Thai time - Bangkok

19 - 21 November

I reluctantly took a taxi back to Colombo's airport for my flight through to Bangkok in Thailand. Once there I headed for "backpacker central" - Khao San Road, which is covered in budget guesthouses, touts for suits and many other items, rip-off "tour guides", and markets that seem cheap (but are actually well overpriced compared to elsewhere).

I found a cheap guesthouse down a quiet side alley at the very basic end - flushing toilet with a bucket of water - and explored a bit, with a beer from the 7/11 (!), amused by the incredibly overly touristic nature of the area...

The types of bars on Khao San Road - "We do not check ID card"...

I had several days to explore around the city, and headed first for the Grand Palace. Roughly transcribed as Phra Borom Maha Ratcha Wang in Thai, this complex was used by the royal family since the late 18th century, and is full of impressive examples of Thai architecture, with the typical pointed roof eaves.

As with Buddhist sites in Sri Lanka, dress code was strict, and photos weren't allowed to be taken in the hall housing the famous Emerald Buddha, probably the most revered Buddha statue in Thailand - to the extent that only the Thai king is permitted to touch the statue, where he changes the outfit three times a year according to season.

Outside Chakri Maha Prasat throne hall

A daunting warrior statue

Two monks walking in front of Viharn Yod

Detail on the Ubosoth which houses the famed Emerald Buddha

Detailed mural paintings depicting Thai history

I couldn't help but smile at the image formed by this group of monks I saw just outside the palace soon afterwards, stuck in a Bangkok traffic jam:

Only in Thailand?

I wandered around that part of the city and on my way back to my guesthouse in the evening, discovered a rather large blockade on one of the large avenues adjacent to Democracy Monument. Anti-government protesters had been camped here for quite some time.

Anti-government protests - particularly non-violent at this stage - at Democracy Monument

The political situation in Thailand was finely balanced in November, and has since deteriorated further. As I write this, the incumbent prime minister was deposed by the courts just this week. The ruling Pheu Thai party's support from the rural poor, who are likely to continue to win voting due to their larger population, are up against the urban elite who want to install a "people's council" instead of a democratically elected government. However both sides of the conflict refuse to back down until they get their way. It's a real shame for Thailand - politicised bickering by a small minority - and it is having a noticeable negative effect on tourism in a country that has recently boomed in that industry.

I headed into Bangkok's city centre the following day, exploring some of the incredibly large, Westernised shopping malls and watching the swathes of motorbikes.

A 3-storey high Christmas tree in a 7-storey shopping mall in central Bangkok

I must admit while it's encouraging to see Thai people embracing the spirit of the festive season, Christmas is not a Thai holiday at all. Bangkok has become a very international city and I think has lost some of the charm and friendliness of Thailand that I experienced later on.

More motorbikes than you can count - and a lot of taxis too

My electrical engineering friends would be shocked...
Naturally it's in front of a 7/11, which appear on both sides of the road on almost every block in busy parts of town

Knowing I would have a couple more nights in Bangkok before my flight home, I boarded a bus the next morning to head for the beach. Destination: the resort island of Koh Chang.

Sri Lanka part 3 - the cultural triangle

14 - 18 November

Arriving in Kandy, a bit of bargaining with a stubborn tuk-tuk driver, and it was off to the Kandy City Hostel with an Australian backpacker, Leigh, who'd been on the same train.

Sri Lanka's centre, roughly between Kandy, Anuradhapura and Polonnaruwa, is widely known as the Cultural Triangle. This area holds a number of locations of high cultural heritage and interest, and is noticeably more conservative than the rest of the country, especially regarding dress in temples and the sale of alcohol.

One of the primary sites is right in Kandy's centre - the Temple of the Tooth Relic, which purportedly holds a tooth of the Buddha and is therefore considered one of the most important Buddhist pilgrimage sites in the world. Leigh and I headed there the next morning to discover how important the spiritual connection is to Kandy's Buddhists (answer: very)...

Reflections outside the temple

My shorts weren't long enough at the Temple of the Tooth, so I hired a sarong
(Sri Lankan men often wear sarongs, and would be a top choice for many semi-formal type gatherings)

Buddhist flags inside

Locals walking past the opening leading to the Tooth Relic (in a golden shrine at the rear)

Lighting candles to the Buddha

After a bit of shopping, we took a walk up to Bahirawakanda Temple, perched on the top of a hill with a commanding view of the city, where there was a massive statue of the Buddha presiding.

