.  We also met a couple of cool ladies from Finland who have traveled extensively and were great fun (one was a NICU nurse).The place was so relaxing that we only left once to go into a neighboring town called Galle where we walked along an old fort by the Sea at sunset and had a delicious dinner at a family run restaurant where mom came out of the kitchen to make sure everyone enjoyed their meal. The three days in Unawatuna were lazy and relaxing and a perfect cap to our time in Sri Lanka. After that it was back to Colombo for one last rice and curry and our flight to India. Sri Lanka was a wonderful and interesting addition to our trip and featured some of the best food and friendliest people we have met in our travels. What's more they found it in their hearts to upgrade us to Business class on the way to India. Well done Sri Lanka

 

Tash in Unawatuna

our room complete with mosquito net

Me dancing with the Old German lady

A blue whale

A pretty beach, too rough for a swim

a panorama with tash

A sweet hammock that tash got stuck in.

 

Our first Sri Lankan Sunset

Rice and Curry

The rice and curry Chef/hotel owner

"Short eats" in a stapled together homework bag

Fried shrimp and stuff on the Train

The beach in Unawatuna

I caught a hermit crab

Me and our friend Jill

An island off Marissa

Dolphins

The beach in Tengale

Dog's on Blogs- I named this guy Johnny Football

Another beach in Tengale

A big ole' Lizzard

Mmmmmmmm trash

"Is this helmet on right?"

A beach in Tengale with a shrine to the Tsunami victims

Another rice and curry

The courtyard of our hotel in Tengale

Those are all bats

Me and tish on Safari

An elephant taking a bath

Same

Same

A peacock

Another elephante'

Now with tish

Elephants in the lake

Same

And again

Same

This is when they were coming out of the water

This is my new exercise plan

Dogs on Blogs

Me with a pregnant cow

Mountains around Ella

A man working at a tea plantation

That little ribbon is the road we drove in on

Me on a mountain

Now with tish

Same

Black and white tish

Makin friends with a cow. Note the handprints on the top and side. This cow had been recently decorated for a ceromony

Finally a sign that makes sense

Kohttu Rotti

Tish enjoying a cocktail

Dogs fighting right in front of us

Then makin' up

Time for an eyebrow trim?

They ironed all of our clothes to dry them and they came back HUGE!

Me and tish on Ella Rock

A waterfall from Ella rock

Another rice and curry

The flip flop guard

A Sri Lankan train

Same

More workers on a tea plantation

A lake in northern Sri Lanka

This is where Buddha's tooth is

A giant Buddha at the train station

Me ordering some breakfast

This is what breakfast came in

the view from the train

I finally gave in and bought a balloon

Pretty sweet huh?

Our last rice and curry

You know what I could go for? A coffee from Strabeans.

This is Melanie's little brother about to open a coconut for the curry

Tash grinding a coconut

Melanie doing the same



Hilarious sleeping Dog on blog 

A cool sunset

Tash making a curry

Melanie and Christian

Our Swedish friends Pia and Nini 

They were so friendly

Right before I taught him a thing or two about badminton

A kid playing cricket

This rug is made our of leftover cookie monster pajamas. I know because I own a pair of them at home. See the eyes? It's a dead giveaway

A colorful temple

More rice and curry- soooooo good

Good ole' Colgard

The number one way to prove you don't belong in Business class is to start taking a bunch of pictures of yourself 

Why yes I will have some more champagne.

Me and a baby goat

Tish waiting for a train

Tish behind the gate in a wine store

A cool tree in the safari park

Standing on the bus

More from Adams peak



Now with tish

A cow we met

Boom

Hillarious

"did I remember to wash my hands?"

"Ahh who cares"

Knuckles spring, perfect for washing down that Knuckle sandwich

Tish on a train

A big spider

a kiss from a cow

Tash getting shoved around on a train

The elephants getting out of the water

and another elephant