Chiang Mai, Thailand

31st May

Today we crossed over the river to Chiang Kong, Thailland. It was so straight forward - we were walked to immigration from our hostel by a woman and her little girl, who were part of the company we booked with. We could have gone their on our own to be honest, but we weren't to have known it was so close and straightforward! Got our passports stamped, then got in a little boat and in a few mins were at the other side. 

We crossed the river in a little boat

We could literally see Thailand on the other side of the river - Chiang Kong

Almost walked into Thailand bypassing immigration, as we didn't see it! Got stamped and then into a shared taxi who took us to a hotel where we got the minibus from. We waited there for an hour, and I went for a swim in their outdoor pool! Excellent way to pass the time. The minibus took less than 5 hours to get to Chiang Mai, including a 30 min stop for lunch. It was fast, comfy and air conned, but I got a bit travelsick because the roads were windy. We were dropped off at the inevitable commission-intended choice of hostel, and got a tuk tuk to our hostel. Annoyingly we went to the wrong branch so had to walk a bit, and it was v hot. The lady who owns the hostel is english, and was very abrupt - nice, but you wouldn't want to mess with her. We headed out to the night market, via a bar for a Chang beer and some free salted dried peas and nuts! Both our hostel and the market are outside the old city walls and we walked along them for a while to get to where we wanted. The market is huge and spread out over several streets. I finally bought some new flipflops (mine have broken!) and nearly got some bargain fairy lights but the adaptor she tried to sell me didn't work. We got dinner at this outdoor temporary restaurant which was doing a promotion - dishes for 50baht - and it was all quite modern healthy thai food that the locals seemed to like. Then it started pouring with rain, so we sheltered inside and I got a white chocolate ice cream. A treat and comfort food! We had to get a tuk tuk back as it was (and still is) pouring. Our room smells a little rank...its definitely our fault. No matter, in a few days well be settled in Sri Lanka and will have clean clothes!! 

1st June

Its been an exhausting day. We are both just knackered from travelling and today was just a day of walking in the heat too far I think! We started on a fail...yet again the Rough Guide failed on the restaurant front. This time it directed us to totally the wrong place and we ended up going to a different place where I had good wholemeal hot toast, real butter and jam and marmalade. We then got a tuk tuk to the bus station to buy our overnight bus ticket to Bangkok. He returned us, and we walked to Talat Thanin market (featured on Masterchef according to Zoey). 

Talat Thanin market

Amazing sweets and puddings

It was a night mare trying to find it and we asked so many people, and went backwards and forwards up the same street...very puzzling as it was supposed to be huge!! We eventually found it, set back off the street. The Lonely Planet should recommend you get a tuk tuk. It was big, and full of the most amazing food stalls - from fruit, to salads, curries, noodles, fish, bbq'd meat, sweets, pancakes...I got a salad topped with fried fish, peanuts and sweet chili sauce. I also got a sqaure of sticky rice topped with coconut cream and black beans! It looked yum, but was actually very salty and a bit weird. Afterwards, we had planned to go to Wat Umong because it was built for a wayward monk who kept walking off into the forest instead of doing his duties in the temple, and so they had to paint pictures of nature in tunnels in the monastery to keep him in!! But Zoey was feeling really tired and a bit ill, and the tuk tuks were charging a lot (although in reality it was still only a few dollars, and that's nothing in the scheme of things) so we stayed around the old city. We saw Wat Phantao, which is small but beautiful and made entirely out of old teak, and then Wat Chedi Luang, which was more ostentatious and used to house the giant Emerald Buddha before it got taken to Bangkok. After this we walked back to the hostel as Zoey was feeling bad. We had a rest, and then headed for a massage. Got a 1 hour foot, shoulder, back and head and it was sooooo relaxing! The foot massage was my favourite, and afterwards my feet felt like feet again, rather than numb, hot and pounded things on the end of my legs! I liked the pressure of the back massage too - more pressing and manipulating than rubbing. At one point she had her whole body on top of me with her knees in my back and her elbows in my shoulder blades! After wards we were given some tea, and when we started walking again we felt lighter and  rejuvenated and like some oopmh had been restored in us! We were only going to find a beer though, so maybe that had something to do with it! After a drink of Chang in a little bar, we got some food in a tiny restaurant on a street just off Th. Moon Muang (at the north end) called Soi 6.    Had chicken with cashews, and beef with pineapple and basil and rice. And a dollar each. The beef was quite spicy - at my upper end. I can't seem to deal with the spiciness of Thai food - its the fresh chillis. Then we got a whole sliced fresh mango each for 10 baht (20p) and ate it walking back. 

Wat Phantao

2nd June

Went on a trek today :) Saw some baby elephants:) there were only 4 people on our trek and it felt really quiet and remote. It was more scary than we thought it would be - our elephant was really naughty and practically pulled down a tree to eat and we thought we might go over the edge of a steep hill! He also kept taking the really steep muddy route down which was fucking terrifying! He was huuuuuge too. 

 I wasn't very sure about the visit to the 'traditional' village that we were subjected to before we walked to a waterfall. It felt like we were intruding, and was very staged and contrived. We learned how the women weave their dresses which was interesting - now they get the cotton from the city and can get many colours, but before they could do this they made the cotton themselves and it would take months to make one dress. Unmarried women wore white and married women wore blue. Now they can wear many colours though. We were meant to buy something, but there was nothing we wanted. There were little children running around and were playing a relly sick game which involved trying to force a beetle to bit a tiny kitten.....kids!! 

Weaving

The walk to the waterfall was good, except some of the bridges were precarious to say the least! We swam in the water but stayed in the little pool rather than going near the waterfall as it looked very rough and dangerous. 

After lunch we went rafting. We got a lift to the restaurant and felt smug whizzing past the trekkers who were doing a more hardcore trek - i had had enough walking as it was scorching!!). Rafting was amazing - we had to go in our bikinis as it was very wet, but so chilled! :) 

When we got back to our hostel, we went to the Saturday walking market tonight and it was so good, bought a few things including fairy lights! And got interesting food including sticky rice with coconut and honey sprinkled with sesame mmmm. I had my faint thing again, but eating helped. I don't like it when it happens though.

3rd June

Hello :) I had my cooking class today and it was so good! Learned how to make so much stuff (and got to eat it!) I can now whip up a pad thai, papaya salad (this tasted just like we have in restaurants!) a red curry ( I could've made it spicier but the flavour was gorgeous, and we made the paste from scratch too) a coconut soup (not so great but there are other soups I can try now I know the technique) spring rolls, deep fried banana and coconut balls and mango sticky rice! 

Our welcome dish comprised a selection of herbs and foods that.
when combined, created a perfect balance of sweet, salty, sour and spicy:
ginger, lime, ontion, coconut, peanuts and sweet honey dip

We wrapped the carefully balanced ingredients in a leaf
and the result was a burst of flavours and sensations

Ready, steady, cook!

My papaya salad :)

Our cooking station

Hand-pounded curry paste

We made a good team!

I also saw (and tasted) how chicken and cashews was made, and some other types of curry and soup (we got to choose what we cooked from a menu). We got to cook everything, and had our own wok and cooking stations and it was like masterchef! There were only 6 people in the group so we got loads of help and advice and got tonsee how everyone else was doing things. We learned about the balances of flavours - salty, sweet and sour - and how you separate your ingredients into 'flavours' when you are preparing them ie spices from veg. We visited the market beforehand and got taught about all the different types of spices, rice, noodles, veg etc and Zoey and I bought some powdered thai ginger (galingale) and kaffir lime because its hard to get in england. It got so hot cooking!! We got given a recipe book which is step by step and really helpful and I'm so excited about trying it all when I get home! I've decided I'm going to grow herbs on my windowsill, and I need to invest in palm sugar - an essential ingredient - and sweet basil. I also have to see if any shops sell sticky rice as it is a special type. At 9pm were getting a night bus to Bangkok (joy!) We then fly to Sri Lanka tomorrow night and arrive tuesday morning, and are being picked up.  I'm feeling a bit homesick - I think because I'm now sort of in transition from one part of the trip to another, and I don't know what to expect from Sri Lanka. 

4th June

We're about to leave Bangkok and camp in the airport. I got my hair cut on Kho San road...its now a lot shorter (above my shoulders) but I like it, and I can still tie it up - its just a lot cooler and more shape and it will grow in 6 weeks anyway! Skyped home -saw ziggy and my bedroom and I now feel so homesick! Did last minute shopping and bought Chang Tshirts and fairy lights, and bought a very spicy papaya salad for unch and were watched with fascination and amusement by an old lady as we perched on the road and ate it. She opened the bag for us when we were struggling (yes it was in a bag!) took away our napkins, and provided us with napkins at the end We were so tired having got an overnight bus and not really slept. We got sticky rice at the bus staition with sweet chili sauce and made an old lady very happy as other people saw us buying it and bought it too! We aren't going to sleep tonight either as we fly overnight. We will be so tired tomorrow in Sri Lanka!!

Sri Lanka

5th  June

Hi, we arrived in Colombo at around 9am Sri Lankan time (4.5 hours ahead of UK). We stayed overnight at the airport and it was ****ing awful - too much air conditioning and hard cold floors and we didn't sleep. When we'd got through security at 4am we made the most of all the tasters that we discovered last time - loads of different flavoured rice bites, wafer curls and choc rice crispy cakes. A good pick me up! We also hadn't slept the night before as we'd taken an overnight bus to Bangkok. So we were deathly tired. 

Anyway, the landing was awesome; I didn't realise Sri Lanka has so much forest! It was so green, with little settlements interspersing the blanket of forest, and when we got closer to the ground, the forest became dense clumps of palm trees! It looked so tropical and amazing. We were met at Colombo airport by our driver Roshan and drove about 2 hours south along the coast to Aluthgama (the town where we are staying). Our apartment is amazing - we have a kitchen, a living room with leather sofas and a tv with limited satellite channels (BBC can't be accessed, but CNN and National Geographic ect can). Our room in nice and big, and the bathroom has a shower with hot water and shower curtain separating it from the toilet! It feels so clean and homely. 

The front of our house

Our living room (with washing hanging up!!)

Our kitchen

Our driver took us to this cafe for lunch where they brought out a huge plate of assorted bakery things, like samosas, fish rolls, bajjis, hotdogs and burgers and you eat what you want and pay for it. This is called 'small eats'. He only ate one thing which I thought was odd - then realised it was because it was courtesy of us! Lol. We then set about de-mankifying (if that's not a word it should be!) our bags and sorting laundry and showering with hot water. We went to buy supplies from the local supermarket, including washing up liquid and loo roll and mango jam. Things like cereal are really expensive and the selection of non-Indian type foods is quite limited. There is a fruit market near us though, and we can get sliced bread and cheese and yogurt and biscuits and stuff from the supermarket. 

The fruit market

We then went for a walk around the next big town - Bentota - which has lots of hotels and is by the beach and is more touristy. We got led off by a man who wanted to sell us a river safari (there is a huge river by us) but we thought he was showing us the way to the beach! When we politely turned him down though he was still nice to us, and carried on chatting, pointing out an almond tree and lotus flowers. We then found the beach, and it is vast and beautiful, with a backdrop of windswept palm trees. 

