Sri Lanka weekend - April '08

I spent April 4-6 in Sri Lanka with 3 friends from Target. Sri Lanka is a tiny, tropical island nation off the southern tip of India. It is also a short 90 minute flight from Bangalore.

We arrived in the capital, Colombo late on Friday night April 4. We met our guide Joseph at the airport. The first thing he asked us to do was give his van a push as the starter wasn't working. The rest of the weekend he always parked on a hill. Fortunately in a mountainous country it is pretty easy to find hills on which to park.

The next morning we needed to be up early to get to our first stop, the Elephant Orphanage by 9:30 am to see the elephants getting fed. Since it was a 3 hr drive we had to leave at 6:00. Getting up at 5:00 am did allow me to see the sunrise at our hotel. We were at a beachside hotel. This outrigger canoe was well up on the beach waiting for high tide so the fisherman could put it in.

On the drive to the town of Kandy, where the elephant orphanage is located, we got our first good look at Sri Lanka.

Welcome to the Jungle... I'm the one in the "Indiana Jones" hat. Whenever I wear this hat I want to be referred to as Indiana Balthazor

This was an unplanned elephant ride. Riding an elephant is extraordianarily uncomfortable. We only did the 15 minute ride. A 30 min. and 45 min .option were available. We all agreed 15 min. was plenty for our elephant-unaccostomed asses.

Street scenes and signs can be the most interesting sites. Anyone want to shop at the House of Bag or grab a snack at the Eat Me Food Court?

The elephant orphanage currently has about 70 elephants. The majority of the heard was hanging out in a palm tree grove when we arrived. Soon however it was time for their morning bath and drink.

The elephants bathe in a nearby river. To get to the river they walk down a street of shops to the river bank. I took two videos of the procession. I can't figure out how to rotate the 2nd one so you'll have to look at it sideways.

Elephants eat a lot of wood. Since paper is made of wood pulp it is possible to make paper from all the undigested pulp in elephant poop. Don't believe me. Read the sign...

In manufacturing these are known as raw material and finished goods...


I made a new friend along the way. Isn't he cute. (I think it is a "he", I didn't really do a thorough inspection)

Another unplanned stop was an herb farm. They grow everything from coffee to pineapple, to cinnamon and cardamon. All of which they make into medicinal oils and cooking spices. The guide did tell us that the reason people in India and Sri Lanka eat such spicey foods is that you have to maintain the internal and exteranal temperatures the same or the body gets unbalanced and you will have health problems. Riiigth... By that reasoning everyone in MN should stick to a diet of ice cream and popcicles from Nov. - Apr. I didn't tell him that though.

Lunch was at a restaurant the seems to have trouble keeping track of the calendar.

And then we finally arrived in Kandy. Kandy is a beautiful city in the mountains. The roads in Kandy are almost wide enough to accomodate the busses that routinely travel on them. Usually they were going the opposite direction as us. Since they were bigger we generally had to pull waaaay over to let them by.

A performance of traditional Sri Lankan dances was pretty cool especially the grand finale; fire walking.

This was the downtown shopping bazaar in Kandy. You could find everything from counterfeit Polo shirts to counterfeit Rolexes and even some shoes with an interesting brand name.
By walking next to this Buddhist monk I'm trying to gain total enlightenment on my death bed so at least I'll have that going for me, which is nice.


Finally, a nice hotel. If you are ever in Sri Lanka I highly recommend it. It would probably be easier to find if I could remember the name.

The last stop before returning to Colombo was an incredible botanical garden just outside Kandy.


The trees and bamboo grow incredibly large in tropical climates.

Apparently this guy lounging in the middle of the garden misunderstood "Botanical" as "Bovine" baa-dum-bum.
One section of the garden had a path lined with evergreens that were completely innundated with fruit bats. Each of the dark spots on this tree is bat. Fruit bats are huge. They have a wingspan of around 2.5 feet. They look about twice as large as a pigeon when they fly. We have them in Bangalore too but I've never seen so many at once.

