2015 May 18: Ekay Dekay Tunay

Steve often talks about his so-called 'nemesis bird', the one species that no matter how hard he looks, he just cannot see - the Indian pitta. He has spent over two years of his life in India and Sri Lanka, and this bird always eludes him. In this trip, one small newly created national park that we stumbled upon is known for having numerous migratory pittas throughout the winter months...and we arrived one week after they left. Poor Steve.

As for me, I seem to have found my nemesis language.

Growing up, I had no trouble learning French. In university, I took German and Spanish classes, and quickly learned to read and understand those languages, and although I can no longer speak them due to lack of practice, I can still read some German and can usually understand or at least get the gist of written Spanish. I also studied Russian and Italian on my own, and can still read a little of the latter. The three times I lived in northern Canada, I learned basic Inuktitut, some Cree, and a little Chipewyan, and had no trouble learning those. Even today, almost twenty years later, I can often read and understand what my Inuit friends are saying in Inuktitut on Facebook, although I have forgotten most of the language for speaking. (Just last month, for example, I was part of a conversation about walrus meat.) When I was in China I learned enough Mandarin in six weeks to be able to go shopping, order in restaurants, ask directions, read maps and street signs, and (most importantly!) find the restrooms. About a year and a half ago I began doing volunteer work for my church, where I answer the questions that people send in to the main church website. I found that my language experience was very useful, as I am able to understand the questions asked in many languages, and using a translation program, am able to respond in French, Spanish, Portuguese, Romanian, Italian and German. More importantly, perhaps, I am usually able to tell when the machine translation is poorly done, meaning that I have to tweak the answer in English so that it makes sense in the other language.

But Sinhala? Boy. This language just does not stick with me. I have tried phrase books. I have tried several 'Learn Sinhalese' textbooks. I have tried just looking up random words in the dictionary to get me started. Even the text that Steve swears by has been of no use to me...I have read and reread and studied chapter one a dozen times, and every time, it's like I have never seen the words before.

It's been most frustrating.

What is weird about the whole thing is that I have daily conversations with our driver, with him speaking Sinhala and me speaking English. I understand at least the gist, and sometimes more than that, of the sermons and lessons at church. Usually I can join in the conversation (again, in English while they speak Sinhala interspersed with a little English) in the weekly women's meeting.

I have managed, however, to learn a (very) few words. Mostly food related, but hey, at this point I'll take whatever I can get!

So I was pleasantly surprised when I went shopping today and had my first real conversation.

It went like this:

Me: Do you have any batteries?

Clerk: Oh. [Yes]

Me: (shows package of lithium batteries) This kind?

Clerk: (gets package and puts it on the counter) Oh.

Me: How much?

Clerk: 750 rupees.

Me: (raises eyebrows) Okay. (points to package) batteriyah ekak tunsiyah [One battery 300]

Clerk: (waggles head in the decidedly South Asian style that indicates agreement)

Me: mama tunay packages [I (need) three packages]

Clerk: 1800 rupees

Me: But 750 times 3 is 2250 rupees.

Clerk: I know. (smiles and winks at me) But you pay 1800 only.

A savings of 450 rupees for trying a few words in Sinhala. I was pretty pleased with myself.

The Idiot's Guide to Cricket

I am not bragging when I say that I know a lot. I do. I know a lot of things about a lot of things. I even know some pretty useless things - I used to collect useless elephant facts in my early twenties, for example. (Did you know that elephants are the only animals with knees and ankles that cannot jump? Or that they are the only animal you can teach to stand on its head?)

But one thing I do not know much about is sports. I suppose if you broke it out into all the different sports that I don't know much about, it would be a lot things that I do not know. Take hockey. Don't know much about it even though I once lived with three star players on an elite university hockey team. Or football. Don't know much about it, either, even though the same university was also known for its football program. In fact, in seven years in university there is just one non-graduation photo of me in the university yearbook, and wouldn't you know it, it is of me at the one football game I attended. On the two page spread, I am just about in the middle of the page. Everyone else in the stands are on their feet with their hands in the air, mouths open, as they cheer for...well, for something, but I have no idea what. And there is me, sitting there with a confused look on my face.

