Rice and curry feast
And fresh tropical fruits for dessert: watermelons, papaye, Mangosteen (and mum you can see how they look inside as they were half opened for us) and mangoes.
Thursday, 13 August 2009
Rice and curry
We went for lunch at one of Mali's friend today in the suburb of Colombo and we took pictures of the food as this was a superb example of a typical Sri Lankan Rice and Curry meal: A big pot of rice (in this case with cashew nuts) in the centre and a multitude of curries: cashew nut curry, dal, stuffed capsicums, fish balls, fish curry, tomato and chive salad, mango chutney, mint salad, etc, etc. Each meal is different as different vegetable curries are made. And before you ask, yes we have put on weight since we are in Sri Lanka, hence why there is no pictures of us anymore on the blog ;-).
Sunday, 2 August 2009
Sri Lanka's beasties...
We've had a tough time in Sri Lanka -
attacked successfully by dengue carrying mosquitoes from the outset...
haunted (and even poo-ed on) by the entire monster spider population of Bowata,
splatted by carelessly flying tree frogs and spied on by their cousins living in the pond down the garden and behind the picture in the bedroom (cheeky one, that!).. and then we left the relative safety of Mali's house and came across this little lot..
Cheeky monkeys keeping us on our toes as we 'relax' by the pool...
'I'm a brick and a piece of straw' chameleons...
'snake on legs' Iguanas (this picture's specially for Sylv's mum ;o)
and snake (that doesn't need legs to get up those steps)
.. add to this the population of 'surprise' loo frogs (yes, we've developed a technique involving a loo brush and a lot of patience - a sort of emergency ladder arrangement), kamikaze flying beetles and bugs and bats and it's been quite a nature holiday!
After all this, it was not a surprise to hear that the last village we were in was under attack from wild elephants, then - no sightings, (un)fortunately.
We're making good progress overcoming all our phobias though - won't flinch as we evict a spider from the bathtub ever again!
attacked successfully by dengue carrying mosquitoes from the outset...
haunted (and even poo-ed on) by the entire monster spider population of Bowata,
splatted by carelessly flying tree frogs and spied on by their cousins living in the pond down the garden and behind the picture in the bedroom (cheeky one, that!).. and then we left the relative safety of Mali's house and came across this little lot..
Cheeky monkeys keeping us on our toes as we 'relax' by the pool...
'I'm a brick and a piece of straw' chameleons...
'snake on legs' Iguanas (this picture's specially for Sylv's mum ;o)
and snake (that doesn't need legs to get up those steps).. add to this the population of 'surprise' loo frogs (yes, we've developed a technique involving a loo brush and a lot of patience - a sort of emergency ladder arrangement), kamikaze flying beetles and bugs and bats and it's been quite a nature holiday!
After all this, it was not a surprise to hear that the last village we were in was under attack from wild elephants, then - no sightings, (un)fortunately.
We're making good progress overcoming all our phobias though - won't flinch as we evict a spider from the bathtub ever again!
Game time
Spot the difference...
An easy one to start the week :o)
We've been wandering the island and learning lots about the history of Sri Lanka from some fantastic ruins. Sylv's busy uploading pictures and we'll post something in the next week to give you a taste.
As for this lion - he marks the place for the king's throne in the council chamber built on the banks of the beautiful tank (lake) in Polonnuwara - the rest of the guests had pillars with their names on, which have also lasted longer than your average name cards!
More soon...x
An easy one to start the week :o)
We've been wandering the island and learning lots about the history of Sri Lanka from some fantastic ruins. Sylv's busy uploading pictures and we'll post something in the next week to give you a taste.
As for this lion - he marks the place for the king's throne in the council chamber built on the banks of the beautiful tank (lake) in Polonnuwara - the rest of the guests had pillars with their names on, which have also lasted longer than your average name cards!
More soon...x
H & S hit the cultural triangle
We've just returned from 10 days wandering Sri Lanka's Cultural Triangle - not just seeing the 'must sees' of Sri Lanka but learning loads about the island's history, eating lots of lovely rice and curry and generally having a good time.
First stop was Anuradhapura - ancient capital of the island
The site was enormous and included ruins of royal palaces and the numerous monastries that were built by the different kings ruling there. The monastries were BIG - usually about 5,000 monks and the buildings and statues were big too... Some of the stuppas are the biggest in the world! Millions of bricks used, enormous troughs (i.e. 18m) for the food given to the monks... everything was big!
We rented bikes to cover the site - hot work but worth it!