The beautiful beach

The temperature is nice - hot, but with a sea breeze that reaches where we live and it rains occasionally but in short bursts (we have just been sheltering in this hotel!). It was the full moon festival, so people were handing out free drinks and biscuits in the street.

Everyone is so genuinely friendly, and says hello to us. Sometimes they are very baffled when they ask which hotel we are in, and we say we are staying with a charity and are staying here for 1 month! A guy this morning asked if our salary was going back to our UK bank accounts and we said we weren't being paid! His face was a picture - utter puzzlement. They just assume we're tourists, as tourism in Sri Lanka is very much staying in a big hotel complex with all the luxuries, a beach and short excursions and that's it.

We went back to our apartment about 6pm and met Pryantha who is part of the charity and was checking everything was OK. We asked for some saucepans, and he realised our cooker had no gas. The washing machine, which he pointed out when we asked about laundry, needs a filter (and looks baffling to use!). We then went to a restaurant on the river (run by the supermarket we used earlier!) for supper and had curry and Lion beer. It was expensive compared to what we are used to, but well eat out as treats (the seafood looks amazing at some of the places).

6th June

This morning we woke up feeling recovered, and had a breakfast of mango, banana and thick yogurt. The coffee isn't instant as we'd been told, and so its not very nice if you treat it as such! But we have a tea strainer so that will work. We ate it watching a bit of CNN. Pryantha then came round with saucepans etc and said our cooker and washing machine may get fixed tonight ... we need to wash our clothes!! Then we walked into Aluthgama to nose around for cheaper local restaurants and internet. We spied some restaurants, but they look very small and not too well established. 

The shops here are much like India - there is nothing you'd want to buy from any of them, and its all so random and higgeldy piggeldy. Some things look like they've been there for years - bottled drinks being a prime example. I suppose it shows its not a touristy town - at all! There was no internet that we could find. The only way of getting it is to come to this hotel, which is in Bentota (the beach town) and use their wifi. We asked about using their pool (its a huge complex) and the receptionist insisted we had to buy a buffet lunch and pool pass for $20. But our charity told us other volunteers had bought a pass for about $5, so we argued and they've finally agreed, but its still more expensive than we were told. The hotel is so nice though, and they gave us complementary guava juice and the whole place smells strongly of tea, and they let us use the wifi. It looks like we have to come here to send emails etc, and once we are volunteering I'm not sure how easy it will be to get here (its a fair walk). But we'll just have to see. The main thing is we have access to internet, which I was slightly worried would be a big issue! 

Bentota beach hotel grounds

The pool

We had an interesting night ...we didn't get our cooker fixed (Pryantha, the guy who looks after us, couldn't work out why the gas rings weren't igniting, and slowly gassed us in the process!) and it was pouring with rain, so we ate banana toasties, mango and yoghurt for supper! The toasties were a bit of a fail because they stuck to the toasty maker but they were OK considering. After, we watched Gossip Girl and Friends on the TV with a large cuppa which was so nice. So not a conventional, but a memorable (and studenty!) evening! 

The walk back over the bridge that connects Bentota with Aluthgama

7th June

This morning we got up at 7am and went for a run to the nearest town - Bentota. It started to get hot and so we need to go in the evenings we think, rain permitting, but we both did well (especially considering our footwear which for me was Primark pumps...) We came back and checked the washing we had put on in the machine, and Pryantha had failed again...he told us we just needed to  disconnect the pipe which feeds water into the drum, use it to fill up the drum directly and then leave it disconnected. Well, no wonder the cycle stopped part way through, as this method means there is no water supply! We reconnected the hose and it works fine. Men!! Useless. We are just fine on our own - worse off with help by the looks of it! Though, we do need our cooker fixing as only 1 gas ring works and the other you have to light with a match which is a tad dangerous. Someone is supposed to be coming tonight. 

After showers, and a breakfast of tea and bananas and yoghurt, we were picked up by our driver Roshan and taken to the library and pre-school to meet the boss - Ajith. It was so cute - we were presented with a bouquet of flowers and handmade card by 2 tiny girls in white pinafores from the 4+ class. I literally couldn't stop smiling, it was just so cute seeing them all and being made so welcome. 

Receiving our bouquets with Ajith

Then we were shown around by Ajith, the 'big cheese' of Rebuilding Sri Lanka (RSL) who works alongside Clare Allen (the founder). He is the most gentle, genuine and softly spoken man I have met for a long time, but his English isn't great and he tends to end up rambling and going on and on because he is so keen to help us and explain things. We were shown the library - it is like a university one! So ordered, with books on medicine and Economics and Law, as well as fiction and English - and in Tamil, Sinnhalese and English. It is so clean and puts English libraries to shame. We were also taken down to the reference section, which Clare (the founder of Rebuilding Sri Lanka, who they refer to as 'our madam' and have photos of her everywhere like a shrine!) insisted they set up to ensure that kids who travel for hours to get here can always get a copy of a book. It is so humbling to think that people travel for miles to learn, and again highlights the general apathy towards learning found in the UK. 

We were sat down to coconut juice (from a whole coconut) biscuits and bananas, and talked through our schedule. We will be teaching 9:30 till 1:30 Mon, Tue and Wed at different schools - some more remote than others. On Thur and Fri we will be helping at the Rainbow Centre which has been set up for kids from the slums. We will be provided with lunch, water and biscuits everyday and the charity is so caring towards us. We have taken out some books from the library - on teaching English, the history of Sri Lanka, and Buddhism! 

The RSL library - our main base

8th June

So I have made it to the hotel again - we are lying on the beach sunbathing! Our apartment is serving us well...except the cooker had to be totally dismantled and although it now works, the grill and oven work with gas and we have to light them with one of those long lighter things. Also our washing machine is pretty rudimentary and temperamental. Our landlord is clueless and we can't quite work him out...he gave us a lift in his tuk tuk last night to a restaurant and invited us for a drink tonight, but emphasised we mustn't tell Pryantha (the person who looks after us basically). Hmmmm! Also we had to leave him in the house with the guy fixing the cooker, and he said 'is there any money in the house?' - !!! Anyway, I'm glad the cooker is fixed because the other night it was raining so hard we had to stay in and the only food and method of cooking we had was bread, bananas, and a toasty maker. So we had banana toasties for supper (and the toasty maker is rubbish so they fell apart :() but we watched friends on TV curled up on the sofa so all was rectified!! 

Today we visited the Rainbow Centre. It is for children from the slums. They are taken in at 6 months, and the aim is to keep them until 13 ish and transfer them to school. They are given breakfast at the centre, because they don't eat supper at home and so this is their most important meal. They are also washed and taught to brush their teeth. Sometimes some come in so dirty that their clothes have to be washed. Many have problems stemming from being sexually/physically abused at home, seeing this happen to their mums and siblings, and having parents who are on drugs/alcohol or are prostitutes. They can't be given some food because they are made to sell it on trains and buses and it makes them upset. Sometimes the kids, even 3 year olds, touch each other inappropriately, or are violent, because they think this is normal. I nearly cried several times, especially as we were being told all this whilst watching the tiny little children playing around with big wide eyes and grins. We just have to play with them. Its shocking that the centre gets no support, and that police can't be brought in when a child is abused because 1) the authorities like keeping a class of poor people for cheap labour and drug dealing, and 2) the mothers of these children have ties with the policemen because they are prostitutes.

I think the Rainbow Centre is going to be the hardest place but the most rewarding.

Last night we had the most amazing dinner which included the tastiest chunks of tuna steak and a gorgeous sauce, and this mound of diced roti (soft bread) mixed with veg which had a great texture and was such a nice change from rice. It coast less than $2 each!! Tonight we're going to have cocktails at a riverside bar that is generally expensive, yet sells mojitos and G&T's for less than $2! And we're going to treat ourselves to some nice seafood. Bentota is famed for its seafood - lobster, crab, jumbo prawns are all on the menu for a fraction of the price of England (but still a lot more than were used to!!). Tomorrow our driver is taking us for a day out to Gaule - an old colonial town, and on the way were going to the tsunami museum and a turtle sanctuary.

9th and 10th June (first weekend)

We are spending the day at the pool today - Bentota Beach Hotel is epic!! We have had the most AMAZING buffet lunch which included salmon mousses, sushi, all salads under the sun, amazing fish, cuttlefish (like calamari) crab, steak, curries, breads, cheeses, puddings (mousses, ice creams, cakes, fruits, mini tarts and truffels) - it was exquisite!! The pool is amazing and we just saw an elephant having a bath in the grounds. Day of luxury! 

The buffet....

Unlimited ice cream!!!

Yesterday we went to Gaule, a colonial town which is a confusion of Dutch and British architecture - churches, a post office, a lighthouse - and everyday Sri Lankan life (complete with a mosque).

A church built by the British. Many plaques commemorate
 those who died  young from tropical diseases

Reckless cliff divers there to impress female tourists...

On the way to Guale we went to the tsunami picture museum, which is a collection of photos and memories in a house that was destroyed and the family still live there and you can talk to them about escaping. There were some really moving statistics, memories and sayings:

• 40,00 people died
• 392048 were displaced
• 5650 are missing
• there were 322 camps
• smiles turned to tears': people saw the sea go out with the first wave and ran towards it to get photos and have a look. Only some ran away. The second wave was the killer and washed them away
• it was Poya festival, so more people were in the area and outside
• the majority of the dead were children because they couldn't run fast enough.
• the sea is a paradox: people relied on it for survival, it destroyed their lives, and now they have to rely on it to rebuild their lives. 

A train was washed away near that place which had a family in that our driver knew. People still live in temporary housing and we saw this too. Its so sad. 

A drawing by a survivor of their experience

We also went to a turtle sanctuary and held 1 day old sea turtles, saw turtles damaged by the tsunami e.g no arms, and albino turtles!! 

Turtles are handed in by fishermen (they are given an incentive as they get
money in exchange)  and gathered by  the centre and incubated in confined areas.
The sea is so strong it washes away the nests and exposes the eggs to dogs
and the sea. 

I held some 1 day old hatchlings!!

An albino turtle

This turtle was exceptionally heavy!

When we got back to Aluthgama (home!) we had $2 cocktails and banter with our waiter friend at Nebula (he didn't have the local spirit - Arack - which was required for the cocktail so we made him let us taste what gin would be like as a substitute - it was good!) . Then we had dinner at Sinharaj - where Rochan took us for lunch on our first day. As from today it  has a limited menu because it has lost customers due to a new highway. Tonight we have to plan our lessons for tomorrow - first day of teaching!

It's so so hot at the moment - I'm writing this in a bikini by the pool and need to jump in! We have tea and cake provided later and I'm not sure we can eat it! We have been watching BBC on satellite and getting very nostalgic - there's lots of programmes about the British Royals!!

