Colombo, Sri Lanka Feb. 20, 2007

Hello from Sri Lanka! Hot, noisy, peaceful, frustrating and fascinating!! What a wonderful day we had. We all wish we could have stayed longer. A surprise to me. I never thought that looking at all our ports of call that this one would be so outstanding. Colombo, the capital of Sri Lanka, has a population of 2.2 million people!! People have been using Colombo as an important port city since the 5th century, when Colombo was important in linking East and West. The Dutch used the town for trading with rich cinnamon plantations in the 17th century. Sri Lanka gained it's independence in 1948. Outside of Colombo, is a town called Kandy. It is prime jungle territory, full of snakes, swinging vines etc... Many of the old Tarzan movies were filmed here. We did not have enough time to go to Kandy, but when we come back we will. I hope!! Also, in Kandy is a sacred tooth relic of the Buddha. It is kept behind closed doors and in a gold shrine. They bring it out in July and parade it around on top of an elephant. Anyone thinking of coming to Sri Lanka may want to consider July, so you can see this happening. It is a HUGE celebration. It is said that the tooth was plucked from Buddha at his funeral in 543 BC!!! Although Buddhaism is the major religion here, they also have some Hindu, Muslims, Protestants and Roman Catholics. Markets and shops are everywhere. We went to a really nice store that was like an upgraded Pier 1 and then we went to Pettah. Pettah is an area of narrow streets with every little type shop imaginable. They have everything from belts to buttons to skirts to shirts to caps to cats to spices to linens, it went on and on. The currency here is called rupees the exchange rate was 103 rupees to one dollar! We toured in a nice van most of the day but after shopping and sweating through our clothes a few times in the markets, we opted for a 3-wheeler ride back to our van that was about 7 blocks away. The traffic is so bad here that parking is impossible. Our driver knew of "wide spots" to park but still required walking as they were few. Crossing a street here was a harrowing experience. I felt like the frog in the game "Frogger". Busses were zooming past, 3-wheelers going in and out at high speeds, motorcycles swerving to miss you, it was out of control! One good thing was Kathleen's blonde hair. Most people were so surprised to see a blue eyed blonde in the market area that they slowed done enough that we were not killed! Although our day was fun and safe (sort of), this country has much unrest. Their military soldiers were seen on every street corner with automatic rifles, sometimes behind bunkers. There is violence here between the government and a group called the LTTE (Tamil Tigers). This sometimes results in attacks of the city, mostly with car bombs. We found the Sri Lanka people to be very friendly and peaceful. It is a shame that they have to live with such fear of attacks. Their agreement to end fighting is due to end tomorrow. I will be watching the news we get here to see if there are any problems. I hope not. It is really a beautiful place. Have a look at our adventure.

This is at the port. As you can see they are thriving in exporting goods. They export spices and coconuts.

When we first got off the ship there were people selling goods right on the pier. They are smart. They know that some people don't go on tour and some of the ship staff do not have time to go, so they set up easy shopping for these visitiors. This is Kathleen with our friend Lisa from the ship trying on a silk Sari.

Our guide was Vemal. He is a Buddist. We wanted to see the temple he "belonged" to. He took us. You are not allowed to wear shoes into the temple. Not good news for Nicholas. He asked for a locker, as he did not want someone to take his shoes!! He loves his new Nike tennis shoes and did not want to trade them for someone's sandals. He/we all put our shoes in locker # 23. We chose that one because it was one of few that had numbers on them.

Inside the temple, there were many Buddhas. Buddhas can be in different positions. A meditating Buddha is what you see here. We also saw a teaching Buddha here.

You are not allowed to turn your back to the Buddha and have your picture taken. What we are looking at are the offerings of flowers, rice and water that people had been by for morning prayers and put on the altars.

I was surprised this monk let us take his picture with Nicholas but he seemed happy about it and so were we.



The temple has it's own elephant. It eats over 200 pounds of food a day. You can see in this picture a man with his hand in the elephant's mouth. That is his job. He stands there all day and feeds the elephant. Those tusks were pretty intimidating.

You can see that Kathleen was the only one of us brave/crazy enough to get close enough to "pet" him! She survived. No crazed elephant story to report, thank goodness.

This is a sacred shrine inside the open aired temple. Inside this shrine there are relics of well thought of monks. None from the Buddha.

All these Buddha's were a gift from Thailand to Sri Lanka.









Kathleen outside the upgraded Pier 1. It was a beautiful shop. MANY bargains to be had there.

We had to keep touring so shopping was limited!! I liked it for the airconditioning and beautiful clean restrooms as well!

They did not steal our shoes!! As a matter of fact, it looks like nobody but the Welden's used a locker!

This cannon was left over from their Dutch days.

This was a shocking sight for us. Their twin towers. Not nearly as beautiful or as tall as the twin towers we lost on 9/11, but a very quick flashback for Charles and me.

The US embassy. Could not see much. Mostly a wall. A lot of security. We were happy to know they had one.

I did not know if I would ever see a sign like this again, had to take a picture. I don't know if any of you at home are looking for colleges for your daughters right now....

My biggest disappointment of the day. This is Independence Hall. Looks kind of see through doesn't it? This is where the "cobra man" is everday playing his flute and charming a snake out of a basket. We looked for him and asked many people. The story went that he made enough money the day before that he did not come to "work"!! Our luck it was the cobra man's day off! I felt like the Griswald's when Wallyworld was closed! I had to settle for a postcard of a cobra man. Our guide assured me I will see a cobra in India. I'm counting the days!!

Who knew that Feb. 20th is St. Bridgette's Feast Day?? Guess what, this is St. Bridgette's convent and private school. It was beautiful. They were having a celebration at 5:30p.m. but our ship sailed at 5:00p.m. Missed that too!

LUNCH TIME!!! Everybody dig in. After you figure out what you have here.










Kathleen and Nicholas are tryng to decide what they have in front of them The national food here is rice. They give you a lot of rice! Eating on a banana leaf. On the left is a fish ball, lots of peppers in the middle, some chicken and a hard boiled egg with more hot sauce on it!!

Happy to find out that chicken was spicy but good. See the 2 Sprites that Kathleen had to have to cool off her tounge!
Off to the narrow streets and markets. We did not buy anything in these pictures but looked at many things and bought a lot of other stuff. Don't know why we didn't take pictures of that stuff!! We will get better at this.

One man thought Kathleen wanted to buy a kitten, so he "caught" this one for her! YIKES!! He waas really skinny and scared. Look carefully and you can see him clawing the sidewalk! We hope he finds a nice family. We already have a cat.

One smart thing we have been trying to buy everywhere is a flag from every country we go to. The sun was setting as we were leaving Sri Lanka and Kathleen was freshly showered. I made her go out on the balcony and wave goodbye with her flag. There was a "pilot" boat escorting our ship out of the port. The military men on that boat saw her with that flag and went crazy. They were jumping and shouting, we could not understand but when they blew us a kiss and gave us a salute, we knew it was their way of saying thank you for liking our country. They are beautiful people and were very kind to us.

Goodbye Sri Lanka, hello Indian Ocean again. We are at sea until we arrive on Saturday morning, Feb. 24th at 9:00a.m. in Singapore, Singapore! Three sea days. Pray for smooth seas, as we will be in some of the most traveled ocean area in the world, we will pass many ships in the night, for 3 nights!! I will post happenings at sea if we have exciting news. I do know that tomorrow night we are going to a star gazing session with our guest lecturer, Jon Lomberg. Check out his webpage, he is amazing and our new friend. He is Nicholas' new trivia partner! He knows how to surround himself with Dartmouth graduates and astronomers!! Jon's webpage is http://www.jonlomberg.com/ We have been to all his lectures and they have been fascinating.