This is a single tree that covers almost 2000 sq meters (that's about 21,500 sq ft to you and me)

On the way back to Colombo the jungle did exactly what I thought a jungle should do; after a hot muggy morning we had an afternoon rain. After the rain the jungle was steaming and clouds rolled over the tree tops.



It was a gret weekend but I guess I got a little tired by the end of 3 full days.

Baked Easter Eggs

A couple days before Easter I had the bright idea to color Easter Eggs (no pun intended). A few fellow Targeteers were interested so I undertook the task of finding the required materials. As with most things unique to America this is more difficult than going to the nearest Target and buying one of the 38 different Paaz Easter Egg decorating kits in the Easter display.

My driver Stephen is a Christian and attends church regularly. Assuming if anyone would know about Easter eggs it would be him I asked on Thursday night "Stephen, do people in India make Easter eggs?" He paused for a few seconds; this should have been my first clue to engage the 'misunderstanding early warning system or MEWS' but I missed my cue. "Yes, yes, Easter egg."

"Good, some of us are going to decorate Easter Eggs at my apartment on Saturday.
I'll need eggs, white vinegar and food coloring. Do you know where to get food coloring?"

Had I been less eager to believe it could actually be this easy I would have recognized that I'd just made Classic Ex-Pat Mistake #4; Trying to put things into context.

"Uh, Fatima Bakery, very famous bakers."
"Ok, so you are going to get food coloring at the bakery. Sounds good."
"Uhh."
This brief exchange is a fabulous example Classic Ex-Pat Mistake #7; Reading between the lines and finding meaning that isn't there.

As a side note, Stephen says "Uhh" a lot. He has many cell phone conversations with another driver Shankar, in which the entire conversation seems to constist of "Uh Shankar, uhh, ahh, naa, ahh, ya-ya, ok." Shankar drives for Todd. I asked Todd once what Shankar says during these conversations. He said it is about the same on his end and he assumed Stephen was saying something more. But back to the Easter Eggs...

Friday morning I gave Stephen the shopping list. This is it verbatim:

4 dozen eggs (48)
Food Coloring / Dye
White Vinegar - It has to be white / clear

Note how I used highly explicit clarifiers to avoid misunderstanding; 4 dozen = 48, coloring is the same as dye, etc. Classic Ex-Pat Mistake #12; Forgetting the law of Synonym Asymetry - don't assume what is a synonym for you is also a synonym for someone in India. Or, if it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, in India its probably a goose.

Everything seemed fine so I settled into work for the day. At 11:30 Stephen came into my office or cabin as it is called here (see what I mean about Synonym Asymetery). He had a cake box in hand and a smile on his face. He opened the cake box to reveal 4 exquisitely decorated, egg-shaped cakes each about 5 times the size of a real egg.

"Did you buy 48 of these," I asked increduliously?
"Yes, Yes. Easter Egg."
"This isn't exactly what I wanted Stephen. I just want to take chicken eggs and turn them colors."
A quick web search produced a nice picture of what I consider to be "Easter Eggs".

"Ooh, ya ya, that different Paul."
"So what do we do," I asked, fully assuming I would be giving Easter egg cake to everyone I knew.

"I return."
"You can return bakery items?" It was at this point that I realized what he was actually telling me when he said 'Fatima Bakery' the day before. I'm slow but eventually I get there.
"Ya ya."
"Ok, so you will return these and get 48 chicken eggs, food coloring and vinegar." Notice how I eliminated all the elaboration, adjectives, clarifiers, and context. Again, a little slow sometimes but eventually the light bulb pops on.

That night I got home and there were 48 eggs in the fridge; food coloing and vinegar on the counter. I don't know what ever happened to the cakes.

So the moral of the story: Eventually I'll learn to just say "Stephen I need 48 eggs, food coloring and vinegar" then close my mouth. I'm virtually positive I'll get 48 eggs, food coloring and vinegar on the first try.

Here's what it was all for... Happy Easter