Fluidity.

It’s interesting how pernicious I feel about the truth. In just one night, not even one entire one, a breath or moment even- your world can be so full of possibilities. And so devoid of them.  It is a fluid, fluctuating situation.  A world of total possibility. But absolutely not. I guess that’s what makes it interesting; Flux. 

A Thank You Note.

Only afterwards did it hit me.  Only when standing in the midday sun, no shade, in the middle of nowhere did I realize it’s quite an assumption that when you say to a total stranger, “Can you pick me up in 2 hours?” and he says “Yep!” that he will, indeed turn up for a fare worth roughly 2 bucks. What if he picked up a bigger fare? Fell asleep? Rolled his tuk tuk? We had no phone coverage, no way of getting back other than a 10 km walk on dirt roads under the blasting sun. But I only had 2 minutes to wonder about this because we were approximately 2 minutes early and our tuk tuk driver was approximately exactly on time. Of course he was, because the people of Sri Lanka had been so helpful and reliable and eager to help us see and appreciate their beautiful country that after a week we had very comfortably made such assumptions that we would be totally OK. And we were.

My extremely brief moment of concern made me realize what a total lack of concern I had experienced over our travels through Sri Lanka. Despite strangers leading us through the city to their school, giving us tours around gardens and unexpected massages while drinking a cup of tea, we never felt any concern. A little bemused at times but mostly we just enjoyed a very interesting, sometimes crazy ride which occasionally led to us handing over cash for a bit of shopping we didn’t even realize we were doing.  Over the last 4 months I had felt very much pummeled by the concerns of making decisions about where to go and what to do and how to pay for it but now I was smiling and laughing all over the place.

I have been in situations where I felt quite a bit of apprehension – often in my own country in the city I know best, but I have also had to teach myself to not be held by fear and to trust more rather than expect everyone to be out to rip you off or lead you astray. I remember how defensive I was when I first arrived in Istanbul over 10 years ago and how I eventually realized that the majority of people genuinely want to be helpful and want you to have a good experience in their home. I have met far more people who love their country and want you to love it too than people who want to take advantage of you.  I have shared really wonderful moments with people wanting to know about my country and my life, and who are so generous in sharing part of theirs.  I wonder though whether this is how tourists find Australians?  It is a real national pride when you want to appreciate and share your place and culture with others, I’m not sure this is the case with many Australians who seem to think patriotism is about proving why only some are worthy of a place in such a huge space. Except in the Northern Territory, there live people as keen as any Thai, Sri Lankan, Guatemalan, Turk or Nepalese person to help you love love love their strange, exotic world. 

In Sri Lanka we were humbled by a man who thanked us – as Australians- on behalf of all of Sri Lanka, for the help our country had given theirs after the tsunami. He didn’t know us, we weren’t buying anything from him, but as our well-fed, holidaying first world selves were drinking tea and getting a massage he thanked us profusely. He summed up for me why I had not felt any reason not to trust the people we met and what a wonderful thing appreciation is, for what we have and what others give us. The Sri Lankans gave us so much; jumping in a tuk tuk and asking a stranger to recommend the best off the beaten track beach or restaurant, being shown through physically and culturally amazing places, shaking the hand of a Buddhist teacher and getting some insight into his – and his students- lives, watching 6 year old entrepreneurs rap dance for cash on the top of a mountain, learning about cricket and curries and their history and beliefs are the moments that make me want to travel for the rest of my life. I love that I have had the opportunity to be in places where I can be so trusting in the hands of the locals and it’s one thing I can take with me when I go home in the hope I can help someone love my country as much as I do.  And when I meet a Sri Lankan in Melbourne or Darwin or Jan Juc, I’ll shake their hand and thank them on behalf of their country for making my heart smile again when it had been a little concerned. 

Sri Lankan Hijackings

So, we have managed to be hijacked three-four times in two days since we arrived in Sri Lanka.

The difference is, unlike India, these hijackings did not involve:

•      Food poisoning resulting in shitting and vomiting simultaneously
• Being driven two hours to buy illicit alcohol for my host family
• Being cornered and plied with dodgy alcohol and asked if I wanted to watch blue movies with same host family.
•  Eating at a leper colony. Food made by lepers.

 And unlike Vietnam we were not stolen away after our excellent tuk tuk tour of  Saigon to have a higher price demanded or else risk being abandoned in a very seedy, non-touristy area in 35 degree heat and 213 % humidity whilst jet-lagged and, again, confused.

Instead….

We arrived at Colombo airport with a severe case of dry bikkies due to the bright ideas that the first night of holidays brings. We had hijacked ourselves – instead of buying Toblerone and Chubby Sticks and tobacco at Duty Free we detoured….Announced: “Hey:  “I’ve been sick for a week but it’s officially holidays so let’s pay $90 each for a mix of vodka, gin and mojitos before 9 + hours of travel….Instead of buying water to drink on the plane let’s stay at the bar and buy some sort of other ridiculously expensive drink… that’s an absolutely excellent idea.”

5 hours after said mix of toxins and we were delayed in Dubai airport for 2 hours. And no alcohol to get rid of a chronic case of the D.Ts. It was quite bad. We hated the world a bit. And everyone in it.

Aaaanywaaay..

Arrived at Colombo at sometime between 10 pm the night before and 8 am the day after tomorrow. No idea what day or time zone or place in the world we were. And clearly we looked it because we were accosted in the very quiet, civilized airport full of tourists who clearly looked less befuddled than we. “Yes maam, you need taxi? Driver? Bus? Tractor?”

“Umm…Where are we? And do you know where we might be going?”

So instead of getting a taxi to the train station we ended up with a private driver all the way to Kandy – one of the best decisions we have ever made – we got to stop for fresh tropical fruit, sleep and arrive at Kandy 3 hours before the train. In our travel stupor we organized the same driver organized to pick us up the day after next to take us to Sigiryia rock. A supposed must. Ok.

So we spent our extra hours mixing duty free vodka into soda bottles and drinking by the pool on a national holiday when alcohol consumption was banned. It was an awesome night of enlightened banter. Epiphanies included.

On awakening after 28 hour of vodka and jet-lagged induce sleep we went for a walk around the lake. Only to be accosted by a giant lizard and a toothless, fanatical Buddhist cricket fan Sri Lankan who wanted to point out the very huge and obvious temple we should pray to. Yep, we see it. And we should also follow him to his school because he is also a teacher- of a school that our fellow Australian Ricky Ponting supports and recently in the last ten years visited. Righto.

Hijacked, at least not by ourselves so with no sense of guilt, we had a tour of his school where the students were away for the weekend but the monkeys were keen as chips for any kind of action. We were shown the one outdoor classroom for 1200 students – it did have a very large blackboard where Ricky Ponting did some kind of speech, the bathroom-sized kitchen and the Ricky Ponting built bubble taps that the monkeys had destroyed. We were then led to the shop where we could – and would- buy beautiful fabrics that the students had managed to screen print without Ricky Ponting. And buy tickets to some kind of dancing festival, which the teacher may or may not be partaking in and which may or may not involve monkeys and elephants. “You will see baby elephant dance, monkey dance, butterfly dance, cobra dance!” An hour, 3 cups of tea and shitloads of cash later we got back to the hotel, collapsing by the pool. Hard. Luckily we thought best to assume the tickets were valid and went to the festival to see some seriously excellent traditional dancing, although all animals were evident only via interpretive dance. Not in any kind of real world as we had clearly left that behind. Thank the gods.

Next day we hopped in the car to drive an hour and arrive at…a Herb n Spice Garden. Huh?  The car stopped, we hopped out bewildered – this was not a rock – and an extremely animated man told us all about the plants and herbal medicines possible for piles, gall stones, tinnitus, diabetes, cholesterol and other ailments we had no experience of. Dude- what fixes a case of the too many vodkas? A severe case of  What The Fuck Am I Doing? And Where and When? But he had a Sri Lankan version of a Jim Carrey face – it was so dynamic and mesmerizing that we walked out with creams for hair removal, colds and hair moisturizer – in case the hair remover didn’t work at least it will be super soft.

Eventually, after visiting gardens and a temple – amazing and beautiful and still a little unsure of how n why we got there – we arrived at Sigriyra Rock. Where another super animated Captain of the Hijack opened the car door for us and took us on a very educational, historical tour of the foundations of the crazy-arsed glamorous castle of a dude who killed his father and therefore had to have a very well- protected fortress that could also hold and bathe 500- women. And the guests who weren’t his relations out to kill him. It was such a beautiful place and without our unexpected guide we might not have seen that the very old wall paintings of women had “very big boobs” or that the painter had made a couple of mistakes so that some originally had three nipples and three boobs. Very culturally significant in the history of Sri Lanka. We might also have not appreciated the truly awe-inspiring effort it must have taken to build such a huge palace on the top of a massive mountain. And we would not have had so many photos taken of us sweaty faced, hard of breath and clearly terrified of the heights we were climbing on rickety stairs and tiny, steep steps. It is a really stunning place made more so by the stories he told us- with genuine pride- of the way it once was.

In just a few days we felt like we really had experienced the real and dynamic Sri Lanka. So the happy news is that, unlike some places where to be hijacked can be a little scary, so far our Sri Lankan experience suggests we should just say yes to all the happy, friendly peeps here and all will be pretty fucking cool. A little confusing perhaps, but cool.