11th June

An exhausting day in contrast to yesterday! We got up at 6am to go for a run before it got really hot. We had to go to the bus station and our driver came with us to show us where to get off. It was a 40 minute journey, and we were very hot by the time we got there! When we arrived at the centre, there was no-one there except the caretaker, but we were eventually provided with tea and biscuits and got a tuk tuk to Elpitiya school and arrived around 10am. We were late, and all the children were running around outside whilst they were waiting. We had to walk up a very steep hill (the school is built into a mini mountain - poor teachers!) and it was daunting being watched by teenage kids from above - they were like mountain goats watching amateur walkers finding their feet in the wilderness. 

The children climb on boulders in the school grounds

The school is extremely rural

We were literally thrown into a classroom and told to start teaching! Hmmmm. The teacher was useless - she asked the kids to ask us questions, which of course they weren't going to do!! So we just followed the lesson plan we had briefly drawn up the night before. We started with 'what is your name?' 'My name is...' and practiced it in pairs. It was a fairly painful process - some got it, others did not understand the concept of Q and A! Without a teacher to translate into Sinhalese its very hard to do even such basic exercises. The alphabet song worked well, and by this time Zoey and I had lost all inhibitions from shouting at the children and explaining things in any ways we could think of. 

Our second class (grade 10a) was the best. They were good and intelligent, and understood the concept of Q and A, and we played the memory name game. We also taught them 'his/her name is' and taught them "how are you? I am happy/sad/good/bad." We were able to play hangman with them. Our third class was horrendous. We totally lost control of the boys - we are pretty formidable as a pair, and hard to defeat ... but both of us gave up and resorted to singing 'Old Mac Donald' and going 'with an oink oink here..' Even though they blatently weren't interested we just wanted to pass the time! One amazing thing happened though, a little girl came up to me and said 'poem' and stood up and recited in perfect English an advanced poem in a professionally theatrical manner with tonal and physical expression. It was crazy to see - I wonder how much (if any) of it she understood? It was sad because the girls were quiet and wanted to learn but the boys prevented them.  

The third class was much better, as we asked for the prefects to stay in the classroom with us. They were grade 10b and not as good as 10a but manageable, although the girls were a lot brighter than the boys. The fact they sat girls v boys made this very obvious. In fact this was the case with most of our classes - the girls were willing to learn, and brighter, than the boys! Our last class was fine too, and by this time we had refined our lesson plan and teaching methods and didn't split up the class; it was good for them to listen to each other in silence and it was easier for us to keep control. We went back exhausted - totally drained both physically and mentally. It was exhausting shouting all the time, and having to be so energetic and positive the whole time, and have patience at the same time. We were given our lunch packet a mound of rice with different curries and sauces with it, wrapped in cling film and then paper, and looks like fish and chips when it is given to you!! Its very yummy though, and the curries/sauces are different every day. 

Our lunch packet. Sadly not fish and chips!

We then had to teach an evening class of 10 year olds. This was more fun - we chatted to them first, then played 'What's the time Mr Wolf?' And 'Fruit Salad', and a game where they run around and have to get into groups of the number we shout out. They (and we!) loved it! The bus ride on the way back was horrendous and made us both feel so sick. We needed to stop for a beer, and just managed to make cheese toasties (out of weird cheese and bread that is a week old and falls apart in the toasty maker) and crawled into bed before 9pm!

12th June

Today we went to a different school - a junior school. It was great! We taught 4 classes, and were able to take them outside and play games to go with the topics. The first class were very small, and we got them to draw their family and house and label it. Some were really great and labelled their pics without prompting (although the teacher said they couldn't write!). It was great having a teacher to help identify the members of the family that each child had drawn, by asking them in Sihalese and telling us in English. Otherwise it was often hard to tell! 

The classes at this school were smaller, and the teacher helped us translate instructions into Sinhalese and encouraged the children in Sinhalese too which was good. It took a lot of coaxing to get individual responses to our questions, but they were so willing to learn. It was really effective making them repeat words/sentences really quietly then really shouting to make them confident with speaking English. It was exhausting teaching 4 classes though! But I felt we'd made an impact and both the kids and us had had fun, especially playing the games. 

We got back, had our lunch parcel and had to help the pre-school teachers translate government issued exercises into English. I just wanted to go home! The bus ride was more sedate. We got a beer again to relax and persuaded our friend there to bring us some bread as we were starving! He bought us garlic bread, and gave us the bread that the table next to us didn't finished. We felt like such tramps!! We had told him we had no money to buy food, and then when we left we found the supermarket and market was closed!! We couldn't go back in and eat there, so we had to make do with 1 piece of toast and cheese, some cake left over from Sunday (with mango jam spread on to make it more exciting!) and watermelon. It wasn't too shabby! 

13th June

Playing 'What's the time Mr Wolf?'

Our last day of teaching for the week, and it wasn't an easy end!! There was some confusion about getting to the school (Bantu), and it was a teacher training day so there didn't seem to be any principal or English teacher there (I heard 'raining day' and thought it was strange that teachers wouldn't come in if the thought it would rain!!). We were warned about snakes before we went to the school as it is in the jungle...great!! This school was supposed to be the example school but to me it wasn't as organised and the children weren't as bright as at Gal school yesterday. The kids know their numbers and how to say basic stuff but they just don't know how to apply it!! Its crazy how they are taught by rote but don't understand it. 

There was no teacher in our first class - grade 3 - which was a tiny class. They weren't as capable as the equivalent grade yesterday and just didn't understand without someone to translate. Then we taught grade 2, and it was a little better because when we asked her, the teacher came in and explained the concept of question (What is your name?) and answer (my name is...) and we got through this quite quickly. The children seemed to know vocab e.g. they could count 1-20 very fast but when we asked them to write the individual numbers on the board they couldn't! So we made them come up one by one and write random numbers, and count how many stars there were on the board etc, and it was a painstaking process but they slowly started to actually understand. 

The numbers game reinforced it and we made them count how many people were in their group once they were in the correct numbers, and got the children to call out the numbers. It was a actually very satisfying reinforcing something so thoroughly and seeing them progress. When we played it with the grade 3's, they all stood with their arms apart on their own (marking out their own space) when we shouted out '1' so they seemed to really get it. The game is good, but the nature of little children means that some are reluctant to leave their friends or a group they are in, even though they may know it is bigger than the number we want them to be in.

They can also get quite violent! Sometimes it was hard to see who were the 'excess' people or who got their last and was out, and we just had to make our best guess and prize children away to sit out - we felt a bit mean but they didn't seem bothered. 

'What's the time Mr Wolf?' was popular, except the children didn't really understand what a wolf was so just shouted 'What's the time?' And it was hard to get the wolf to say 'O'clock', despite us going over the time by drawing a clock on the board and asking each child to tell us the time. All the girls kept fighting to hold my hand and I actually risked being quite damaged several times! We then got them to draw their families (the teacher came in and explained) and this went well, with some children labelling their family members successfully with our help. But with no teacher (she left) it was hard to identify many figures, and we don't know the Sinhalese! I learned that mother was 'ama' and father 'tata' but they have different words for older and younger siblings etc and its too confusing! 

Our last class was grade 4/5 and more advanced, so we could move onto 'his/her name is.' There were some bright girls in our class who kept trying to get our attention. This class didn't understand the difference between letters and numbers, so we had to reinforce the alphabet by getting individuals to write random individual letters on the board. Hangman was a painful process - it is hard when the words aren't written down for the child at the board to fill in the letters and spell the word, but also they sometimes couldn't write a letter and one girl just told her team the word (Sri Lanka) out of frustration! They really wanted to play 'What's the time Mr Wolf' though and shouted very loudly and it was a satisfying round!    

After our usual lunch we taught an evening class to slightly older children than Monday. We just chatted to them for half an hour, which was a bit painful (they were very timid!) But we were tired and this was easiest for us, and also it encouraged them to use vocab and practice speaking and asking/answering questions. Then we played hangman.

In the evening we branched out and braved the gas grill...we surpassed ourselves with the grilled tomatoes and cheese on toast we made - the tomatoes were so sweet and yummy. And we had watermelon for pudding. Mmm. And watched Friends and Gossip girl :)

This was our comfort food!

14th June

We have had a day off on Thursday, and spent the day on the beach. It is about a 20 min walk from our house, and the water is too rough to swim in but we can jump in the waves. Its a stunning beach with a backdrop of palm trees and is very quiet. It was quite windy and rainy which was annoying because we wanted beach time. We had lunch at home - a standard grilled tomatoes and toast and I bought my first raw carrot!! And then went back to Bentota beach hotel as Zoey wanted to skype her mum. I sat on the deckchairs and got accosted by chipmunks!! One jumped on my back and I screamed so loudly! Luckily no-one came, but what if something bad had happened?!! 

We have been befriended by a creepy man who 'works' at the hotel. If he's legitimate, he is a yoga teacher in his spare time but works as a lifeguard and guide at the hotel and his dad is the head chef. He is always hanging around the security guard bit at the end of the grounds by the beach, and seems genuine, but he's definitely stalking us!! Every time we go to the beach he's there. He took us to 'see the turtles laying eggs' this evening. Really, we got into his pimped tuk tuk (they are the thing to have here) with flashing lights and photos and loud music, bought Arrack (the local spirit) on the way and took us to a quiet beach bar. We didn't see any turtles needless to say, and he got quite drunk. He took us down the beach to try and find some turtles at 11pm but it was pitch black and I didn't feel comfortable at all. Especially as earlier he'd proudly demonstrated how he got rid of a mugger in Malaysia, and I saw how strong he was. So I made some excuse and he took us back - very drunk. He kept ringing us after he'd dropped us off (we made sure he didn't see our house). Creepy.

Drinking arrack with yoga guy. 

On the plus side, we went for dinner at a very local restaurant (well more of a fast food joint a la Sri Lanka) where nothing was in English. We were asked what we wanted, and managed to get Kotthu (diced roti mixed with veg and/or fish, chicken, egg or pork) and fish curry - 1 piece of fish each in a cold sauce! It was actually quite yummy - the fish had a very good texture and flavour and went quite far with the kotthu despite its size. I was just a bit dubious about its temperature! But we weren't ill, and it cost less than £1-win!!
Ps we watch BBC news every morning, and watched a prog about the Royal Family, and it makes me homesick!!

15th June

Anyway, on Friday we went to the Rainbow Centre - the place where extremely poor kids are looked after. In the morning we looked after 2 year olds!! Soooooo munchy :) they didn't get head,shoulders knees and toes, or the Hokey Kokey (I'm not sure why we even tried lol!) But loved kicking balls around outside. I got so hot and started feeling quite sick. 

He built a camera from bricks!

We got to feed them their ricey soup (for wait gain) and they loved it when I pretended the spoon was an aeroplane! 

Drinking rice soup

They then put on a little show and did animal impressions and sang some songs - one was the Sinhalese version of I'm a little teapot! We played with them while they ware washed and given clean clothes (they don't get any of this at home) and the ones who had been shy let us pick them up, chase them etc. 