So it is not surprising that I know nothing about cricket either. In fact, the only cricket I had seen prior to this last week was the groups of men and boys that play in the sports fields that dot the country.

Steve does know a lot about cricket. Having spent time in India and Sri Lanka before, he has come to love the game. At Pizza Hut last week his eyes were glued to the television screen, as were everyone else's except mine. Yesterday he tried explaining the game to me as he watched the highlights reel of a big match from last weekend while we were eating at Burger King in Colombo, and while I sort of got it, it still really made no sense to me. Then again, I was distracted by the most awesome veggie burger I have ever had and was composing a "please extend your Asian veggie burger to North America" letter in my head to Burger King.

Cricket is a big deal in much of the world. It ranks number two only to football - soccer to North Americans. Yesterday when we were in Colombo we were slowed down getting to our destination due to a huge parade that stretched at least four or five city blocks. It was a precursor parade rally to a big cricket match that was happening between two high schools. There were numerous floats, countless instruments being played, music blaring from flatbeds, dancing, decorated cars, shouting, cheering, chanting, flag waving.... All for a high school cricket match. When Steve asked the tuktuk driver about it, he replied, "It's a very important game today for the school." With such fervour over a high school match, you can imagine how things get when the Cricket World Cup is on. In India alone, the big cricket match today between India and Sri Lanka was watched by 195 million people. India won, by the way, much to Sri Lanka's dismay.

Today, Steve, hoping to further enlighten my sports befuddled brain, found this piece which explains the game quite well, and could easily be dubbed "The Idiot's Guide to Cricket". Here is an except from the section on how the game is played:

• The pitcher (called a bowler) sends the ball bouncing off the ground, rather than directly through the air.
• When it gets to the batter (called a batsman), his primary goal is blocking it from hitting a set of three stumps stuck in the ground behind him, called a wicket. These stumps (roughly analogous to home plate) have a pair of small sticks (called bails) balancing on top of them, and if the ball knocks them off, the batter is out.
• Instead of four bases, cricket has just two wickets. The batsman's other goal is hitting the ball into the field, which allows him and the other batsman (there are two at any given time) to score runs by running back and forth between the wickets until the ball is returned.
• There's no foul territory: the batsman can hit the ball in any direction. If it goes past the boundary, he automatically gets four runs (if it bounced over) or six runs (if it flew over).
• There are no strikes, and the batsman doesn't have to run after hitting the ball. In the form of cricket played in the World Cup, each batsman gets one at-bat per game, but the at-bat can last a really really long time — it goes until he gets out, either by hitting a ball up into the air that gets caught, or getting caught running between the wickets, or by allowing the ball to hit the wicket behind him, or by blocking a ball with his body that the umpire thinks would have otherwise hit the wicket.
• Each team bats for one extended period of time (called an innings), then fields for the rest of the game, instead of switching back and forth like in baseball. A team's innings is finished when ten of its eleven batsmen are out, or when the other team has bowled a certain number of times (as measured in "overs," which are sets of six consecutive pitches).
• In the form of cricket played in the World Cup — called one-day cricket — each team can bowl 50 overs, and matches generally take about six hours.

Okay, that's pretty basic, right? But apparently this kind of cricket is played only to make the game more accessible. Real cricket is a grueling game called Test Cricket, which is designed to see which team has the most endurance and real skill, and can last up to five days!

Here is my favourite explanation of how the game works, from a sign on the wall at Lord's Restaurant....

  

That just about sums up the game, right?

2015 March 4: Torment. Or...the Absolutely Wretched Supper

Can we say melodramatic???

Elanor is currently gulping down 1/2 cup of water or more with every bite of her supper while frantically waving her hand in front of her mouth.

"Why are you doing that?," I asked.

"It's so spicy!," was the reply.

"Elanor, there's nothing spicy in the food."

"Huh?"

"There. is. nothing. spicy. in. the. food."

"Well, it's spicy to me!"

"These are the same beets with coconut milk that you've been eating all week, and the same eggplants you've been eating all week, except I added some bbq sauce to them."

"Well the bbq sauce is spicy!"

"No. You watched me make it - ketchup, brown sugar, a splash of vinegar. Nothing spicy."

"Well it's Sri Lankan food and Sri Lankan food is spicy."

"Yes, but this Sri Lankan food was made by a Canadian. It's not spicy."