This is Sylv in front of one of the 3 biggest Stupas in the city
This was another of the three stupas, the only one still 'active' and very busy, as we visited the night before the big Jasmine festival which would cover the whole walkway with flowers. There were pilgrims everywhere, preparing to sleep outside the temple and stands of food and loads of other things (clay pots, cushions, food etc) too, which made it all feel like a fair.
Lamps at the Maha Bhodi shrine - the Bo tree arrived from India and is a cutting of the one under which the Buddha sat as he attained enlightenment - lots of people, prayers, donation calling (a bit like bingo calling but letting everyone know who's given what..)
Next day we took the bus and swapped the saddle for hundreds of steps to see Mihintale, a temple on a rock and ruins of caves and other temples around, and site of Ashoka's son coming to teach the kings about Buddhism, leading to lots of conversions.. He taught from the top of the rock on the right - windy and rather hairy place for a lecture!
From Anuradhapura we went to Polonnaruwa, the next ancient capital of Sri Lanka and rented the room prepared for the three bears' visit... ha ha!
Polonnaruwa was much more 'concentrated' than A'pura and the sites have been excavated to a further extend giving a better idea of what the capital would have looked like when it was full of people. There was even a long shoppping arcade outside the gates.
Here are some pics to give you an idea of the site, temples, moonstones, lotus pond/ jacuzzi, image houses...
The Gal Viara is the famous collection of three enormous statues:
The dying Buddha and his disciple, Ananda
The Buddha meditating - these statues were absolutely stunning and this one seemed to be breathing...
The monastry ruins all over Sri Lanka were dotted with ancient loos, part of the amazing water management and irrigation systems built here by successive kings and creating enormous artificial lakes across the country. Here's Sylv demonstrating a Polonnaruwa loo....
And a view of the lake at sunset.....
From Polonnaruwa we made it to Sigiriya - a crazy palace on a 200m high rock, an ancient disney land built over meditation caves... and a good test of our head for hights and our strength to see if we were really over the Dengue - it was a long climb up!
On the way up, the king had covered a whole side of the rock with paintings of beautiful women.. then added a wall on the other side of the path up to reflect them and surround those walking up - it took your mind of the climb for a while!
Views from the top were stunning and it was amazing to think of how they built the palace, laid out the gardens, got water up there and fed everyone!
We took a little trip to Dambulla and visited the cave temples there... up some more steps!
We crossed a weding party coming down - dressed in the traditional Kandyan outfits - big shoulder pads and tums for the men, frilly saris for the women!
The colours, paintings and statues in the caves were amazing and well worth the climb!
At the bottom, there was what Mali calls a 'Coca-Cola' buddha at the Golden Temple attended by life-size plastic monks - a contrast in styles indeed!
Now we're off doing some 'work' for a change visiting the Home and school supported through Lankangels and accompanying a group of the Colombo women's intelligentsia across the country on their first trip to the East Coast after 30 years of war which made this bit of land inaccessible.
We've got egg sandwiches, fruit cake and a map, so we should be fine!
First stop was Anuradhapura - ancient capital of the island
The site was enormous and included ruins of royal palaces and the numerous monastries that were built by the different kings ruling there. The monastries were BIG - usually about 5,000 monks and the buildings and statues were big too... Some of the stuppas are the biggest in the world! Millions of bricks used, enormous troughs (i.e. 18m) for the food given to the monks... everything was big!
We rented bikes to cover the site - hot work but worth it!
This is Sylv in front of one of the 3 biggest Stupas in the city
This was another of the three stupas, the only one still 'active' and very busy, as we visited the night before the big Jasmine festival which would cover the whole walkway with flowers. There were pilgrims everywhere, preparing to sleep outside the temple and stands of food and loads of other things (clay pots, cushions, food etc) too, which made it all feel like a fair.
Lamps at the Maha Bhodi shrine - the Bo tree arrived from India and is a cutting of the one under which the Buddha sat as he attained enlightenment - lots of people, prayers, donation calling (a bit like bingo calling but letting everyone know who's given what..)
Next day we took the bus and swapped the saddle for hundreds of steps to see Mihintale, a temple on a rock and ruins of caves and other temples around, and site of Ashoka's son coming to teach the kings about Buddhism, leading to lots of conversions.. He taught from the top of the rock on the right - windy and rather hairy place for a lecture!
From Anuradhapura we went to Polonnaruwa, the next ancient capital of Sri Lanka and rented the room prepared for the three bears' visit... ha ha!