The water is heated in a cauldron

The clothes are washed everyday

Lunch time was like a military operation!! The after school kids arrived, and everyone went into a hall with tables in rows and collected their portion, which was decided by their size. They all waited and said grace and then began gobbling it down with their hands. The women looking after them went round and helped by pulping up the eggs into the curry and rice and shoveling it into the kids mouths! Everyone here eats with their hands and it isn't pretty! We luckily got a separate table and helped ourselves to rice and curry and got forks and spoons! The kids were allowed seconds. It reminded me of Oliver Twist. 

Afterwards we taught 2 classes - one younger where we stuck to the alphabet (A-E with drawings eg dog - mine were shocking!) and one older where we did my name is, his/her name is, and family. This was hard as some of the children were in difficult situations eg one girls father had died and her mother lives with several men and she has been abused so we were told that 'family is far far from her mind and she didn't have a childhood'. It was surreal having this explained to us while the girl was just stood there looking oblivious. But she still answered with the help of Aruni (who runs the centre). Some of these kids were exceptionally bright and picked up things quicker than those at the government schools. Partly its because Aruni is there to translate, but they are also so well disciplined and educated here. I surprisingly felt less awful after this lesson (I was so hot and sticky) than before it because they were so great!

This little chap insisted on drawing his dog on its head!

On Fri evening we treated ourselves to cocktails and the most amazing seafood platter complete with lobster and tuna steak and chips and garlic butter. Then we made our waiter friend invent us a pudding - jaggery ice cream (we discovered it at the buffet last week and love it - jaggery is like crystallized sugar from coconuts and comes out like honeycomb). We also bumped into our friend who owns a very posh restaurant and he bought us RED WINE!! Mmmmmm. good end to the week!

16th June

Today I got up and went for a run at 6:30am and then relaxed with coffee watching BBC.  We had breakfast, and then Rochan came and drove us to the cash machine to get out money to pay for our house. He also took us to a Kodak shop so Zoey could have her camera charger looked at as it is broken. It is hard to find a replacement, and the guy is going to Columbo to find one! We await the result (though Zoey has said she doesn't want to pay more than £10...could be his loss!). 

We were then dropped off at the beach and had to avoid yoga guy (he said he'd take us to a waterfall and teach us yoga, but he keeps ringing us and its freaky and we've decided not to do any of it). We went home for lunch and had grilled tomatoes and cheese on toast and then realised our fridge door wasn't shutting, so spent the afternoon waiting for it  to be fixed. Standard. On the plus side, we paid the landlord and he took off 10% for all the stuff that's gone wrong (but we still love our house!) 

We ended the day with a Lion beer at Nebula - our daily haunt - and then went for dinner at Sinjaraj. I tried the mini pizza for 80 rupees (less than 50p) and it was a fail - less than kids sized - but it tasted OK. I had to fill up on biscuits, watermelon and yogurt when I got back. We watched a programme about the british monarchy and I missed home! 

And the fridge door comes off....great!

17th May

Today its boiling again and we are at the Bentota Hotel making the most of the pool and buffet!! Our treat. It is such a hot day. 

We went for a run at 6:30am (and had to avoid yoga guy...again - he rang us again after he saw us running. (creep) and then went to the hotel. The buffet was slightly different, and I realised how much I missed good pasta (because of the amazing aubergine and cheese and pasta salad). The fish was amazing, as was the aubergine curry with dried fish in. The puddings were the best bit - jaggery ice cream again (really soft creamy vanilla with huge pieces of crystallized sugar made from coconuts) - chocolate mousses, hot bread and butter pudding (made with something like croissants and had cinnamon and apple in) chocolate gateau, chocolate sauce, mini carrot cakes and cheesecakes...my tummy hurt when we finally finished! The waitress recognised us and was really sweet - I think she's really intrigued and puzzled by us! 

We scavenged some rolls, carrot cake and cheesecake and put it in empty yogurt pots that we'd bought with us!! It was even better as there was a large group of old English people on a SAGA holiday, and we had some English banter with them - 'I'm going to cut this chocolate gateau as no-one else will, would you like a piece?' and 'don't eat whilst you are going around the buffet (said an old man to Zoey!) and discussing the pros and cons of the different flavour ice creams. I miss England!! 

We then spent more time by the pool (I had to sit under the umbrella as it was just too hot) and swimming and chatted to a lady who just got married here (her and her husband are self employed taxi drivers) and is at the hotel for 1 month. It is apparently all inclusive including alcohol, and is 1800 for the whole month! There was also a really cute old couple, and the lady was being shown by a young man how to get wifi on her ipad so she could skype her daughter!

We had tea and cake at 5:30 even though we were still so full! We have to psyche ourselves up to another week of teaching!! I know I will be fine when I start, its just the thought of being totally drained after and having to keep going for so long! I'm feeling a bit tender from the sun, but am back home on the sofa watching BBC news! 

18th June

A hot and knackering day. We went to Elpitiya school which is the huge school with both primary and secondary children. We were teaching primary this week (thank god!) But it was so haphazard and disorganised. The English teacher didn't seem to have any clue which class we should teach. We were just sort of stuck into whichever class was free and then yanked out just as we'd got going! We taught grade 3 first and were shown there by the prefects we met last week. We were a little late anyway (the bus was so slow and we had to give up the front seat for a monk!!) and we were taken on a bit of a detour by the prefects - via the pond (photos taken of course!) and other parts of the school. We didn't mind!! 

We taught grade 3 'what is your name? My name is..' and 'How are you? I am...' But the English teacher was useless and wouldn't explain things to the kids as she didn't get it either!! I began to get frustrated as every child answered 'I am fine' but they didn't understand that they had to vary their responses and choose another word on the board (good/bad) to practice. 

By the time we'd counted up to 20 the lesson was over as we'd started late. Then we got some very sugary black tea and sat with the prefects. They gave us their email addresses and skype names, and we looked at their English literature book - the poems were really advanced, and folded inside the book there was a rough draft of an analysis of a poem about a bird and it was very mature - she was saying how the bird was a metaphor for trapped and exploited people etc. So English lessons for secondary children must be good and advanced. 

We taught two other grade 4 classes, and got to play 'what's the time Mr Wolf?' with the last class, despite the reluctance of the teacher!! Zoey had to sit out as she got glass in her foot from a glass falling off a shelf and smashing on the way outside. So I led the game...the class was huge - at least 40 kids - and so it was hard to explain and organise them. They wouldn't just stand at one end facing the same way but insisted on lining up! I had to manhandle them into position as the teacher was useless. But they got what they had to shout very quickly, and did it without my help (all I had to do was beckon for them to shout it). It felt like I'd won them onto my side!! The child who was the wolf was good too, saying the time properly - 'x o'clock.' 

We ended at 12 and chatted to the prefects about boyfriends, how boys are quite disruptive in lessons, what they like to wear (not saris as it makes them look like women!) and they told us that they wear saris imported from the UK!  Not quite sure how that works. They gave us some wrapped up wedding cake and a bracelet with Ganesh on it! Zoey's is black as apparently last week the girl who brought them in thought she was a boy!! Our tuk tuk driver tunrned up half an hour late, and the girls insisted on waiting with us (and missing maths...!) 

We had a good lunch with a good selection of curries - including our fave aubergine and dried fish, potato (or breadfruit?!) and coconut thing and dhal. Mmmm. We were texted and called by the prefects which was quite amusing. They call us 'dear' because they think its the thing to do. At 3:30 we taught the evening class and it went quite well - we asked them what they did at the weekend, and played the numbers game and they remembered 'what's the time Mr wolf?' We went onto food and drink and asked each person to name something and they came up with sophisticated vocab like wheat and juice, as well as their local foods such as hoppers. We played pictionary, and got each person to think of their own word to draw for the other team. 

We got the bus at 4:30, and the caretaker followed us to make sure we got on the right one! We got a text from Rosi (one of the prefects) saying (in response to our reply saying we are teaching this afternoon as we work very hard): 'Ok, dear. Its good quality. I respect to it. When one person work hard, one day he can reach his dreams. You can dear, my congratulation. Bye! See you tomorrow.' lol!
We did a bit of shopping on the way home, had a beer, then made supper: we warmed up a mini cheese roll that we scavenged from the buffet yesterday, cheese and tomato on toast, carrot cake (again scavenged) with yoghurt and watermelon. A feast! We keep getting calls and texts from the prefects. The most amusing has to be this random gem from Sanu: 'women live better, longer and peaceful life...why? Very simple, a woman does not has a wife!!' I don't think she got that this is a sexist joke against women...!

19th June

We got up at 6am and went for a 40 min run. It was cooler and quite bearable and we didn't pass yoga guy!! Had a nice unwind with a coffee and our usual banana and yoghurt breakfast and set off for the bus at 8am. When we got to the RSL library, we chatted to Ajith about our experience yesterday at Elpitiya school. We said we didn't regret going, but that future volunteers should only go if they are guaranteed to be in a class with the senior English teacher as she had very good English and was very organised. Ajith said yes it was a huge school and many of the teachers find it hard to control the children, and English teachers have bad English as the best go to the best schools. I felt it was important to emphasise that we struggled, but volunteers shouldn't be pulled out as its unfair on those children that might benefit (e.g the prefects we met). 
Good teachers go to better schools and cities. He also said:

• Teachers don't want to go to rural schools - no transport, shops etc. This is especially the case with English teachers
• Children are put off by poor teaching and become fearful of grammar and don't want to learn english
• Schools that are popular eg Elpitiya just grow and become huge. Administration there is 'at floor level' - the principal has no idea what goes on at the top of the hill!
•  at government schools,  RSL has to work with them as they can't do anything else because of bureaucracy.  For instance, children can't be taught at the RSL centre during school time by volunteers, so volunteers have to go to the schools and work within the systems.
• Rural schools without help from RSL - very small classes because children too are poor for uniform and books etc. Gal and Batu schools have bigger classes now because Loughborough school has helped with uniform and milk powder etc.

So we learned a lot about the difficulties RSL face when trying to send volunteers to teach English at schools, and how best to help the children. 
We arrived at Gal school at around 10, and were met by the principal. The English teacher was sick...no-one else spoke English but it was OK as the children were well behaved and there was always a teacher present to help in their own way. We taught grade 1 to start (for 25 mins) and got them to draw and write items of food - banana, apple, pineapple (that's all we had time for). Some were very fast - did good drawings and started writing the word without being told. Some even went ahead and drew the other words on the board and we had to stop them. Others were quite slow but got there in the end when we stood behind them and said each letter repeatedly. On girl was slow and the teacher implied she was thick so give up, but Zoey persevered and she did OK in the end. One boy clearly had a mental problem though.

We then taught grade 2. We wrote words on the board and drew a picture and got them to come up and copy. They all did it well, so we started a game where we wrote the word and they had to come and draw it to show they knew what it was and their team got a point if it was right (there were 3 tables so 3 teams). They were a quick class. We then went outside and played duck, duck, goose with food words (we called in bananas and coconuts) and they loved it! 