She puts one little drop of coconut sauce on her tongue and gulps her water again.

Rolling my eyes, I go into the bedroom where the AC is running, having finished my own absolutely delicious supper already.

Now she is making gagging noises by the sink...... When does hubby get back from his conference in India? sigh

The door opens. In peeks the girl. "Yes, Mama?"

"Yes, what?"

"Did you call me?"

"Nope. Did you finish your beets?"

"No," with a loud sigh. "Seriously, they're making me wheezy. Seriously."

Wheezy? I don't think that's the word she is looking for, but I let it slide.

She goes into the bathroom, makes all sorts of moaning noises, and when I don't respond, she goes out the other bathroom door and back to her absolutely wretched supper.

You would think I was trying to poison her.

She didn't have any complaints about lunch. We decided to go for a walk through the nearby alley down to Beach Road, along there until we found somewhere to get some lunch, then back through the alleys and side roads at the other end of the street until we got back home again.

Her lunch was one banana pancake and a chocolate milkshake. The milkshake was gone in 18 seconds. The banana pancake turned out to be basically Bananas Foster, but with the banana wrapped up in a crepe. Or I should say crepes. "One banana pancake" turned out to be two super-sized crepes, two whole bananas, and two huge scoops of ice cream!

Chatting with Steve via Skype. With a wink he tells me to stop tormenting the poor girl. Tormenting??? I ADDED SUGAR to her food and she is acting like I gave her Thai peppers to suck on!

She comes into the bedroom and sits on the floor, plate in hand. The beets have been choked down. The eggplant has disappeared, presumably in her stomach and not mashed into the kitchen drain. All that's left is onions in bbq sauce, which she appears to be mashing before dropping them into her mouth with the fork, like a baby bird being fed by an automated crane.

More water.

More sighs.

I ask if she would like to hear today's blog.

"Sure!"

I read it to her.

"Anything you would like to say?," I ask.

"I said the food was sour."

"That, too," I reply. "Are you finished your food?"

"I only have onions left."

"Onions are food."

More sighs. "I guess that means I'll have to drink an entire bottle of water then!"

"I guess so."

"Humpfh."

Supper started at 5:40. It's now 7:16. She's still not done.

Me? I thought it tasted great.

2015 February 16: The Long Road to Chilaw

Map courtesy Google Maps.

The Negombo Bus Station. The clamour of drivers hawking the virtues of their particular routes. No orderly lines and ticket counters here - in fact, there are no lines or ticket counters period. We study the rows of brightly coloured buses in all shapes and sizes, find one that is going to Chilaw, and board. There are no timetables or schedules - when the bus is full, it leaves. No matter...all day long another is waiting to take its place. The assistant passes by, asking for end locations and accepting payments....three people traveling 51 kilometres (31 miles) is just 177 rupees ($1.38 US). As people disembark en route, the driver's assistant loudly calls 'ilaw ilaw ilaw ilaw' (short for Chilaw) to the passing throngs of people, trying to refill the bus and maximize his profits on this trip.

The road is lined with street vendors of all sorts, everything one could imagine available as we pass by....pastries, candy, fruit, shots of liquor, t-shirts, dresses, shoes, kitchen strainers, vegetables, water, pets, farm animals....

Nainamadama....a town filled with tiles factories, with their hot kilns and mounds of clay ready to be made into roofing tiles and bricks.

We pass the Coconut Research Institute, a very important and prestigious government department, with its acres and acres of coconut plantations, many of them doubling as cow pastures as they attempt to maximize the use of the land.

Cathedrals, Catholic schools, shrines, white robed nuns, uniformed school children line the entire length of this Catholic corridor, and everywhere, everywhere are leftover signs welcoming the Holy Father, Pope Francis, who visited Sri Lanka in January of this year. With 1.2 million Catholics in the country, this made worldwide news, as did the mass that was celebrated in Colombo, the capital city, with some estimates of over one million attendees.

Marawila....waiting for more riders, the intoxicating fragrance of row upon row of bakeshops fills the senses, a sharp contrast to the sweetly acrid and smoky air in Nainamadama.