Polonnaruwa was much more 'concentrated' than A'pura and the sites have been excavated to a further extend giving a better idea of what the capital would have looked like when it was full of people. There was even a long shoppping arcade outside the gates.
Here are some pics to give you an idea of the site, temples, moonstones, lotus pond/ jacuzzi, image houses...
The Gal Viara is the famous collection of three enormous statues:
The dying Buddha and his disciple, Ananda
The Buddha meditating - these statues were absolutely stunning and this one seemed to be breathing...The monastry ruins all over Sri Lanka were dotted with ancient loos, part of the amazing water management and irrigation systems built here by successive kings and creating enormous artificial lakes across the country. Here's Sylv demonstrating a Polonnaruwa loo....
And a view of the lake at sunset.....
From Polonnaruwa we made it to Sigiriya - a crazy palace on a 200m high rock, an ancient disney land built over meditation caves... and a good test of our head for hights and our strength to see if we were really over the Dengue - it was a long climb up!
On the way up, the king had covered a whole side of the rock with paintings of beautiful women.. then added a wall on the other side of the path up to reflect them and surround those walking up - it took your mind of the climb for a while!
Views from the top were stunning and it was amazing to think of how they built the palace, laid out the gardens, got water up there and fed everyone!
We took a little trip to Dambulla and visited the cave temples there... up some more steps!
We crossed a weding party coming down - dressed in the traditional Kandyan outfits - big shoulder pads and tums for the men, frilly saris for the women!The colours, paintings and statues in the caves were amazing and well worth the climb!
At the bottom, there was what Mali calls a 'Coca-Cola' buddha at the Golden Temple attended by life-size plastic monks - a contrast in styles indeed!
Now we're off doing some 'work' for a change visiting the Home and school supported through Lankangels and accompanying a group of the Colombo women's intelligentsia across the country on their first trip to the East Coast after 30 years of war which made this bit of land inaccessible.
We've got egg sandwiches, fruit cake and a map, so we should be fine!
Sunday, 19 July 2009
Wednesday, 8 July 2009
Sri Lanka, food fest and Dengue
It has been such a long time. We have a good excuse: no good internet connection for weeks and then we both caught Dengue (a strange tropical disease brought by mosquitoes that leads to high fever, joint pain and rashes...lovely). So we were in bed....
But we are in Sri Lanka and still alive ;-)
The first week in Colombo we stayed a Preethi, a friend of Mali who is super cool and super nice and Harriet made friend with her dog Mindy who plays 'the ball game' with H all the time.
Mindy and her ball.
And in Colombo we went on a food fest. Colombo has all the food of the world and after 5 months of Indian food, we just went like mad for junk food. We were joined by Laurie (our mate from the chidren's project) who came to Colombo to renew her Indian visa. She has been in India for even longer: 1 year! So we went crazy around Colombo and ate pizzas, milkshakes, cappucinos, sandwiches, pancakes, brownies, even Sushies. You can see Laurie's joy at the variety of food on offer after 1 year of a rice and curry only diet.
Laurie enjoying sandwiches, brownies, cappucinos and even Durian.
Harriet and Laurie in Unawatuna.
We went to the South to Unawatuna with Laurie for 3 days on the beach and now we are resting and recovering at Mali's estate in the countryside on her coconut plantation. Not recovering from too much junk food, oh no, but from Dengue. We both caught it! But I think we are getting better now and we should be fit for travel again next week.
Mali cooking and caring for the Dengue patients.
But we are in Sri Lanka and still alive ;-)
The first week in Colombo we stayed a Preethi, a friend of Mali who is super cool and super nice and Harriet made friend with her dog Mindy who plays 'the ball game' with H all the time.
Mindy and her ball.
And in Colombo we went on a food fest. Colombo has all the food of the world and after 5 months of Indian food, we just went like mad for junk food. We were joined by Laurie (our mate from the chidren's project) who came to Colombo to renew her Indian visa. She has been in India for even longer: 1 year! So we went crazy around Colombo and ate pizzas, milkshakes, cappucinos, sandwiches, pancakes, brownies, even Sushies. You can see Laurie's joy at the variety of food on offer after 1 year of a rice and curry only diet.
Laurie enjoying sandwiches, brownies, cappucinos and even Durian.
Harriet and Laurie in Unawatuna.
We went to the South to Unawatuna with Laurie for 3 days on the beach and now we are resting and recovering at Mali's estate in the countryside on her coconut plantation. Not recovering from too much junk food, oh no, but from Dengue. We both caught it! But I think we are getting better now and we should be fit for travel again next week.
Mali cooking and caring for the Dengue patients.
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