'Banana, banana, COCONUT!' (child legs it)

With grade 4 we again played pictionary and each person had to think of their own word and draw it for the other team to guess. We learned the name of a new fruit - Rambutan (we were introduced to yesterday at the evening class). We played bananas and coconuts, and fruit salad (though this fell on dead ears and didn't really

work without the teacher explaining it, and he wouldn't!)

With grade 3 we did the same, except they didn't have the range of vocab to think of their own words and kept drawing the same fruits. We learned another new fruit - Mangoustine. We came across it in Vietnam. Both Zoey and I were starving and got a bit grouchy when a few of the children wouldn't tell us what they'd drawn/wouldn't draw. The principal told us the play bananas and coconuts at the end - I'm glad he likes us playing. The kids thought we were going to play Mr Wolf! We will do that as a treat next week. They really got the concept of the game like grade 2 did and it was fun watching them chasing each other. They kept picking me (the principal whispered 'madame!'). 

We went to Nebula for a beer on the way home, and then were picked up by Rochan for dinner at his aunts. His house was very big, although all on one floor, and we met his father who was late 80's and used to be a tour guide - he showed us his old ID! His brother was there too, and his aunt. They all stayed out of the way and it was just Rochan and us sitting with beer and bombay mix! It was nice to see him in his house and relaxed, and he showed us photos of when other people from the charity visited. We chatted to him about his job and how he works for RSL as a driver, but also works as a driver for tourists in high season. Now there are few tourists because it is low season so he doesn't do much in the day except watch tv and see friends! 

We ate quite late, and tried stringhoppers (like brown noodles) - they had a nice texture but a horrible sharp aftertaste. We had dahl and chicken and coconut sambal with it. They kept filling up the bowls! His aunt was tiny and like a little bird and hardly saw us, bit cooked it all herself! Then we had papaya and buffalo curd for pudding and ginger tea. 

Roshan's family

20th June

We left a bit later today and then the bus broke down on the way! It just sort of conked out and the driver kept revving the engine and it billowed out fumes which came in through the window. We decided to get off the bus as it didn't feel safe, and rang Ajith for a tuk tuk. We sat outside a random shop and waited - we were given chairs (they get really offended if you sit on the floor here!) We went straight to Batu school and water and biscuits had been sent with the tuk tuk! 

We didn't know what to expect from the school this week, as last week the English teacher was at training. Unfortunately, we were given the grade 2's and no teacher. We made her come in to discipline them but she kept disappearing. It was annoying because they kept getting out of the chairs, and other classes kept coming into ours and staring. The door wouldn't shut and the wall was just mesh wire so they could all peer in anyway. Because they were quite young, we played the game where we write words on the board, and each table is a team, and one person from each team comes up and draws a different food word to see if they understand what it is. It worked quite well, and their writing was good and neat too. We then did 'I like to eat...I don't like to eat...' But this was a little painful, as they kept saying the same things (apple) and also repeated the same thing for both like and don't like, so they obviously didn't understand. I ended up getting them to repeat after me, word by word, which was slow and demoralising as they clearly didn't get it but it was better than nothing. 

We then went outside and played bananas and coconuts, but it was hard work. First we had to get them into a circle which was nearly impossible because the girls clung like limpets onto Zoey and I. Then we had to teach them that only 2 people run around, not everybody! But they sort of got it in the end...except one boy who just kept going around the circle and saying the same word, and a few others who didn't grasp that they had to say a different word when they wanted to be chased. 

Then it was break time. The teachers remembered I didn't like sugar in my tea so made it without...(actually it was just a few degrees less sweet than Zoeys! But still nice of them to remember). We were also given Rambuttans in the lesson by the teacher when a child said they liked them and we said we did too, so we ate them and lemon biscuits which we had been supplied with by Ajith. Then we had to teach the grade 4's. I picked up hope as the English teacher introduced herself to us and I thought it would be an productive lesson. In fact, she wanted to leave and teach another class. We said we needed her to stay. She did, and was very helpful - e.g when a little boy kept giving the wrong answer she said he did it on purpose for attention, and she told us the children were used to a certain sentence structure 'I like to eat....for breakfast/lunch/dinner'. This made the world of difference to their responses. Firstly we played pictionary and their vocab was good (except we had to alter the rules so that instead of a person drawing for their own team to guess, they drew it for the other team so that there was no cheating and telling what they were drawing!) And then we did 'I like to eat'. Some children were very good and really got it, others were slower but most got it, especially as the teacher was there to help. She used the cane at one point on a little boys shoulder! They seem to put up with more disruption than we would eg standing up, calling out. 

A few children were very attention seeking and kept putting their hands up all the time, even when we weren't asking a question. Funnily, they weren't the brightest, as often attention seeking children are because they are bored. The brightest were very quiet. The teacher was good at knowing who had/hadn't answered, and who should be asked. So despite us asking her to stay she worked with us well. We then played bananas and coconuts and they really got it. Their playground is so gravelly and when they fall over they get really bad cuts and grazes, but no one seems to care. The kids took over and the game went on without much input from me which was nice. They got that they could use any 2 food words and so varied them. The only problem was some kids complaining to me in Sinhalese that the same person had gone lots, when they hadn't (I assume this was what they were saying anyway!) But there wasn't much I could do about it. Satisfyingly the most attention seeking people weren't picked!! 

We finished at 12 which we weren't expecting and had to call Ajith to get us an earlier tuk tuk. The teacher hadn't been told that we were staying till 12 so had told the kids to go home then. Zoey had been chatting to her during the game, and found out that her kids went to international school and were taught English literature from grade 3! She also told us that wed was speaking day (according to the curriculum) - this explains why speaking is so poor if they only do it once a week and also if all they do is telling stories etc then this doesn't practice conversation. If we are coming in Wednesdays, it seems ideal we are used in these classes but NOT as replacements for the teacher. The problem is we come in, they leave us to it, we have no idea what the children know, how they are taught, and can't translate into Sinhalese and the children play up majorly and we don't know how to deal with them and which are problematic and why. We should come in to help the teacher in a way that she wants and thinks would be useful. We may have deprived a class of a teacher today because we made her stay with us, when she said she had to teach another class. That's not our fault, but nor is it hers as she thinks we've come in to do her lesson. There is a lack of communication on so many levels - between the charity and teachers, between the teachers and us and between the charity and us. 

We tried to speak to Ajith when we got back. He said that the government doesn't let 'outsiders' take lessons so that's why the teachers leave us...that makes no sense! If this was the case then they wouldn't leave us because if we were just helping them, then we wouldn't be doing anything wrong. But anyway, this isn't a problem if the government approves of us coming in...surely the charity has this approval??!! He didn't seem happy. Also when we rang him in our first lesson to ask him to ring the principal and ask for a teacher to stay with us he kept saying 'the thing is...' and implying they didn't have to stay. But we'd talked to him yesterday about the importance of having a teacher!!  

The bus we used everyday

We chatted with the library girls at 2pm, and it was OK except they are very timid and only one speaks very much. They did ask Zoey if she likes short hair, and both of us if our hair was dyed and that they like our skin colour. We then taught an evening class to older children. We started by asking what they did at the weekend, and most went completely mute! They answered the question last week! We were so confused. One or two were really good - especially a girl with short dark hair who was very fluent and advanced. We had to go right back to the basics with the past tense and I felt really bad for her - it was obviously frustrating. We got them all talking when we talked about food and drink and what they ate for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Then we played pictionary and Zoey and I found out about milk rice and oil cake. At the end a girl gave us a traditional sweet made out of coconut oil and sugar and had a jelly texture. 

The bus back was scarily fast. We had a beer at Nebula and made a deal with the waiter that if we bought him and the chef an ice cream each, they'd make us milk rice for free! Win. Our supper was our fave cheese and tomato on toast, some cheesecake and pineapple cake we scavenged from the buffet, and some watermelon. Mmmmmm. Gossip girl and Friends were on, and so was Mama Mia!! This made me so happy and a bit homesick!

The library girls

21st June

So we went on a little jaunt with the charity to Neluwa library today! Went for a run at 6am and had a bit of a measly breakfast as we'd nearly run out of yoghurt. Roshan picked us up at 8:15 and drove us to the RSL library to pick up Ajith. Armed with enough water to fill the lagoon, and of course biscuits, we set off. Even the caretaker came! It took about 2 hours to get there and the roads were very windy and pot-holey. But the scenery was beautiful - vast tracts of tea plantations dotted with palm trees and with a backdrop of forested hills. It was a contrast to the beach and town landscape, and flat rural landscape we are used to. I was so excited to sea tea growing!! The library was in the centre of the tiny town, and is much smaller than the main one that we go to. But its an example branch, and has around 300 books. The arts section is busier than the main library in Uragaha as children are poor here and the teaching of sciences etc is poor. In the  Urugaha library, the sections are used equally. 

There are 3554 members at Urugaha and 300ish at Neluwa. New members have to fill in an application form - this puts them on the road for the future for when they have to fill in forms for jobs. The philosophy is that it doesn't matter if they are wrong here because it is the first time they've seen such a form - they can learn from their mistakes. There is a small annual fee of 150-200 rupees (50 discount for schoolchildren). Peoples addresses can be very vague, so it is hard to trace books. If they don't return books, they can keep them but are banned from the library (this happens mostly with education books not fiction books). Software system keeps record of everyone. Children with exams are given priority over certain educational books and their borrowing allowance is increased. The library is very important for schoolchildren as their parents often aren't educated.  First only adults used the library but now children do, and this shows it is successful. People come from over 50km away to use it.

They have Harry Potter in Sinhalese!

It reminded me of how important libraries are and how undervalued they are in England. The libraries set up by RSL are an example of how people can help themselves if they are given the chance, and that poor people do want to take opportunities given to them and libraries are needed and valued institutions. It was quite humbling actually. Many people here work as tea pickers, and earn 500 rupees a day (£2.50). We were taken to see a waterfall by Rochan which was spectacular, and there were locals bathing in the pool at the bottom, and he bought us bananas and passion fruit on the way back! We had lunch (fried rice) and were taken to see how small this town was. There was a stunning river at the end of the town which feeds the river in Bentota. 

At the waterfall

We picked up Ajith and the rest of the staff and drove back and we got back to Bentota at around 5. We drove rather too fast for my liking! We went to Nebula at 6ish after buying yoghurt and watermelon and ice creams for our waiter friend Madu and the cook...we had made a pact that if they made us milk rice we'd give them ice cream! We got it...a huge plateful complete with garlic chilli sauce stuff. I wasn't expecting it to be savoury - it was sticky rice made with coconut milk and salt and was savoury, and you put it with the chilli (it was nice without as well). I made the chef and Madu sit with us...the chef stayed for a few mins and we had a bit of a chat, then he went and Madu finally came and had some with us. It was nice. We also met the owners wife, and she invited us on Tuesday for drinks at Escofia (his other restaurant). It was nice to meet her - last time he told us that she gets jealous when he talks to other girls, but it was nice he'd told her about us and she chatted to us. So we got a free supper, and an invite! 

