Memory lane, shopping and a meal with a friend

Dec 10, 2019

We had no problems checking in at the airport for our flight to Sri Lanka, other than a slow down due to our airline’s computer system being down and our boarding passes had to be handwritten. The flight was short at three and a half hours and we were reminded how close SL is to the equator…about five degrees north. So, it is always hot and humid.

We checked into our Airbnb which is located about a five-minute walk from where we lived in 2004-05. I was able to reach Mr. Kularathna, my former trishaw driver and he picked us up to take us to lunch. We went to Barefoot which is a fabulous shop filled with wonderful things made in SL; hand-loomed clothing, ceramics, weavings, etc. There is a bookstore, café, and art gallery on the premise. After a delicious lunch of black pork curry, we went shopping. None of my summer pants from Barefoot fit as I have lost weight and my body shape has changed some from our gym workouts. We will come back tomorrow because the manager wasn’t in and I had corresponded with him about holding some hand-painted dishes for me.

On the way home, we were hit with an incredible downpour. When it rains here, IT RAINS! The streets flooded quickly. We came back to the apartment and collapsed from the short night of sleep and the heat. When we got home, we turned on the AC and turned out the lights and rested. When we got up, we decided to revisit one of our favorite romantic restaurants that is part of a guesthouse. It is nearby but the traffic here is awful. We haven’t been in SL since January 2017. Lo and behold it was totally black. Our goof, this is the second time we have made the assumption that restaurants don’t close. The website is still up so I’ll call to find out if they were just closed for the day or permanently.

We had to get another ride downtown to go to another favorite place, an upscale Italian restaurant. Oh my, this place knows how to please customers. The maître de noticed when I commented on how cold the AC was and brought me a shawl. When I inquired if the shrimp were in the shell or cleaned, he offered to make it the way I wanted it. In the part of the world, shrimp is usually served with the way it comes out of the ocean, heads and all. It is a lot of work to try to clean it at the table. My shrimp spaghetti was out of this world good with red chili flakes, tiny slices of green onion, garlic and loads of rich olive oil. Ron had an Italian sausage spaghetti and was also very pleased with his meal. We shared a delicious rocket salad.  The focaccia and breadstick were served with a pesto dip or olive oil. We were very happy diners. We walked across the way and visited a DVD store. You can only buy illegal DVD’s here so we stocked up for our viewing in Phetchaburi. We never bring these home because the customs fine is big if we get caught.

Rather than ordering an Uber, we decided to just take a cab in front of the Cinnamon Grand, a large upscale hotel next to our restaurant. The cost was five times as much as an Uber. Lesson learned.

Dec 11

We managed to sleep in until 7:00. No roosters and birds to wake us at 3:30 onward. We had breakfast downstairs and visited with Gayathri, the owner. We were served a great SL breakfast: chicken curry over a mystery grain and black tea. It was yummy and spicy as all SL food is.

 We decided to walk through our old neighborhood and see the sites

First, we walked to the open market. Much of it was closed today as it is poya day. 








Every full moon is poya, a Buddhist holiday in SL and most businesses, particularly public businesses, are closed. 





We passed a Buddhist temple which in SL are as abundant as Starbucks is in the US. We were surprised to see a supermarket open and it was crowded. We were amazed to see so much development here. Large apartment houses are springing up. The neighborhood houses that remain are better maintained than when we lived here. During a civil war, there is no money for development and upgrades. But now there are sidewalks; we passed a garbage truck similar to what we had in the US before the large carts came in use. When we lived here in 2004-5 it was quite different. A man would walk down your street and yell ‘dust bin’ (how very English) and about five minutes later a tractor pulling an open trailer would come by. So you had to run around the house and collect any trash and put it in a plastic bag and set it outside your door. No one had a garbage can. If you did have one sitting outside it disappeared. The men would throw your trash into the trailer and move to the next street. You NEVER knew what day or time they would come by. If you missed it because you didn’t hear him yelling"Dust bin" so if you were away from your house, you were out of luck. Due to the heat and humidity, garage rots quickly. So some folks just pitched it over a fence. Colombo was one trashy city with torn plastic bags everywhere. Street dogs, cats, cows and birds found their meals readily from this horrible practice.

That has changed. Thanks to the project Ron worked on here 15 years ago. The project worked in 35 small municipalities on various topics. Mostly they designed and implemented training on everything from the collection of past-due revenue to the cities to teaching solid waste (trash) collection, etc. They taught how to develop a route that was a time/cost savings; they taught that you should have a regular day/time window for pick up so customers knew when to set out their trash. Where possible they taught about recycling and composting. At the time 80% of the trash was compostable because most people shopped at the open veggie/fruit markets rather than at a supermarket where most items are prepackaged. We returned to SL a few years later. Most of the 35 places had implemented the practice and shared the benefits at a national conference. There were huge labor savings of 40% by improving the pick-up route. That enabled them to expand their services to outlying areas. By the time we had returned, we noticed how much cleaner Colombo was. We commented on this to one of the men Ron had worked with on the project. He told us that the practices had been adopted by Colombo and the rest of the country. There is a success story worth bragging about!

The house we rented when we lived here

Sorry for the sidetrack above. We went by way of our former house. Veena, our landlady, still lives next door. We are taking her out to dinner tonight. After our walk down memory lane, we came back to our room and soon left for town.

 I had arranged for the store manager to hold some hand-painted plates for me. He was out yesterday but available today. We enjoyed a sweetened lime juice in the outdoor café before looking at the show in the art gallery. 

Next was lunch at another favorite place nearby. Ron had a Super Burger and it was a challenge to eat due to its size. I had gazpacho soup and broccoli avocado salad. Yum but too full to try the great looking desserts. We made a pharmacy stop where we got some prescription items for a fraction of the US deductible cost and came home to escape the afternoon heat.

On the way home, we stopped at another hand-loomed textile shop

and then rested for the afternoon.  We had dinner with our former land-lady who we still stay in contact with.