Bahirawakanda Temple towering at 27 m high

The monks' washing line

Enjoying a refreshing coconut before the walk back down

That afternoon, Leigh and I also visited the Tea Museum, located just out of the city within the tea plantations. It was a bit of an odd place, built inside an old tea factory, but had some good documentation on the development of tea as a commodity, it's pioneers, and some old tea processing machines.

The next morning I got up early to head to Dambulla, for a cricket ODI between New Zealand's Black Caps and Sri Lanka. A local got talking to me on the bus* and we shared a tuk-tuk to the stadium, where we arrived just as it started a typical Sri Lankan tropical downpour.

* One of the things that was very noticeable in Sri Lanka was their desire to strike up a conversation, find out where you were from, and practice their English. There were often two things that they mentioned when I said I was from New Zealand - the All Blacks, and Anchor milk. The fact that the New Zealand cricket team was touring Sri Lanka was almost unknown to most, which surprised me somewhat considering cricket is their national sport!!

The covers being removed as the rain stopped - about 200 guys of manpower!

I quite enjoyed the atmosphere of a Sri Lankan cricket match. The locals were right into the game, and very fond of their star Lasith Malinga. Cheering when New Zealand took a wicket, the silence around me was almost deafening - but when Sri Lanka hit a boundary, the wall of sound of cheering from the locals would hit...

I happened to find three other New Zealand backpackers there - Alice (who I'd seen on the train to Galle) and two of her friends - turns out Sri Lanka is a pretty small place! Despite a good bowling performance, the batting was dreadful and New Zealand eventually lost by 36 runs when it got too dark to keep playing.

A boy cheering on his team

Some of the locals wanted a photo with the crazy Kiwi

I stayed that night in nearby Sigiriya, a small town nestled against the ancient historical site of the same name.

Breakfast - another delicious dhal curry

Having met up with Leigh again, we headed to the ancient city early in the morning to avoid the heat. Centred around a 200 m high pillar of rock, the city was built in the fifth century by a local king as his capital.

By one of the moats around the city...
"Refrain from bathing, crocodiles go about"

The towering pillar of rock at Sigiriya

Sigiriya translates roughly as "Lion's Rock". The structure built on the side of the rock - in the fifth century - included two massive lion's paws carved into the rock at it's base. This is a view down onto those paws from the staircase above.

View down to the ancient city complex from atop Sigiriya

View from the summit

City constructions at the summit

A cave within the side of the rock is home to some beautifully painted frescoes

Aside from it's importance as a ancient city, and the wonderfully-preserved frescoes, a wall covered in graffiti also serves as probably the single most important source of information about the development of the Sinhalese language.

On my way back to Kandy that evening, I also visited the famous Rock Temple (also known as Cave Temple), where over 150 Buddha statues are located inside caves in the hillside. Nearby is also a towering Golden Temple.

Reclining Buddha in the caves

A row of Buddha figures

The Golden Temple

After a long day I finally arrived back in Kandy, and the next morning it was back to Colombo. I was very reluctant to leave this wonderful country - it really is a fascinating place I would love to go back to - but managed to sign off with a typical spicy-as-heck dhal curry with Ashan before winging my way to Bangkok.

There were only two countries to go on my world trip!

Sri Lanka part 2 - the hills

12 - 14 November

Before describing my time in Ella, I want to make a bit more of a comment about the situation in Sri Lanka. It is a country only just developing it's tourism industry again, after a civil war of many many years between the Tamil Tigers and Government forces, which were generally Sinhalese. There are still many accusations underlying events during the war, in particular crimes against humanity, including some against the current President Mahinda Rajapaksa. This in fact led to some leaders' boycotts of the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM), which was hosted by Sri Lanka during my visit.

The event itself was quite controversial - some locals seemed unhappy about the amount of money spent on it and the resulting traffic jams around Colombo, while foreigners were unhappy that it resulted in Rajapaksa being appointed acting Chairman of CHOGM given some of the crimes he and his government are accused of. However for the general population, they seemed to be oblivious to it's existence, and life for them went on just as normal.

In many ways I think it is a fantastic country to visit - kind of imagine a bit like India, but not so crazy, and with more natural beauty and extremely friendly locals. Certainly ten days was not enough for me.

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I needed two busses to get to Ella - the first was a comfortable, A/C bus with spare seats to Matara, just an hour or so. The second, however, was one of the aged "government busses", which means no suspension, 40+ years old, no A/C, lots of people, terrible driving, and the rest...

