Settling in

Tuesday 27th May 2003. Colombo
There was no opportunity to write anything yesterday as lots of friends and relatives were calling all evening.

Yesterday began with a visit to the jewellers to collect Neil’s and Jeev’s wedding rings and to select a diamond ring for Neil to present to Kalinga as part of the Poruwa wedding ceremony. The area around Ratnapura is considered to be the gem capital of the World - the name means, literally, City of Gems. There are very many jewellers throughout the country selling elaborately ornate, heavy gold jewellery set with sapphires, diamonds and other gemstones. The ordinary Sri Lankan people tend to carry their wealth around with them in the form of jewellery, rather than holding investments or bank accounts. It’s a common perception that every European visitor to the country will wish to purchase some locally mined and crafted jewellery whilst there. However, we found it all rather too decorative for our more simple, western taste. Neil and Kalinga were soon sorted and we all waited patiently whilst dozens of trays of rings and bangles were pored over by Jeev, Nita and the salesman. They found it all very exciting but for the rest of us it soon became rather tedious. However, there were comfortable chairs and the place had very efficient air conditioning.

We were then taken by our hired driver to the dilapidated suburban railway station at Bambalapitiya to pick up Marc who had rung earlier to say he’d arrived from Caen. He is so tall he towered above the other passengers alighting at the station where he struggled with all his luggage, including a huge surf board. The railway station was an unbelievable ruin. It looked like a very old and dirty bombsite. But still there were kiosks with vendors selling chick peas, rather dubious looking pastries and general tat.

Leaving Marc’s luggage in the van we walked back up the dirty, litter strewn street that heaved with people, looking remarkably clean and fresh in white shirts, sarongs or saris. Here we rejoined Jeev, Nita and Kalinga in a wonderful, quite unexpected, air- conditioned shopping precinct for iced fruit crushes and for Marc to have a meal.

Kate, Rob, Ian and I all then went our different ways and the others took Marc off to a guest house in Mount Lavinia where a couple of Jeev’s and Neil’s Italian friends were staying. Marc says it’s really good and cheap and he has decided to return there once he has been travelling for a bit.

Ian and I walked along the Galle Road towards the city centre and Fort. We were perpetually warding off tuc-tuc drivers unable to believe that we actually wanted to walk. However, it quickly became exhausting in the heat and as the fifteen kilometres between Ratmalana and Colombo is one long ribbon of run-down, scruffy little shops interspersed with various banks and temples, seething with people and with the constant chaotic roar and perpetual hooting of passing vehicles, we soon flagged and decided to catch a bus. We clambered aboard, hanging on the handrail by the exit steps, swinging along with the locals for whom there was no room inside.

The bus turned out to be going the wrong way so we jumped off. It had however saved us a considerable walk so we continued on foot past the American Embassy, the British High Commission, the residence of the Prime Minister – complete with soldiers manning live machine guns. We passed a school where an attempt was made to con money out of us for the Deaf and Blind School. Conning is very clever and it’s so hard to realise it’s happening when people are so nice and friendly. We’ve had dozens of attempts made on us now. We seem to be a walking magnet for beggars and con men and there is no doubt that it is a very unpleasant experience. It’s not threatening but it’s horrible to feel unable to trust or believe anything at all. So far we have not been approached by one honest person, yet all sound very plausible and it’s so disappointing to discover that we are regarded with such contempt, even though, by our standards, the sums of money involved are not necessarily large. When we innocently explained that we were planning to make an official visit to the Deaf and Blind School in Ratmalana so would prefer to donate direct, the person practically ran away! (Abey has already organised a visit for Margaret who teaches the deaf in Exeter.)

Suddenly, as we neared Galle Face Green, we came across an oasis of cool tranquillity amidst the turmoil and heat of the Galle Road. A modern, clean, cold café selling lime ice and western style sandwiches with English newspapers to read! We were in paradise for the hottest hour of the day. Most other customers were Europeans and are the only ones we have encountered so far.

We braved the heat again to continue, past the old residential building that is now the Galle Face Hotel, where the English cricket team stayed recently, and along the Green by the sea with a welcome breeze, warding off intrusive “wannabe” tour guides who assured us everywhere we planned to walk was closed – not true.

We made our way to the Fort area and then to the main shopping streets. One particularly persistent tout insisted that as westerners we could not enter one of the supermarkets. When we emerged after an interesting half hour looking at the shelves of goods so reminiscent of our childhood, with names like Lifebuoy, Surf, Port-Sunlight soap and Rinso, he was still there waiting for us!

We eventually shook him off and explored the little back streets of Petta. This is a fascinating area of small shops and market stalls filled with rubbishy items or plastic buckets and brooms. There are stalls selling curry powders, rice, dried packet foods, biscuits and hopper powder. Other stalls sell bottles of tepid water and vegetables, but most of all, there are stalls of recycled bits of electrical equipment! They are piled high with switches, plugs, old armatures, elements of kettles and old telephones. It was quite astonishing to see second-hand electrical devices from my early childhood still being sold on the streets of Colombo!

Stepping through fetid puddles and bags of rubbish, past little hardware shops and soft-drink bars (alcohol isn’t commonly seen here) we made our way through the narrow, congested streets to the Dutch Museum – a relic of a typical residence of the Dutch colonial period here in the seventeenth century. For 65 rupees each we entered the cool old building. We were probably the only visitors all day and the staff ran ahead of us, turning on the fans as we progressed from room to room. In one room the attendant was fast asleep so we tiptoed around him.

There were some interesting exhibits but it was a very poorly displayed. One delightful elderly attendant insisted on showing us all the secret drawers in the Dutch writing bureaux and almirahs (cupboards).

We returned through the crowded streets, where people held umbrellas to shield themselves from the sun’s heat, to Fort station where we picked up a bus to Ratmalana, even getting seats. The crazy one hour ride cost us 20 rupees for both of us – about 16 pence.

Later in the evening relatives called in and Jeev’s two Italian friends and Marc came round.