Sri Lanka 2 - High lands and beaches

Buddhist Temple in Matara 

Greetings from Sri Lanka again,

We left Kandy to head to Nuwara Eliya as previously mentioned. On the second day there we went to a place called Horton Plains, which is a cloud forest about 2000m above sea level. It seems to be the only place in Sri Lanka that has frost. The forest is descended from one of the oldest forests ever known to the earth, so the Sri Lankan forest authority took great care in ensuring that it was protected, which was nice to see. The theory is that when Sri Lanka and India broke off from Antarctica and moved north towards the equator, only this forest remained unchanged over time due to its elevation, where as the lower lying areas changed in accordance to the large temperature increase.

Burning monkeys isn't cool, but it was kind of a cute sign 

We went on a 10k hike through the cloud forest and saw some incredible views of the area. One place in particular, called the "edge of the world" reminded me of something you would see in Avatar or the Last Airbender; it was really cool.

Looking down a 1000 foot cliff

Panoramic view of the worlds end cliff

It's the end of the world as we know it, and I feel fine

Didn't see too much wildlife save for some wild deer. One of them had been tamed to the point of not being afraid of humans, so I got my picture taken with it. It's funny, because in the US when we see a deer we think about what a nuisance it is, where here we were all taken aback with it's beauty. It was different than American deer in that it had a much thicker coat, so that was neat.

Another part of the hike included a fairly large water fall called Baker falls. I've seen plenty of waterfalls in my life but this one was unique mainly because of the tropical vegetation around it; giant ferns and small palm trees. It was like something you see in the movies, or on that TV show "Lost" that was on a years ago.

Baker Falls

The following day we headed down to Matara and Polhoma beach. This place is great. We get served fresh fruit every day, and we walk about 5 minutes to a beach that is right on a coral reef. We spent most of our first day here snorkeling and looking at some really amazing fish.

Breakfast featuring Papaya, Mango, Pineapple, Bananas, and juice containing all of these things. 

Buddhist temple on an island near our hotel

Bird Bath at our hotel 

We were having lunch by the ocean yesterday and we saw a whole bunch of crabs crawling around the rocks near where we sat. Then out of nowhere a giant Monitor lizard came up and started chasing the crabs for his meal. It was quite a surprise, but I'm slowly getting used to the fact that big creatures will show up randomly here on this island.

Surprise lizard

Today and tomorrow we will snorkel some more (and try to avoid sunburn) and then we'll be heading back to Ngumbo (where the trip started) and staying a night to get ready to get back on the plane to head to Georgia, and back to winter. 

Sri Lanka 1 - Escape from Hoth

Coconut Palm Tree in Kandy

პრივეტ (privet, hello) from Sri Lanka!

After waiting for what seemed like eternity in the cold winter of post soviet Georgia  I finally got onto an airplane and made my way to Sri Lanka, land of milk and honey (well, papaya and sea food). It's been so wonderful to get out of the cold and finally get to eat fresh fruit and fish again.

On the 10th we went from Tbilisi to Dubai, where we had a bit of a layover. Gina (person I'm traveling with) and I ended up taking about a 3 hour nap on the floor of the Dubai airport, which was tough since the Islamic call to prayer would blare over the loud speakers and wake us up. It was really neat seeing all the different Islamic dresses in the airport. On the flight (fly Dubai) they had a safety and security video that was done with Arabic cartoons, and it was funny seeing the characters of the Islamic world doing airplane safety things like fastening their seat belts and not smoking.

View from plane flying into Dubai. It's a very large city. 

We got in at about 5:00am and changed our currency, and went outside to catch a Tuk-tuk to our hostel (a tuk-tuk is a 3 wheeled motor taxi, kinda like what you'd picture in Indiana Jones movies). It was weird to see the sun rise at 6:10am (in Georgia now it rises at about 8:30), and there were many birds and monkeys screeching. We got to the hostel in Ngumbo and I took a nap after being awake really for about 48 hours. After I woke up we went to the beach where we took a walk and saw some pretty sweet Oruwa boats on the beach.

 Later that afternoon we went along one of the boardwalks in Ngumbo and had ourselves some fresh fruit juice from one of the local vendors, made for us right on the spot (we had anoda juice). After not having real juice in almost 10 months, it was a real treat; not to mention that it was a type that we don't really get in the USA. It's also here that I found out that in Sri Lanka, everything is REALLY INEXPENSIVE.

A picture of the types of fruit we have available in Sri Lanka. 

That night I indulged myself and had a seafood platter that had 3 lobster tails, 2 crabs, calamari  shark, shrimp, and some other type of fish along with fries and salad. This is great because I'm scared to eat the seafood in Georgia given the pollution levels of the country. All for about $14 US. Did I mention that everything is very inexpensive here?

Yes please. 

The following day we set out to Kandy. We took a very crowded bus to get there from Ngumbo. Before we got there we stopped off to take a look and then ride some elephants, which was actually pretty hard to do given how wide they are. It would have helped to have done some stretching before hand, but it was still fun. The money went to helping rehabilitate and protect them from poachers, so I didn't feel too bad about exploiting them for our tourist purposes.

Finally we made it to Kandy, which is where there is a large temple devoted to the Buddha's tooth, recovered after his cremation (it's the left incisor in case you're wondering). This is a very sacred site to Buddhists, and there were many items of devotion surrounding it. There we also a lot of monkeys, but we couldn't take pictures of them because they were angry, and there were lots of them. Oh well. 

Tooth Temple

Moonstone leading to the Tooth Temple

That evening we walked about 3K around the lake at Kandy, and it finished in a nice sunset over the lake. We stopped and got fresh Mango with chili powder sprinkled on it. I had never had that before, but it was delicious. I definitely recommend it.

On the top of the right mountain you can see a large statue of Buddha. 

Today we went to Nuwara Eliya and to a tea plantation near by where we got to take a tour of the place and see how tea was made. I learned all kinds of things about the qualities of tea and how they differ depending on where they are grown, it was really neat! And of course at the end we got to try the tea for free, so that was nice. I had 3 cups, all with great satisfaction. I bought some tea for my host family and my director, so it'll be nice to have a present coming back.

Tea plantation and their own hydroelectric plant (it's an eco friendly operation)

Me drinking Tea at the end of the tour 

We're in the highlands of Sri Lanka, so they sell all kinds of fantastic rip off clothing here. I did some shopping and bartering and was able to get a 2 layer North Face Jacket for about $50 bucks, and it included a balaclava , since even though I'm warm now, I know it's gonna be cold as balls when I go back to Georgia. 

Tomorrow we go on a hike, and then we're going down to the white sand beaches of southern Sri Lanka.

If you can't tell, I highly recommend this country as a place to visit.

The Georgian Epiphany

Happy Holidays!

Yesterday was Christmas #2 here in Georgia. Part of being on the orthodox calendar means that some of our holidays aren't exactly in line with what I'm used to in America. We also celebrated catholic christmas, but just with a supra with lots of drinking (read, just another day).

Once the new year came, we had a pretty large supra (which featured my pulled pork BBQ) and then we went from neighbor to neighbors houses having mini-supras. It all meant a good amount of drinking, and saying the same toasts, but it was fun. then at about 4:00am we stopped going to houses and came back to my house, where we danced for about an hour before I passed out.

The hangover was such that I couldn't get out of bed until 7:00pm the following day. My host family found it quite entertaining.

Here are some of the differences in US holidays and Georgian holidays:

• Georgia has two new years celebrations, January 1st and January 14th. The days in between are the epiphany. 
• Georgians also celebrate Chinese new years, but on January 1st. This year is the year of the snake, so we gave some money to a toy figure of a snake. 
• Because it's the year of the snake, my family didn't set off fireworks because "snakes don't like them". 
• At midnight on December 31st, the eldest son takes a pumpkin, raises it above his head, and smashes it to the ground on the carpet in the living room. In my house the cats then immediately sprang into action to eat some of it. 
• Christmas trees (see below) are new years trees here. 
• Santa clause has the same name here as snow man. 
• On Georgian Christmas we eat a special kind of Khatchapuri that is cheese and boiled egg baked inside of bread, and lots of butter. It was yummy. 

Me and the kids in front of the New Years tree. The kids are the ones who do the decorating here

A selection of the ornaments used

The finished Christmas / New Years tree. Not bad. 

On one day One of my students asked me to come to her house to install some English language software to help her learn more. I asked my host brother Tedo how long it would take to get there, and he said it'd just be about 20 minutes. 

An hour later and 2,000 feet higher, we finally arrived and I suppose I had my own form of epiphany with regards to how people behave in school. The distance that some of these kids have to walk to school each day is incredible, and so it's no wonder that they want to talk and socialize throughout class; it's impossible to go to a friends house after school without hiking a tremendous distance, and probably not being able to make it home that night. While this doesn't explain the rampant cheating, it does explain some of the other behavior. Myself I am impressed that these kids make it to school as much as they do. 

Oh also this, we went to another Peace Corps volunteers site after new years to a supra, and I was able to get some pretty sweet video of my friend Mark downing a large horn of wine in one go. Also he said some pretty good toasts about thanking the family, and having a good new years. 

I head to Sri Lanka tomorrow, so I'm excited to get out of the cold and go somewhere warm for awhile. I hope that I'll be able to take lots of pictures to show everyone.