Dear all,

I've just had a look over the last entry to get an idea of where I can go with this and found a string of comments proving that this is in fact being read by more than just my parents and co-volunteers. Now that I've got over the shock and had a soothing cup of coffee I'll get down to it. Seriously though, I just love the attention.

So let's talk for a wee while about what is arguably one of the most important factors of any trip abroad - food. Perhaps some of you will have seen the photo of the sensationally purple yam in the album "The first Sri Lanka batch" and will have no doubt have had the same apprehensions as I did. I'm sure that to a colour-blind person it would've had no less appeal than any of the other dishes we've been served but I personally found it a little too overpowering. That said, it tasted just like a hard potato and went pretty well with chilli paste. I actually hadn't realised until recently but we get very little meat in our diet and only the occasional fish. Now in Scotland I was a carnivore through and through but the lack of meat hasn't really effected me much which has made me realise just how easy it would be to become a vegetarian here with no shortage of lentil dhal and a wide variety of vegetables. I do occasionally get a craving for a good beef stake though.

With our breakfast we always get a cup of tea, Sri Lanka style. This means lots of milk and five teaspoons of sugar in a 150ml cup - a fact that is obviously unconnected with Sri Lanka's incredibly high rate of diabetes. So if we want a cuppa that doesn't bear a striking similarity to condensed milk we have to do it ourselves. Fortunately we have procured a bag of 'the finest Ceylon tea money can buy' by which I mean 'the finest Ceylon tea that our limited budget can buy'. The Tittigalle tea fields enclose the school of the same name on two sides so we can keep an eye on our source during our twice weekly commute. I won't try to describe the taste to you, I'll leave that to the tea tasters - a career as revered in Sri Lanka as wine tasting is in France. So just take my word for it, Tittigalle tea is goooood. I'm afraid it beats Twinnings hands down.

I have to say that I prefer working at Tittigalle compared with UMV and it's not just down to the tea.It's a lot smaller with only 120 pupils split across eight grades so we can interact with the pupils a lot better and have a bit more fun with activities like 'Prepositions Simon Says'. Put the book on your table, under your table, beside your table, above your table. The kids there also seem to look forward to our lessons, often begging us as we pass their room to come in. That's not really surprising though when you consider the attitude to work. In all the time I've been there there's only been one occasion when the grade 5 teacher hasn't been absent and on one day we arrived to find that out of the eleven members of staff, only six were present. The teachers are all really friendly though and we've even been invited to the depute principles house for lunch and have met his wife, son and several of the extended family.

Things at UMV are progressing fine. We've began splitting each of our classes into three so that Jo takes those who struggle the most while Herbie and I take the crème de la crème in two groups that we've fondly named M.E.A. and H.E.A. That's Michael and Herbie's Elite Associates. Jo has found that her group are far more likely to volunteer answers and our pupils enjoy the opportunity to stretch. We're also making use of my latest project, a set of spreadsheets which I've loaded with the English curriculums for each grade so that we can easily see what each class has been taught and to which extend they have mastered the lesson. Jo in particular has been pleased with this and is glad to see the curriculums she's written be further developed. The school has, however, been rocked by controversy. The Principle, Mr Diratne, has been anonymously accused of corruption so we've had visits from financial auditors who have questioned Jo and the girls over who they pay rent to (they don't, accommodation's provided for us) and who pays their wages (didn't someone tell them what 'volunteer' means?). They also seemed to take umbrage with the fact that the chairs in our English room were painted with the Union Jack by last years volunteers, after receiving permission mind. How terrible, those poor children will no doubt lose all interest in their own culture now that their fragile minds have been tainted by the British flag. All the teachers seemed quite scared by the events and Mrs Jianti, who had kindly agreed to oversee some of the after school clubs, has backed out, fearing for her job. Of course they all had to be axed which has led to a long line of disheartened 9-13 year olds asking almost daily if they can have their clubs back. Unfortunately there's nothing we can do until next week when Carmen Ratnatunga, director of the Senahasa Trust who constructed several of the buildings of UMV, arrives for her annual visit and tries to use her connections in the department of education to allow us to act as overseers for the after school activities.

It's a terrible thing for the younger kids but the senior pupils have simply moved themselves into the adjacent field and enlisted the instruction of their older neighbours, several of whom have revealed experience as rugby coaches. With their help, twice weekly sessions of cricket and rugby have been able to continue. We were particularly delighted when the head boy invited us to join them despite the fact that we were no longer required as coaches. 'As friends' he said. Many of the grade 13s are eighteen like us and it's extraordinary that they can go from being our students last period on a Wednesday to being fellow sportsmen only an hour later.

