Smile, the music is all around you...

SriLanka Tsunami Reconstruction Project - Arrival & Trip to Galle

Well arrival at Colombo airport was uneventful but refreshing...The walk out of the airplane on the open tarmac in third world countries with its fresh air filled with fumes of fuel may offend some, but I say the feeling is something to be cherished. Warm wind is rather refreshing after breathing the same air for 12 hours in the plane cabin.
Clearing immigration was easy but my backpack didn't show until an hour later... For a second I felt rather elevated when the immigrations officer didn't even ask for the VISA..Ahh!!! The SAARC countries don't need one!!!...For the first time ever, I benefited from traveling on my Pakistani Passport to a foreign country....After sweating bullets from the heat and waiting for my bag...customs was a breeze and to my surprise, our pickup (THE GREAT RAVI) was waiting with a sign at the entrance... Having prepared myself for even the possibility of a long trek by foot or bicycle, I was pleased to see a motorized means of transport...and Thank God too, cause as it turned out, the trip to Galle area took us almost 9 hours...


Warren, Ajay, Luc and myself at Colombo airport-from right to left

But this was a trip to be remebered...As our bodies slowly got accustomed to the sweltering heat of 87 F and 90% humidity, we realized that flying into Colombo would be a lot easier than getting out of it. With rush hour quickly approaching, and as we drover deeper into the city, the traffic changed from chaotic to manic to absolute mayhem...There was no rhyme or reason to how Ravi manouvered the van while avoiding bicycles, Tuk Tuks, pedestrians, cars and other moving items including animals ... However, it seemed to just ebb and flow on a consistent basis..A brief jam would be quickly dislodged with the symphony of several dozen horns blaring... On our way we made numerous stops to pick up other volunteers that later became the backbone of our team with a bond that I trust will remain strong for our lives...
This included in order of how we picked them up and also sort of the order in how welcoming we were of these later arrivals in our van :-). The trip was getting longer by the minute as was evident on everybody's faces due to the agony we were feeling from the heat at the behest of the late hotel pickups.
Nicci & Sara
Inka & Lisa
Immogen
and Ajay, Warren and myselft made up the jolly bunch in our van. For hours we drove around picking other people from different hotels in the other Van...and finally around 7 p.m., 7 hours after our initial arrival at Colombo, it seemed as if we were driving out of the city...
During this trip we all shared stories of where we had been, why we came, what we did etc... At one point, the hunger and heat turned us so silly that we would laugh at anything...We started sharing growing up injury stories and just plain silly stuff...Realizing we were starting to make no sense Ravi stopped a little outside of Galle to allow us to get some food...Everybody afraid of strange bodily reactions, sufficed with water while some of us dared to eat some bread...

After dropping most of the people at the first hotel (Tiny House) , Immy, Warren, Sara, Nicci and myself ended up at the Janaka guest house around midnight... Having woken the caretaker and owner, we were quickly hustled into rooms which we later found out to be servant quarters...Well that's what you get when arrive at an inopportune time...However, neither of us complained as we all crashed like we hadn't slept in a week...

posted by Trance Addict @ 8:19 PM