Colombo Sri Lanka

When I was eleven, my father put my sister and me on a plane in London and sent us as unaccompanied minors back to Australia. It must have been a very cheap flight at the time because it took two days to get there and six hours of those two days were spent in Colombo Sri Lanka airport. All I can really remember doing for those six hours was staring at a large display of taxidermied (stuffed) animals. This time, however, my visit to Colombo – Sri Lanka’s capital city has been filled with a whole range of different memories.

Sri Lanka is a country approximately the size of Tasmania residing at the underfoot of India, with a population of about 21 million. It has had a chequered history with Portugal, Holland and Great Britain, all having ruled it and it was only as recently as 2009 that 70,000 people were killed in racial tensions between the local Sinhalese and Tamil communities.

Today and I think that we have found the tuk tuk capital of the world. We were warned before disembarking that the traffic would be crazy, and it was. Tuk tuks, buses, cars, buffalo, bicycles, pedestrians, tractors and sometimes even elephants all jostling to navigate the narrow roads of Colombo. Not really wanting to go too far afield, we forwent the 4 hours each way bus trip to a tea plantation (Sri Lanka or Ceylon as it was once called is famous for its tea) and chose to visit the sights of the capital city. Our overall impression is that Colombo is definitely a developing city on the verge of bigger things. There are few high rises (maybe only 6 or 7) but many more are currently under construction as the cranes and skyline will attest.

There are only two McDonald’s – a testimony to any developing city status. There are, however, lots of cricket grounds – we counted at least 5 in the small vicinity we traversed. Approximately 70% of the Sri Lankan population is Buddhist, and this is evidenced by the numerous Buddhist temples, statues and once even a stupa scattered throughout the city. Part of our time in Sri Lanka was spent in the company of “Dudley” a white Sri Lankan tour guide. Dudley was at least 80, had traveled abroad but was basically a born and bred Sri Lankan. His knowledge and anecdotes were amazing. He kept spouting Shakespeare, and we felt very privilege to have had him as our guide.

The next five days of our adventure see us further traversing the Indian Ocean en route to Dubai, then Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates.