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.