Milk rice. mmmmm

22nd June

Got to lie in until 8am today. Yay! Had passion fruit with our banana and yogurt breakfast - spiced things up a bit! Got picked up at 9 by a tuk tuk, and arrived at Rainbow Centre at 9:15. We just sat down and had some tea, and waited for Aruni to arrive. She didn't, and so we went to the daycare children. We were annoyed, because this happened last week - we just turned up and no one told us what we should do, or would be doing. But day care was really fun. There were 2 new girls who weren't here last week as the had fevers. We played with bricks, and then took them outside to kick around a ball. 

She is very grown up and carries the balls back...

Then she topples...

And falls!!

Then it was rice soup time. After this, we got them drawing trees and colouring in elephants. Zoey and I enjoyed ourselves far too much drawing our own pictures!

 We saw Aruni, and she didn't say anything to us which we felt was quite rude. All she had to do was say hello, ask how we were getting on and apologise for being very busy. We don't really feel appreciated here - we are having a good time playing with the children, and its so interesting and eye opening to see how the centre is run and looks after the kids so well, and how poor some children are. We were chatting to the lady who looks after the daycare children, and she was telling us how one little boy lives with his aunty because his father went off with another woman and his mother went off with another man. He wears a band around his waist with a silver charm on to ward off the devil (it is around his waist because the centre told his aunt that having it around his neck makes it hard for eating and washing, and at one point he had several). 

She pointed out another little girl and said she has several other siblings, and doesn't have a father. Her mother works as a cleaner in the streets, but for every 100 (50p) she earns she spends 300  (on alcohol etc). Then another little boy - his mother, father and older brother work but they spend it all. We were told all this whilst the children were being washed and scrubbed. Then it was lunchtime - the same routine as last week and immaculate behaviour. We had an egg, dahl, rice, popadums and coconut sambal. We then waited to teach our afternoon classes in a room with a fan. It gets so hot here its quite uncomfortable and makes me feel quite ill. We waited around until 3pm and Aruni was on the phone to the donor the whole time so we couldn't ask her what we should do. In the end we taught the younger class and carried on from last week - drawing f and g and a fish and a girl. We did a recap of last week, and the little boy with glasses drew an upside down dog again! There was a girl who wasn't in the class last week, but she whizzed through and was super intelligent. She is the one that the lady who looks after the day care pointed out as having no father and her mother spends all the money she earns. Her clothes were dirty and shabby, but when she was writing and drawing her face just lit up. 

We then taught the older group, and played pictionary with food and drink to see what vocabulary they knew. We then did 'I like to eat/drink...' I don't like to eat/drink...' and lots of them said they like ice cream soda! The littler ones at the front (there's quite an age range) didn't get the difference between eat and drink because the teacher left and wasn't there to translate. But we got there in the end. We had some tea and then left without much acknowledgement from anybody except the kids (who all lined up at the end of the lesson to shake our hands and say 'goodbye, see you next week'. Aruni and her mum passed us in a tuk tuk and offered us a lift, and we said no because we were going to Bentota, but I'm not sure why they didn't come and say goodbye and tell us they were going to Aluthgama (where we live) and did we want a lift. We had a good evening though; we finally made it to the Golden Grill restaurant (everyone has been raving about it) and had shark steak!! It was so good - had the meaty texture of tuna steak but was more tender, delicate and flakey and had a pinkish colour. 

23rd June

We got up just after 5, and Rochan picked us up at 6am. I made some banana and yoghurt breakfast to take in the car. We went down the new highway which was built 8 months ago by a Japanese company and is totally empty!! Lorries aren't allowed on it...weird! We flew to Columbo in 45 mins! It took 2.5 hours to get from the airport, I wish wed used the highway (I think its too expensive). We then drove to a spice garden, where we were shown around by a guide. We saw a cocoa tree, cinnamon tree, sandalwood tree to name but a few, and got ginger tea. We then got a free massage! It was totally unexpected and rather on the hop, but we were both sat on benches and given a really good back and face massage with red sandalwood oil and then a foot massage (done sitting leaning against a wall!) But it was so good and relaxing and the man had a great technique - the most massage like massage I've had in a while (its quite vigorous in Thailand and Laos!). We gave a 500 rupee tip - so a 30 min massage for like £1.25! Win. 

Then we stopped at a tea factory. We got a free cup of Ceylon broken orange pekoe tea (BOP tea). We were then taken to see how it is made. It stank of tea and made me feel quite sick (it was a really bitter and sharp smell). It was also really hot because they ferment the tea using wood fired oven, and the wood is transported on an old school pulley system. We found out the difference between the teas they make:
BOP:  broken orange pekoe - drink without milk and with sugar. Quite strong because it is small leaves
BOP: broken orange pekoe fanning - same as English breakfast tea
Green tea - comes from the same plant but not fermented like normal tea
Golden tips and silver tips -a herbal tea and a very rare type. Very little produced
Flowery pekoe and orange pekoe: bigger flakes and weaker/lighter 
2500kg of tea is produced a day at the factory and all sent to auction in Columbo and exported all over the world. None stays in Sri Lanka or it is mixed and poorer quality.

I got further information from a book from the RSL library:

• 3 steps of withering, grinding and fermenting convert the fresh leaves into a moist, black mass which is then heated in a stove to reduce to two percent all the moisture originally contained in the leaf.
•  once broken into flakes, tea is graded into names based on the size of the flake. These names correspond to size categories: pekoe, orange pekoe, broken orange pekoe, broken orange pekoe fanning and dust (the latter a low quality that finds its way into many of the worlds teabags).
•  the graded teas are auctioned and exported, with the buyers relying on the expertise of their own tasters to guide them
• expert tasters classify tea into categories (rather like wine tasters) such as malty, pointy, bakey, thick, coppery, dull and bright according to strength, flavour and colour.

Then we went to Kandy. We were met from the car by the guide Rochan is frinds with. There were monkeys! He took us, and when we were buying our ticket we saw you could get a free audio guide. We had no option to take this as we were stuck with our guide and I was a little peeved. I know a bit about the temple and its history from first year at Cambridge, and he really wasn't telling us much at all. He was also really hard to understand. He did tell us that in 1815 the British got the tooth relic (the Portuguese and Dutch tried to get it first). But after they got it, there was no rain and the lake dried up. When they gave it to the people it rained (they performed a ritual with it) and so it was formally returned in 1853  to the Buddhist monks. He also pointed out a huge Buddha statue on the top of a hill where a previous king used to take people for punishment and roll them down hills in barrels!

The Temple of the Tooth

We asked to have the audio guide after, and gave him a bit less for a tip than Rochan had told us because he was rubbsih!! We felt bad but it wasn't fair that we were made to go with him, then he wasn't good and we had to go round again which made it extra long for us. the ticket people were really awkward about giving us an audio guide as they demanded our passports and we didn't have them! But in the end they took Zoey's student card. We weren't going to steal the shitty mp3 players that were sellotaped up and had no fast forward or rewind!!
We found out this from the audioguide: The tooth is from the dead Buddha. It was brought from India to Sri Lanka for protection in 1453 after some king tried to destroy it but failed (Sri Lanka is strongly Buddhist). It was  subsequently moved through many cities to Kandy where it now rests. The king who built the entrance to the tooth relic temple reigned from 1707-1739. The key to  the temple is as important as the relic - carried by important people in the temple. It is a very sacred place and was packed with people carrying garlands of lotus flowers to place in worship. Afterwards, we drove up to get a good view of the temple on the lake. 

We headed back on the long drive back after this - no lunch! We weren't sure if our driver was annoyed with us about his guide friend and tipping him less, but its not our fault. He didn't ask us if wed had lunch, and we hadn't - before we came he said he was going to take us to this restaurant for lunch, and we asked if we could go to a restaurant for dinner and have a lighter lunch. He didn't really answer and maybe we gave him the impression we didn't want to stop, or maybe he just couldn't be bothered to take us anywhere else, or maybe he thought we'd eaten at the temple and doesn't have a clue that we went around again with the audio guide and isn't annoyed at all because he doesn't know (although we did say to him we went round again). It turns out he was worried that we were annoyed with him, so that's why he was silent, and more to the point he wanted to get back for his mates birthday. Men!!! And girls - for reading so much into it!! We had dinner at our local place in the end. But he is normally so caring and lovely, and looks after us so well, we were a bit concerned!

25th May

Although it was Monday, we had a day off today. We slept in until 9 and then had rolls (which we'd scavenged from the buffet yesterday) and mango jam and passion fruit for breakfast. We wrote postcards and showered, and then Rochan came round for an impromptu 'meeting' to tell us about the river safari we wanted to do. It turned out that we had to do it there and then, because of rain and so we grabbed our stuff and went! It was just the 2 of us in the boat, and we set off down the river keeping quite close to the river bank and mangroves. Our guide/driver spotted animals we'd never have seen! First we saw a large lizard thing that was mottled yellow and black (I've forgotten what its called) and then we saw a crocodile! It was exactly how I had imagined - lurking in the marshy foliage with its eyes peeking out of the water. It was quite large. 

Can you see the crocodile?

We also saw some baby crocodiles and a man in a boat came up to us and let us hold one! I was quite scared as its teeth looked sharp and its eyes were really beady and yellow. But we were assured it wouldn't bite! I gingerly took its tail and head, and it was so soft! I got a bit freaked out when I could feel its heart beating, but apart from that it was fine. I hope it was a staged part of the tour, otherwise I hate to think what it was destined for... 

Pretty scary!

We also saw a chameleon, kingfisher, cormarant and heron. We were supposed to go for 2 1/2 hours but it started raining. This was actually a good thing, as we'd been lucky and seen everything, and we paid more than half the price we'd agreed! Win! We went back via some mangroves which were eerie and reminded me of Pirates of the Caribbean! On the way back, we bought a papaya for the equivalent of 12 pence and had it for pudding at lunch - bargain! It was a really nice one (some of them taste like feet according to Zoey, and I agree they have an odd taste unless they are really soft and ripe). We have a papaya tree in our back yard, but they're not ripe yet. 

We then went to look around the market and shops. There is no sense of fashion here - the clothes are dire!! We bought a few presents, and eyed up the spices we want to take home to cook with. Top of my list are saffron, cinnamon sticks and cardamom and they crop up a lot in recipes and are expensive in England. I also want to get some Maldive dried fish so I can make the amazing aubergine and fish curry that we have. It doesn't smell so will be fine in my luggage! We had an early beer at Nebula, then went home, I copied some recipes from a book that we have borrowed from the library and we went to our favorite cheap eat place - Sinharaja and had egg Kottu and devilled fish. Yum! 

The river. It was so beautiful, like something out of a painting

26th June

We got up at 6am for a run. I'm glad we did it, although I had to wear tubigrips on both of my knees! The road surfaces combined with Primark pumps don't make for great running :/ it has started to rain a little in the mornings, and so whilst we were cooling down and having our coffee, it rained. But it stopped for our walk to the bus station just after 8. It was a pleasant bus ride - we didn't break down, there was a nice breeze and the sun was shining on me without being too hot. Got a tuk tuk from the RSL library to Galpotha school and arrived around 9:30am. The English teacher was there, and first we taught grade 1 for an hour. We hadn't really planned our lesson in advance...but had the inspiration that we would cut pieces of paper into circles - plates - and get the children to draw their favourite foods on it and colour them in. We had ice cream, chocolate, pineapple, mango, grapes, rambutan ... some were very good. We also got them to write the word of each food on their plate. Some seem to have problems with forming the characters e.g a's are very curly and Sinhalese looking! 

