February 23, 2019

February 23, 2019
Today, Jim and I did another safari.
We had several strikes against us;
I am still not recovered from my cold
And Jim is now in the throws of it.
At noon, when we left Jim was feeling okay,
(It was the large cold Lion beer I am sure.)
Luckseta picked  us up in his land rover
And off we went.
Jim and I have been spoiled by
The many previous ethical safaris
That we have been on.
This was not the sort we want to be on;
Many, many safari vehicles
Vying to find elephant viewing spots.
However, we made the best of it.
Initially I took all sorts of second rate elephant photos
Until my camera battery died.
Power plugs are different In Sri Lanka.
First you stick a pencil into the top hole of the 220 outlet,
The switch is then unlocked
And you can plug in your recharger.
Then you turn on the wall switch.
I neglected this step and hence
Very soon I had no camera power.
This turned out to be a real blessing.
I let Jim and the many other safari goers
Do the photography,
And I sketched, and observed
And tried to remember everything.
Bumping along through this arid Savannah,
We saw phenomenal trees high above.
With twisted limbs
And trunks of mauve, brown,
White and pale blue,
our trip was worth it just to see the trees.
Many large and small grey rock outcrops
Looked like elephants.
The real elephants were in family group;
A dozen or so females and their calves;
From fuzzy newborns
To midsized males just sprouting tusks.
Occasionally we saw a lone male elephant.
Asian elephants seem to wear their skin
Like drooping, large gray coats.
They scuff up the dry ground
With a front foot and their truck,
And gather enough green to take a mouthful.
Once when a baby elephant got obstreperous,
( or maybe we viewers got too close)
We heard and saw an elephant mom
Give her trumpet roar.
Eventually, Jim started feeling sicker and sicker.
I am sure the jostling vehicle didn’t help.
After arriving back home,
( and another Lion beer each)
Jim went to bed,
And I ate supper for two!

Amazing coincidence

An amazing coincidence!

Yesterday I read a short story called The Captives,from the collection Monkfish Moon by Romeshb Gunesekera. This story is set in Sigiriya, the town we have just arrived at. It is a story about a Sir Lankan guest house manager who is trying so hard to be helpful;  so hard that the two guests feel like captives. Well you guessed it. We have the same guest house owner. He keeps popping by to wipe the table or the door.  While we were eating, he stood beside the table. “Everything is good Madame? You are happy Sir? If you are happy I am happy.”

Before supper, we went out for a walk and he chased us down in his tuc tuc to try to pick us up and show us things.  We persisted in just walking.  Now that we are back sitting on a deck in the jungle,  our fellow popped over to show us the flower of the banana. It’s a dark red pointed globe about ten inches long. “My wife, she cook this for you tomorrow. All natural. Tastes like chicken. Then trying so hard to be helpful and have us like him, he said “ My wife doesn’t speak English but she likes you Madame, like a mother. My mother is very short but she is fat like you!”

Here are a few photos from our walk.  Lion Rock has the remains of a fort on the top and wall frescoes on the way up that were done a couple of thousand years ago. Discovered on 1885, it is now a world UNESCO site. The enormous Buddha, built ten years ago is just standing there in the middle of nowhere. He is guarded by many many life sized statues of monks.  The fence of old metal roofing is my kind of beauty; colour and texture.

February 22, 2019

February 22, 2019

This morning after breakfast,

All packed up,

And sitting on our balcony

Awaiting 10 o’clock and our car.

This is what I saw:

Rusty metal roofs,

Deep shadows and strong sunlight

Interspersed with waving palms

And glow red flowers.

A busy congested uphill street,

Packed with men on motorcycles,

Wearing dress shirts and ties.

Do they arrive at work a sweaty sopping mess?

Ancient old red buses

Squeezing by shiny white modern buses,

All packed with people,

Sometimes scrapping each other.

Huge trucks, carrying 

Enormous black plastic water reservoirs,

Lengths of lumber and poles,

Vegetables, bananas,

Coconuts.

Tuk tuks, dark green, and maroon.

Some with bling, and flower garlands ,

Weave in and out and around

The traffic and the walkers.

And one lone black Brahma cow,

Sauntering.

February 20

Wednesday, February 20, 2019

This is a piece of our view in Kandy from the roof where we have breakfast.  Usually, the little sketches are done really quickly but I spent the entire morning on this one. It started out as the usual plan for a quarter sheet but I was enjoying it so much I just kept going on it. As some of you know, I haven’t been feeling well the past few days. I am back on prednisone and antibiotics for my lungs. Jim has been heading out exploring and I have been painting and resting
And oh yes, I am still enjoying the cold Lion beer.

The other absolutely wonderful thing is that we get several fly-bys a day. At six a.m. the giant bats head from the lake which is to our right up into the jungle on our left for the day. These bats are huge and thankfully herbivores.  An hour after the bats we get huge flocks of large white Ibis leaving the lake which is where they spend the night in trees. They travel the six kms twice a day, returning at five p.m. often accompanied by crows.  Last night was the full moon and so it was a public holiday, Poya, for Buddhists, a day of fasting, and praying. The first full moon of every month is Poya, nothing open and no beer.
( unless of course you are at the Majestic Guest House!)

February 16, 2019

Another fabulous breakfast at our home stay. Today we had stringers, ( a sort of fine extruded rice noodle) both savoury and sweet, with a light potato curry and a nippier coconut chutney. Of course we also had the delicious bananas, watermelon and pineapple. Then our host, Tharanga , took us in his tuk tuk up a very rough winding narrow mountain road for a couple of hours through a tea plantation to a place at the top called Lipton’s seat. Whenever we met a bus or a truck or a car, we would have to back to a slightly wider area where we could safely pass. The fog rolled in, the rain at times pelted down, all in all it was glorious. One photo is of Jim with Mr. Lipton. Afterwards Tharanga dropped us off for a tea tasting.  This tea making is very serious business. I have never loved black tea but there is hope that I will before this trip is over.

February 15, 2019

Last couple of days in Ella have been great! This was supposed to be a quiet mountain village. It is beautiful but it is filled with tourists. We did have another fabulous breakfast at our home stay; water buffalo curd and sweet palm syrup, dhal ( a delicious curried lentil) and a spicy lime and coconut dish with rice pancakes, plus the usual banana and fresh pineapple and some sort of sweet bun.  Afterwards Jim and I hiked to a tea factory and got a great tour. Hiking anywhere in this heat is not easy for me. Even though it wasn’t quite noon when we got back to town we stopped for lion beer. I never drink beer at home but I love beer when travelling in a hot country. It’s safe to drink and it is cold!

Enroute to Sri Lanks