A typical government bus (actually with destination in English on it!)
(photo courtesy: wikipedia.org)

For the first stop or two you might have a spare seat. Typically later, it looks something like this.
(photo courtesy: tripadvisor.com)

Matara bus station

However I got safely to Ella, only to find my pack covered in silver paint thanks to a loose spraycan in the baggage area... Thankfully two Quebecois helped me with the bag and we ended up at the same guesthouse, which was even owned by a Peter.

Peter, his tuk-tuk and his guesthouse in Ella

After watching NZ pull off an unlikely last-ball victory in the cricket - it would have been an exciting game to go to! - the next morning I headed off with the two Quebecois and also a group of three guys we met along the way for a walk in the countryside.

Small morning market in Ella

It is pretty normal to walk along the train tracks here - the trains go no faster than 30 km/h and are easy to hear from a long way off. Often it is the only way to walk to a village. We chose to walk up to Ella Rock, giving in to paying a local to guide us through the maze of paths once off the train tracks.

Crazy Quebecois on the walk to Ella Rock

Lookout across the hills by a waterfall

The local (who "conveniently" appeared just when we were getting lost) "guiding" us to Ella Rock

At the precipice of Ella Rock

After that I jumped on a train coming past for two stops - costing less than 10 cents - back past Ella to Demodara, and walked back to Ella from there. The scariest part about that was arriving at a bridge or a tunnel - not many places to escape to. Again, the trains are slow and often sounding their horn, but it is still a little unnerving.

As I arrived near one bridge, a local boy introduced himself as Chaminda and wanted to practice his English. It seemed his parents house was just beside the train tracks. He must have been no older than 7 and wanted to draw in my diary. He also (of course) wanted some money... I politely gave him some water and a banana.

He did however ask me the time and when I told him, he was insistent I didn't carry on yet as a train was coming soon. Sure enough, 15 minutes later (i.e. on time) one did:

The forewarned old-school train over the "Nine Arches Bridge" (I'm sure that's not it's official name) between Ella and Demodara

Passing through the rail tunnel adjacent to the bridge above

I wanted to move on to Kandy the next day, so even after a lot of walking already I continued through Ella down another road for 6 km to a well-known waterfall.

I saw some wild monkeys along the way! Turns out they're pretty common around the place, but they were the first I'd seen properly other than very fleetingly on the bus

Ravana Falls at dusk

I made it down to Ravana Falls just as dusk was setting. I clambered up a bit and had a look around, but quickly had to return to the road as one last taxi was waiting for me and walking 1.5 hours in the dark back up to Ella didn't seem such a good idea. I took dinner with the others I'd met earlier and the next morning headed to the train station for the ride to Kandy.

The very quaint ticket booth at Ella train station

Sri Lankan trains are pretty old-school, with big diesel locomotives winding around the hills at pretty slow speeds and primitive token systems still used for authorisation to enter each single track section. It is quite common for trains to be held up for half an hour or much longer while waiting for the track ahead to be cleared by another train as well.

This meant a 6.5 hour trip took over 8 hours, but the ride was definitely worth it. The train was generally relatively empty - unlike some of the overflowing ones coming the other way - so I was able to spend a lot of time switching between windows to enjoy the fabulous views of the stunning tea plantations over the rolling hills in every direction...

Workers in a tea plantation

Gorgeous multi-coloured terraces of tea

Going on as far as the eye can see...

The train is an experience in itself. I felt obliged to donate to the group of school-age buskers that passed through, and it's a necessity to buy some typical roti, samosa or fritter type concoctions from the touts, all deep fried to oblivion several hours earlier. Usually they have to show you a 20 rupee bill to show you how much it costs, and they serve it in a used stapled up piece of A4 paper as a form of recycling, usually with someone's homework exercises or something on the back!!

Street/train food is served in stapled up paper just like this
(photo courtesy: travelwithkat.com)

I loved just observing the life going on around me, as well as the views, thinking how amazingly worry-free many of these people are. Obviously they have worries - many are living near or below the poverty line - but they're not worried about jobs they have at work, or parent-teacher interviews, or local politics, etc. They live life day to day and this was something I really loved about being back in a lesser-developed country.

View to the front of the train (3rd class - I never knew that existed before) from the back

Waiting for the train to pass with the manually-controlled traffic barriers

And thus I arrived in Kandy early evening for the third and final part of my Sri Lanka soujourn - the famed "cultural triangle".