She was stopping her friends copying by stacking books around her but
the head teacher caught her and said it wasn't very nice!!

At the end of the lesson we gave out milk packets to each child - they get one every month and had been donated by Loughborough High School. The children here are very poor and most of them are tiny, and so they really need it. We then had a break, and I braved the toilet - it was in a very jungly patch and I was so scared about snakes!! We then taught grade 3 and then grade 4 - each 35 mins. We did the same thing with both classes - and each were as useless as the other! We played hangman with questions that we had learned in previous weeks such as 'what is your name?' But they just couldn't guess it even when only 1 letter was missing! They also kept guessing random letters like z and q which obviously weren't going to fit. Even if this was too easy (I have a feeling the English teacher thought it was) these children need to go back to the basics and play such simple games so they can apply what they have learned. If they can't guess that 'what is your _ame'  is 'what is your name' then this shows they are being taught things that they don't fully understand. 

Feeling a bit like we'd been pulling teeth, we then went and played 'What's the time Mr Wolf?' as they remembered it. They still didn't really get the concept of shouting 'dinner time' before they ran to catch someone, but hey. We then gave out milk packets. The teacher then wanted us to teach grade 5. She said Mr Wolf was too simple, and can we teach them a poem or song. All the teachers here seem to think this is what the children want and need...but we've found that it just falls on deaf ears and more often than not the children can't pronounce the words, remember them or understand what they mean. Also, how does it teach them to apply their english - its great to spout poetry but its not going to get you very far!! We played hangman but made the kids come up and think on their own word. We tried to get them to do any word they knew, and we got rabbit, hat, cricket bat and ball. It was nice to see what they actually know. Some of their writing on the board is neater and more neatly formed than mine!! And their drawing is excellent. Then, because they were finding this too easy, Zoey and I gave them words to guess and then questions. Again, this was hard work, but they were quicker than the previous groups.

We found out we had more time left than we were expecting, so had to teach them a song as we couldn't play games for all that time. We did 'If you're happy and you know it'. We wrote it on the board, and they got it quite well. They particularly giggled when we sang 'if you're happy and you know it do all four (and then you clap your hands, stomp your feet, nod your head, bend your knees in silence). Then we played banana banana coconut (our version of 'Duck Duck Goose) and they were good at saying different foods. We were picked up just before 1 and when we got back to the centre had our lunch parcel of rice and a selection of curries and sambols. There was our favourite aubergine, onion and fish curry, a nice thick dahl, a very limey coconut and mint leaf (?) sambol, a curried onion and potato thing and a small piece of fish, oh and some poppadoms. 

Handing out milk packets

When we came back, we sat in Ajiths office as the reference library was being used, and we didn't have a meeting with him as planned. Sanu and Rosie (from Elpitiya school) came at 2:30pm and we chatted to them. Sanu brought us traditional hats made by her grandfather, and both invited us to dinner on Friday and Saturday. 

Modelling our cool hats!

We went to Nebula at 6:30 to meet the owner for drinks, but he was over an hour late. We finally decided to get a beer and if he hadn't come by the time we'd finished we'd go and eat elsewhere. Then there was a power cut, and when we finally got our beer in the dark he arrived! We left our beer and got in their car to drive to their other restaurant Escofia. It turns out that last night they had hosted a dinner party for the presidents niece, and had got back to Columbo at 3am, and had driven back to Aluthgama today. So they had an excuse for being late! We had the most amazing cocktail, and then bread and a cheese board, then some lovely wine (Milliman - Australian) and a seafood platter which included whole crab, Talapath fish steak, prawns, calamari...yum. 

Their 2 year old son was very fidgety and kept spilling his blackcurrant Fanta everywhere and dipping his rolls in it! He had the biggest and most monkey looking eyes too! We were quite drunk by the end, and had experienced what it is like to dine with the manager of several restaurants - he kept jumping up and got distracted by a party who had reserved a table. But we chatted to his wife a lot. She has been a wedding planner, and they both went to England together for 2 years and he worked at the Marriot. They have both had a lot of experience in hospitality, and have made it for themselves, but most of their friends have moved to Australia or are from England. They were so generous to us though and said they'd give us a discount at their new guesthouse that they are opening soon if we come back!

27th June

We arrived and the teacher had grade 5 all sat outside. She was very vague about what she wanted us to do and just said 'have you got something planned?' But last week she had told us it was conversation day, so we expected she would help us with getting them to tell stories etc. She was also teaching them before, and just stopped what she was doing and passed the buck to us. She said she had been playing eye spy - this is a good idea for future games. We had some songs we could do - if your happy and you know it, and head shoulders knees and toes. It was a little annoying, as again we were just expected to teach rather than help in the class. We asked if we could watch her do a story with them, but she said she'd used a book from the library and didn't have it, but did show us what some children had drawn and it looked quite advanced. Its puzzling because they can write well, using advanced language yet it was so hard for us to get answers to 'what is your name?' In the first week! I guess its our lack of ability to explain to them and that is the barrier, and the teacher is reluctant to explain on our behalf. I think its fine if the teacher wants us to take over the lesson but really we need to talk to them before, find out what she would like us to teach and how advanced the children are, and have her in the class with us to translate. 

The English teacher with her class

In the end we wrote the words on the board, and they copied them down, and we sang it and they pronounced well. They'd already sung it and corrected us saying it is 'surely want to show it' rather than 'really want to show it.' We kept getting it wrong. We then did head, shoulders, knees and toes and went outside to play Simon Says. We got them to be Simon after practicing and they said things like dance, run, hop which was quite good. Then we played banana, banana, coconut which they remembered, and cheered at, and then Mr Wolf - again a cheer went up! We got distracted by a chameleon and I tried to take a photo but the children scared it away! One little boy insisted on throwing stones at a dog, and they all started to throw stones at the chameleon.

The children here also continually grab us. I was given a necklace by the girl with really short hair who is very attention seeking. We then had a break and I got sugary tea again :( and we taught grade 3 for 30 mins. We sang head, shoulders knees and toes, played Simon Says, did the hokey kokey (they loved it and were hysterical when we ran into the middle - one boy nearly pulled my arm off!) and played banana banana coconut, and they really got it. We just left them playing until the end, when one little boy fell over and cut his knee. Then we were going to teach grade 2, but they were going home!! We got a tuk tuk back early, and talked with the pre school teachers at the centre. They were all sat around the table with notebooks, but only one spoke and asked us questions about pre school teaching in England. We realised that pre school is a different concept for us - its either nursery where learning isn't really the focus, or rich parents send their kids to pre school. Here, all children go. They were also asking about the level of English of the children at the schools we have taught at, and the teaching, and we said they needed to speak more. They had good knowledge but couldn't apply it. So we told them what we had done with the little ones -grade 1 - drawing and tracing letters and pictures, drawing family, writing letters and numbers etc. 

We then had lunch - fried rice - disaster!! We wanted a last lunch packet :( then we had a meeting with Ajith and told him our main feedback was that we needed a teacher in the class to make the most of our time. He explained (again) that many are worried about looking bad in front of us and the children and so try to leave for this reason. But the English teachers at Gal and Bathu were good...maybe they didn't think they were? Also it would be good to talk and meet with the teachers before we start to get to know a bit about each grade at the school, what they can and can't do, and what we could do to help. He told us that in the case of Elpitiya, he had spoken with the english teacher and they had decided that next time a group of children would come to the RSL library after school to be taught - this would solve the problem of the huge class size, noise and disruptions. He told us that education is the key to solving poverty, and I think this is a great motto. Zoey was feeling ill, so after we'd said our goodbyes and Ajith had given us a present - a guide to Buddhism - we got a tuk tuk home. No bus to negotiate!!

28th June

Today was our day off and we went for a run at 6am. We went to the beach quite late after waiting for the washing machine to do all its cycles and talking to Rochan about the afternoon. We got an icecream on the way - so yum and the equivalent of 40 pence :) We got soaked on the way randomly, but then it was sunny again! We went for a walk along the beach and saw a dead dolphin - its flesh had been spread everywhere and it was gross! I didn't know dolphins were so big! 

We went back for our last ever cheese and tomato on toast and some papaya and tea, and then Rochan picked us up to see the largest reclining Buddha in South Asia. We drove for about 40 mins and though a very rural area, past cinnamon groves, and arrived. It is so hidden and unassuming and magical. And it was bigger than the golden Buddha in Bangkok, by a long way. It was just breathtaking. This is the history of it:

(From 'The sunday times PLUS,' Sunday April 23 2006).

35metres in length
Through cinnamon plantations to the Karandeniya Galagoda Shailatharama Viharaya which houses the largest reclining Buddha in South Asia
About 800 years old belonging to the Dambadeniya period in history in the reign of king Parakramabahu 11
Would have been one of major tasks of the period and undertaken by the prominent chief minister of the king Devapathiraja (who built many temples down the coast)
Abandoned - temple became overgrown and was ransacked by vandals hoping to find treaure and supposedly renovated about 100 years ago by a pious villager Iyonis
Would have originally been out in the open - hall housing it built later and has 7 doors
Statue was on rock, but builders cemented the floor - takes away historical value
Ill maintained due to lack of funds.



































The Buddha was being renovated



















We left feeling very happy about having found this gem. Rochan showed us a cinnamon tree and gave us some bark to eat and it was cinnamony!! We went back via the turtle sanctuary and found out the time for releasing the hatchlings was 7pm, so we will come back on Monday. We then went back to Aluthagama and got a beer after buying some spices - some cinnamon sticks and powder, Maldive fish and Cardamom because its better and cheaper than in England. Then we got a beer at Pier 88. Madu asked us if we wanted to join a group of guys wh had said they'd get us mojitos when Madu said we liked them. Why not? We ended up having another cocktail on top and several cigarettes. The guy from Japan (he's Sri Lankan but has moved to Japan and works in an aluminium factory) said he'd also get the beer we'd had before! When we left, Madu said they had only paid for the cocktails, and so we settled the beer. Then as we were walking to get dinner, he pulled up beside us in a tuk tuk and thrust a 5000 rupee note into our hand and left!! This is like £25. Not the cost of a beer! We didn't know what to do but felt very uncomfortable (we assume he'd meant to give us 500 rupees). So we walked back to the restaurant and tried to find him to give the money back. But he was so wasted that he didn't understand what was going on, and after a lot of explaining he finally took the 5000 and gave us 1000 instead saying he didn't have any change. Really the whole affair was far too much effort, and he clearly wouldn't have missed the 4500 extra he gave us, but it was the right thing to do. We had dinner at the Golden Grill - a selection of curries and coconut Roti and Pittu (rice flour and desiccated coconut cooked in bamboo leaves) and the 1000 covered our dinner. So free drinks (I was pretty drunk) and food!! 