We're also doing some private tuition classes for the two girls who lodge with our host's mother in the house between ours and the main road. They certainly managed to pick the right place to live with fluent English speakers less than a minute away - and ones who don't mind teaching for free at that. Sachini and Chachini (or Sach and Chach) are both students at UMV but aren't in any of the grades that we work with so it's quite good fun trying out activities that we don't normally get the chance to run and at a higher level too. The ominous O-level exams are only weeks away...

Between the teaching we've managed to explore a little more of our surrounding area, taking advantage of the cheap transport to spend a weekend in the coastal town of Mirissa. It's a small village described by the 'Lonely Planet' guide as "Unawatuna fifteen years ago" and it didn't disappoint. If you see any pictures of Unawatuna beach online you'll most likely find a strip of glorious untouched beach but the reality is that these pictures were taken some time ago. The reality is that this description better fits Mirissa which has evaded the numerous bars and beach side cafés that crowd Unawatuna's shore. As for accommodation we declined the cripplingly expensive western hotel and instead opted for a home made tree-house in the front garden of a local family. It was only the one room plus a bathroom but that didn't at all subtract from the awesome that was living in at tree-house. We couldn't have been happier with our choice by the time evening came but I suppose when you pay the equivalent of £6 for four people for one night you should expect a little imperfection. That came in the early hours of the morning when the roof suddenly sprouted a leak during the monsoon rains - right above where I was sleeping. Now I'm fairly well acquainted with camping outdoors but I've never had to deal with a trickle of water directly over my face. The experience had however equipped me with a tolerance of hard sleeping surfaces so I was able to nod off on the wooden floor under the bed where I could escape the drips that I now realised were widespread in the room and still have the protection of the mosquito net hanging from the ceiling. But don't let me put you off, there are still few places so cool where you can stay the night. What also made it worth the trouble was having the opportunity during breakfast the following morning to watch a bird excrete onto Emma. It's amazing how the misfortunes of a friend can bring a smile to your face.

Even closer to home is the town of Galle which we occasionally visit for food shopping,household necessities or marriage proposals (At least I think that's what it was. In broken English a rather insistent tuk-tuk driver invited me to his house for tea and two words that he definitely repeated several times were 'daughter' and 'marry'. This guy was only about 28 himself. I thanked him for his kind offer and casually walked/ran back to the bus station). We've now had the chance to see the main attraction, Galle Fort, as well as journey a little deeper into it's side-streets. Galle Fort was built by the Dutch colonialists during their visit to the island and it's interior is markedly different to the rest of the town. Now although it's called a fort, that really only describes the perimeter wall as the inside comprises of shops, café's and guest-houses much like you'd see anywhere else. What sets it apart is the architecture which is typical of Europe during that era. It felt as though we'd stepped into another town and even brought up images of the Wild West. Outside the fort we were stopped by a pedestrian who, as is fairly common, asked us of our country and of our destination. Upon hearing that we were simply out to explore the town he delighted in leading us to a crafts factory far from the bustling main street that we would never have found out about without help. It was his mother's place of work, he explained, where she made lace and the management employed a man to provide tours for curious passers by. Have you ever thought about how you would make a piece of lace by hand? Seeing the weavers in action was astounding - without looking at what they were doing they threw their numerous bobbins about in what I recognised to be a repeated sequence but couldn't have hoped to imitate. The factory also processed semi-precious gems and used them to produce jewellery and ornaments while another department made fantastic dyed batiks. Of course, everything we saw was done by hand. Impressive.

The October holiday then arrived which allowed us to travel a little farther afield, catching a train from Colombo the area known as the 'Cultural Triangle'. This incorporates the ancient cities of Anuradhapura, Polonaruwa, Dambulla and Kandy and boasts wonders like the largest dagoba in Sri Lanka and the largest brick building in the world, another dagoba with 19 million bricks. Polonaruwa had it's own way of making us fall in love with it when we spotted a herd of elephant across the reservoir. A group of the ever friendly locals helped us to draw the attention of two fishermen who paddled over and agreed to take us across the water for a small fee. I'm sure the elephant watching tours provided in bulk for the tourist industry are also fascinating but I doubt they could match the excitement of being slowly transported in a rickety canoe without the constant drone of a Jeep engine. To pass the time on our journey we got out the camera and made a mini documentary about our trip, Sri Lanka in general and, of course, elephants. Will you get to see it? Unfortunately this website limits your videos to ten minutes but I'll see if a link to youtube offers an alternative. Polonaruwa also had it's set of monastic ruins which we explored by bicycle. If you ever have the choice between a motorised or pedal-powered tour I'd definitely recommend the latter. Things we would have missed out on were a herd of deer running across our path who would have made haste long ago had they heard an engine, and watching a group of monkeys investigate the human technology that is the bike. From a distance we photographed them trying to suss out our water bottle and eventually moved in to reclaim our transport and move on. That was when we realised that the sun cream was missing and that it was in the clutches of a monkey sitting only a few feet away. Hoping that it would drop it in surprise we gave chase but were outsmarted only a short distance into the jungle when the thieving primate jumped into the upper reaches of a tree where it proceeded to bash and gnaw at our property while we were forced to watch. This was rather unwise, as the sun cream we'd taken came in an aerosol can and if it managed to get it's teeth through the outer casing the blast would have likely taken it's head off. Not that I would wish that or anything... It seemed that the monkeys patience outmatched our own so, thoroughly disappointed, we slouched back to our bikes and made our way to the next ruined statue or temple or whatever. It was only an hour or so later that we passed the area on our way back to base camp and found a rather scratched but intact sun cream nestled on the forest floor. We win this time monkey, and you get to keep your head.

Even when we're in Unawatuna we can never be bored, we of course celebrated Halloween in it's true manner with 'pin Unawatuna on the map of Sri Lanka', bobbing for apples, eating doughnuts off a string and costumes. Fearing that our neighbour, Mr Diratne, wouldn't appreciate door-to-door guising we congregated in Erin and Emma's house to perform our party pieces. We may not have had mountains of sweets and an unlimited supply of fake blood but the folk stories, magic tricks and songs that were provided more than made up for it. My audience participation rendition of 'King Caractacus' seemed to go down well enough. Our festivals aside, we were a little unsure about the traditional perahera that wound it's way down Matara Road this week. We were impressed by the costumes and the dancers but were a little disturbed by the men barely older than ourselves who were led about by a leash attached to several hooks put through the skin on their backs. Another performer posed in front of us with what looked like hypodermic needles piercing through the skin all along his arms. Not my cup of tea but if we can dress up as witches I guess they can have their perahera...

I would say that we're coping well with our new culture though and the babble that used to tumble from the local's mouths is starting to make a little sense. I was immensely proud of myself (maybe a wee bit too much) for managing to ask a tailor to fix a pair of ripped shorts in Sinhala. Not an outrageously complex dialogue but I managed "Can you fix it?", "How much?" and "Tomorrow?". I just hope they understood because I was saying it right and weren't guessing from the fact that I was waving a broken item of clothing in front of them and grunting. I thoroughly enjoyed the thunder and lightening that graced Unawatuna with it's presence recently. Louder than anything I'd heard at home, I was quite in awe until I remembered the unreliability of our electrical wiring which sometimes sparks at us when we flick a switch so as the storm drifted directly overhead I knocked all the plugs out of the wall, with a long wooden broom handle. Sorry what? With a broom handle. I beg your pardon? OKAY OKAY, WITH A BROOM HANDLE! Don't laugh at my paranoia, you don't know what it's like! I'm sure that I won't mind it at all by next August. But there are some things that I don't think I'll ever get used to, one being waking up to find a mysterious object on top of the mosquito net over my bed. The atmosphere tense, I slowly reached to retrieve it... and whipped my hand away when I found that it was quite a bit furrier than the paper bag that I'd thought it was. Climbing on a chair for a better view revealed that what I'd just grasped was a dead bat. It was a good start to the day. It's now been removed and I'm hoping that that's as bad as it will get, at least the snake that traversed our rafters last week was alive. That gave Herbie a fright I assure you, but he's all ok now that he's hit the big 18 and has developed the fearlessness that all we adults have. I'd forewarned him that the morning of his birthday might come as a bit of a shock as he is overcome with the glut of knowledge and understanding that eludes children until they join the ranks of adulthood. He seemed to cope with it pretty well.

And so concludes the second instalment to Michael's blog. Feel free to pass it around as much as you'd like and don't forget to tune in next time for a little bit of Auld Lang Syne and to find out 'who said moo?'

Wishing you all the best (and please send over some snow if you have any going spare),

Michael