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My first week in Sri Lanka has been interesting, I definitely had a bit of a culture shock when I arrived and my first impressions were 'What the hell have I come to?'. The drive from Colombo Airport to the house I was staying in near the Elephant orphanage, really opened my eyes. The way people live here is quite unbelievable. I admire them though, they have very little but all look very happy.
I've had an interesting week, some of the highlights were bottle feeding a baby elephant at Pinnewala Elephant Orphanage and having my picture taken with 'Raja', one of the blind elephants. I've stood a few yards away from 86 elephants walking past me to go down and bathe in a river, and its something I don't think I will forget. I even helped muck out the elephant sheds - I won't give you the details on that one but it's something I've got the t-shirt for and won't be doing again! I'm not going to say much about the house I was staying in, let's just say I think some people would be quite proud at how 'basic' I could go and manage to survive the whole experience.
Our shopping visit in the local town was funny, we walked into one shop to buy some beach towels and when we went to pay, we glanced round at the entrance door and there were 30 people stood outside the shop looking in!
Yesterday, we got on a train from Colombo to Hikkaduwa to head to the beach for the weekend. The 2 hour journey cost us 75p in 2nd class, we decided to splash out and upgrade from 3rd class which was 47p! Our hotel last night with en-suite bathroom cost us 10 pounds for the night and it was heaven because for the first time in 8 days we had luke warm hot water in the shower!
The beach is really nice, very sandy and even the water is hot! You get lots of funny old women come along and try to sell you things as you sunbathe. One woman spent 45 minutes showing me everything out of her bag and in the end I caved in and bought a sarong for the equivalent of around 2.50.
We've also heard lots of stories from the local people about what happened when the Tsunami hit here, our tuk tuk driver told us how he was stood on a bus and the water came in and rose to the top of his head in one or two seconds. You can still see the devastation it brought here and years on, people are still trying to rebuild their homes and lives.
We are heading to another beach area today and will be visiting a Turtle sanctuary tonight. We then go back to Colombo tomorrow and Sarah (one of the English girls I met this week) will be heading home whilst I go off sightseeing for a few days before being collected to head to the Children's Orphanage next weekend.
These first two weeks have flown by and I've finally managed to get my pictures up on here, so feel free to have a look. Anyway after my essay, the sun's out and it's 34 degrees here, so I'm gonna head off to catch some rays before we leave.
Hope all is good with you all back at home. x
- comments
Mum Glad to hear you are having a few days of luxury after your basic living!! How are you managing your laundry? No doubt you have got someone to sort it for you! Lol!! The sun is shining here today and Dad has gone off to golf. I am meeting Nikki for breakfast at London Colney and we are having dinner at home this evening-roast lamb!!!!!!!!!!! Don't forget to use plenty of factor 50!! Love Mum and Co.xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Katie The lamb wasnt up to much, dont worry jen, you didn't miss out!! take some more photos of yourself with things and people. i have not seen one of you yet!! i want to see if my tan is better than yours from this boiling hot weather in st.albans :| xxxxx