29th June

Today is our last day of volunteering!! We were picked up by a tuk tuk and couldn't go the normal way because the road was blocked. Instead we went the long way around and saw a parade - school children on bikes with amazing craft trees attatched to them! The driver said he thought an important person was coming to visit.

We arrived at the Rainbow centre and had some tea and chatted to. Aruni's father. He told us some really interesting information.

- the Highway is 450 rupees one way. Government have to pay back Japan in 10 years. But worth the toll to save fuel and time? Safety first. No stray cattle!
Soon highway will be finished direct to Kandy and it will take 1 hour Columbo - Kandy
- there are bribes all the time when dealing with officials or institutions or the government. For example:

 to get planning permission for classrooms and toilets at the centre
to get the Public Health Inspector (who comes every month) to sign that everything is OK
to get children into popular and good schools in the main cities. Columbo - £500 to principal. These are government schools.
parents can be well educated, but can't get their children into a good school if they don't pay. These city schools have indoor gyms, swimming pools, public libraries, it suits. Some rural schools don't have chalk and blackboard! Some rural schools only have one teacher - no English or maths or science teacher
Hospitals good in cities but poor in other areas. Private hospital - 10,000 rupees to heal cut finger. Government hospital won't charge but not facilities! Some have no ambulance or electricity. So have to go private if need good care. Private health insurance is expensive. 
 the Centre does vaccinations and dental care for children. Children were vomiting, worms - no longer.
Scabies, lice, worms, small wounds everyday from playing. Infected mosquito bites as so dirty. No serious diseases
allocation of spending at the centre is divided into main categories: education, salaries, teaching expenses, health, family health 
He does everything he can do to save expenses
Rainbow is first project for street children in Sri Lanka. People in Sri Lanka disregard these children as lowest class - many are Tamils
120 families covered by the centre
Children here are unwanted by parents. They want them for begging. 
Aruni goes to schools where the older children are in the mornings to talk about their needs - books, clothes etc and issues. The teachers aren't interested. 


It was great chatting to him. We then went into daycare. The children were colouring in temples, and we drew outlines of houses for them to colour in. Then, while they were eating their rice soup, we cut out boat shapes and fish for them to stick on and make a collage of the sea. One little boy kept falling asleep - apparently he goes to bed at 11/12 at night because of his parents - getting home from work, cooking then watching tv, and he is up at 4/5am. Poor thing!! 











So sleepy!!


Another little girl kept turning over her paper and doing her own thing - she wasn't interested in what we'd drawn!! Colouring inside the shapes/lines was not anyone's strong point ... Then we were treated to a preformance of songs, including I'm a little teapot and Moon Uncle. It was very cute. Then it was bathtime and lunch. Lunch was yum - eggs in a thin yellow curry, jackfruit seed curry (the seeds look and taste like soft whole brazil nuts and they are mixed with onions in a sauce), coconut and green stuff sambol (too almondy) brown rice and poppadoms. 

Our lunch





We then sat by the fan until our class at 3pm. Its so hot at the centre and it always makes me feel a bit ill. Aruni actually spoke to us when the children were being bathed, and asked us to teach the older class first. We asked if she wanted us to teach them anything specific, and she said no they liked our games and carry on with what were doing. She said 2 more volunteers are coming in July and that they could pick up where we had ended. That was quite encouraging - she cant think we are rubbish then! Out theory that she thinks we are capable and is just leaving us to it is probably right. It still doesn't make it better that she doesn't speak to us but hey. 
Our lessons went quite well. We played hangman with the older class to revise what we'd learned. They guessed the sentences such as 'what is your name?' and 'I live with my mother and my two sisters' unlike the classes at the other schools. At the end we played pictionary and asked them to draw any English word they knew, and we got bulb, butterfly and t-shirt. Then as a tie breaker, Zoey and I drew a town, and team b guessed it. Honestly, the children here are the most rewarding to teach. The younger children carried on with learning the alphabet - we did h for house and I for ice cream. Aruni had stapled their previous work together so they had a little alphabet booklet each which was very satisfying. We left and had to tell the children that we weren't coming back! 

Some of the children from the Rainbow Centre

Aruni's father



We were picked up at Bentota beach hotel by Sanu and her little cousin in her fathers tuk tuk. It took around an hour to get to her house which is 4km from Elpitiya school. It was small and she lives with her grandma and father (her mum is in Kuwait - she visits once a year and Sanu has no desire to go to Quwait...odd!) We had chocolate bourbons, and tried the kos fruit which tasted like banana and had the texture of a vegetable. I quite liked it. And we got rambutans! Sanu also showed us her multitude of English certificates. She wasn't going to eat with us (I think guests tend to eat alone!) But we insisted she did. The food was sooooo good. Chicken curry, dahl, kos curry (the seed is like chestnuts and the fruit goes like sweet plantain when it is cooked, and it is mixed with coconut) a really good chilli sambol, potato curry, coconut roti and brown rice. We had ice cream for pudding which was so good - quite mousey in texture. After, we saw her bedroom and her books and timetables, and her cousin played us the organ...his uncle sang...it had a backing beat and was a Sinhalese song. Hmmmmm. We persuaded them that we had to go because it would take an hour for her dad to take us back. It was such a good evening - Sanus' grandma asked us to take her back to England with us!! 









Her cute cousin!!


30th June
Today was the start of our final days off. I went for a run in the morning and was ready for my Sri Lankan breakfast! We decided we had to try it and it cost 70 pence!! We had dahl and fish curry and bread and manioc with coconut - it was definitely not my idea of breakfast, but I was really hungry so just pretended it was lunch and it was really tasty. 






Then Rochan picked us up and took us to a temple that was over 1000 years old, and was a dazzling white set against the bright blue sky. It had 2 mini temples with reclining Buddhas inside and a young monk wondered around keeping an eye on us. There was a beautiful lilly pond next to it, and a lady came up to us with a lotus flower necklace fore each of us and put it around our necks. 












We then drove back to Aluthgama and went to an internet cafe to put my photos onto USB - it was a slooooow process! Then Zoey burned the photos onto a CD in the Kodak shop opposite and because they did it straight from USB, it took ages!! Whilst it was chugging along, we went to buy some things from the supermarket and took them back to the house. After everything was done, we had some mango jam on toast and rambutans for lunch and then went to Bentota beach hotel - Zoey was having a wax and I was skyping Tom. We went for a long walk along the beach after Zoey had finished, and then Rosie (one of the girls from Elpitiya school who have befriended us, and friends with Sanu) came and picked us up in her uncles tuk tuk. It took around an hour to get to her house, and her uncle drove like a maniac - going up right behind buses, and pulling out and overtaking them. 


Her house was more rural than Sanu's in what they call the 'village side'. It had a cute little garden, and was surrounded by trees and paddies. It was a very basic and small home and her family obviously have less money than Sanu's (both of Sanu's parents work: her mother owns a shop in Kuwait and sends Sanu money). Her mum is early 30's, and was Rosi's age when she had Rosi! We also met her little bother, dad, uncle, aunt and grandma (who was 90 but didn't look it!). We chatted to Rosi, who really came out of herself when she wasn't with Sanu. She told us how she went to extra maths and science and history classes at the weekend (tomorrow - Sunday - she has tuition from 7am-6pm) and goes to literature classes only when her parents can afford it. She wants to be a doctor and needs to get 9 A+'s in her O levels but needs extra literature classes. They cost about 2000 rupees a month. Its sad that she is disadvantaged because she can't afford the lessons, and she 'self improves' her English language and other subjects because she is good at them - yet Sanu goes to extra English language classes and is excellent. I think this was a defensive explanation. I'm sure if her family had the money she'd go to more. The bright children need extra classes because teaching just isn't adequate in schools. The way she sees it is Sanu has more money than Rosie thanks to her mum, but Rosie still has a mother who lives with her. I know which one I would rather. She also said she gets up at 2am to study before school/tuition. Mad!!


Dinner was amazing - she cooked us Tamil food (here is an example of her intelligence, as she thought what can I cook that they won't have tried?) and it was yum. Wheat pancakes, these doughnut looking things that were made of flour and savoury and has a springy airy texture although they were quite dense, a cocunut sambol that was lovely and creamy and a sambol made of fried onions (like broken crisps) with sugar and nuts. So yum. Then there was a pudding that had a texture somewhere between creme brlulee and cake, and was sweet and syrupy with nuts and raisins on top. Was it made of jaggery and coconut milk? Then pineapple. Rosie wasn't going to eat with us, and when we asked her to she hardly ate a thing. No-one seems to want to eat with us when we go to their house - is it what they do with guests? Or is it because we are western? Whatever it is, we found it weird!! 


We also got papaya but I'm not sure it was meant for us...I saw her father coming back with one and pointed it out to Zoey for the novelty, and of course Rosie heard and made us have some! We sat outside in the dark, under the moon and palm trees and were watched by her whole family. Lots of photos were taken, and her uncle who is 27 definitely made inappropriate remarks to Rosie about us and said she shouldn't have told us he was married with 2 kids! I think this is why her mother was sent back in the tuk tuk with us!! There was a lot of confusion about where we lived, and Rosies mum rang Sanu's dad for directions even though we knew it was easy to direct the tuk tuk! On the way back we saw an accident - a bus with loads of people crowded around and a trail of blood behind. My guess is someone was hit and dragged. The buses fly at night and wouldn't stand a chance of stopping if they saw an obstruction. Shudder. When we got home it was bedtime. 

1st June
So the last few days have hit! It is scary how fast our time has gone here!! I think having the pool and buffet every Sunday gave us a marker - before we knew it it was Sunday again and the start of a new week, and before we knew it it was the last one!! The last buffet was top quality and was a good one to go out on! We had everything from freshly cooked chili crab, salads and sushi, butterfly prawn curry, carrot and cashew curry, rosemary roast beef, to fruit crumble cake and custard, chocolate mousse, fruit platters and ice cream. It made up for the weather being a bit rubbish and raining! We got to sit outside after the buffet and it was warm - just not sunny and we used the pool sufficiently. We took so many supplies! Rolls, butter, fruit, cakes, toilet roll, teabags and even milk!! Oh, and a towel each as a reminder (and we think they're quite cool!!).

Our loot!!

2nd June
Today our breakfast and lunch were made up of buffet stash (rolls, cake and fruit) and biscuits left over from volunteering. We packed our bags and it was sad for our house to suddenly be condensed down into 2 rucksacks!! We looked around Aluthgama market - so much dried fish!! And had a last visit to Bentota Beach hotel and beach. Then Roshan came round and gave us fresh limes and ginger and ginger tea and the jaggery that we had ordered. I had also bought some mango jam to take home...my bag was suddenly bursting!! We watched a last episode of friends - it was, quite appropriately, a special hour long episode where Ross goes to a medical conference abroad and they all go with him. Then we went for a last beer at Nebula and then dinner at the Golden Grill and I had shark steak. It kept raining, and little things kept irritating us, and I think we were being told it was time to go. We went to bed early as it is a 2am start tomorrow!