To our right....ancient tanks or wevas (reservoirs), constructed up to 1700 years ago, filled with waterfowl, yellow lilies, pink lotus flowers - part of an irrigation system envisioned by King Parakrama Bahu the Great (1153-1186), who declared "Let not even a drop of rain water go to the sea without benefiting man."

To our left....mile upon mile of rice paddies and marshes, resplendent with myriad types of fowl, including three kinds of egret surrounding the cows peacefully grazing.

Madampe....vast coconut plantations, canals filled with pampas grass, fences lined with sweet smelling jasmine, Hindu temples, Buddhist stupa, shrines to the Horse God, the Roman Catholic Church of San Sebastian, a mosque complete with Ladies Prayer Room and women's clothing store pass quietly by.

Sewer construction causes a small traffic jam as motorists and pedestrians of all sorts attempt to get through. No careful city planning and pipe placement here...to build one's sewer line simply dig a trench from one's house to the sidewalk, line it with concrete blocks, lift the concrete pavers covering the sewer ditch and hope it slopes properly. Then, replace the concrete paver to turn the ditch into a sidewalk again. Block traffic while doing so.

The Madampe Bus Station....just a widened part of the road at a vacant lot where people gather to wait for their bus. We wait for more passengers. In a nearby storefront I spy women's blouses for 350 rupees ($2.74), men's dress shirts for 295 rupees ($2.30), complete children's outfits for 150 rupees ($1.17). A group of white uniformed giggling schoolgirls flee when Steve catches them staring wide-eyed at his huge scary American self. 

Fully loaded once more, we return to the main road, passing vendors lining the fence outside a brightly painted blue Hindu temple surrounded by coconut groves.

Kakkapalliya....40 kilometres (24.5 miles) into our journey. An odd building that looks like a viking boat complete with Chinese dragon head and a door where the mouth should be gives us pause...it's called the Bum Boat. Mynas, egrets, and cormorants line the canal.

Chilaw at last. The driver's assistant finds a bus for us to a well known Hindu temple in Musseswaram, found in the Tamil Region. We are one day early for for the Shiva festival Sivarathri, but it cannot be helped - we have to be in Colombo tomorrow. We buy fruit for an offering - it being a Hindu temple we feel this is okay as the money goes towards feeding the poor, the offering is to be eaten by us afterwards, and Hindus believe in the sanctity of all religions and all gods/Gods. Our guide is delighted to hear Steve speaking Tamil, gives us a personal tour, explains the ceremony and the temple's shrines to us.

The many faces of Shiva, "Great God".

Sariswati, the Hindu goddess of knowledge, wisdom, arts, music       and learning.

Our guide.

Afterwards Steve quickly makes friends with two of the men and a woman at the stand to buy fruit for offerings. As Tamils, they were very impressed that Steve had been to Tamilnadu and many of the shrines found in the parts of India that he has visited.

As our host takes us to meet his friend, a tuktuk driver who can take us back to Chilaw, others call out insults in Sinhala. He quickly chastises them, "They speak Sinhala so you better watch your mouth", with a shake of his head and a dismissive gesture of the hand. His friend agrees to take us back to Chilaw and stops several times along the way so we can do a little bird watching, and when asked, takes us to an eatery that he knows of, Wadiya Restaurant.

A huge flying fox colony.

 Water buffalo and sacred ibises.

Open billed stork.

After a delightful meal of curried dal, beetroot salad, green onion salad, hot okra, rice for the three of us, and spicy fish and devilled prawns for Steve and Elanor (1100 rupees or $8.60, including three litre size bottles of water, and one small bottle of water), the quality of which was no doubt aided by the owners' surprise to hear Steve speaking Sinhalese to him, we head back to the bus station for our return journey.

Past the cows wandering the side streets of Chilaw, past the rural areas just to the south with the numerous Serene Gardens Coconut Plantations, past the rice paddies with their red-wattled lapwings, past Marawila's beautiful rivers and furniture carvers and egrets and bee eaters, past the storefronts and street vendors and beautiful houses and tropical gardens of Katunariya, Wennapuwa, Nainamadama, Waikkala, and Kochchikade....

Back to Negombo.

 Fishermen in the late afternoon.

A murder of crows at breakfast.

Sixty-Four Degrees Part 2

From this in Moncton, New Brunswick, on our way to Newfoundland, Canada, to catch our flight:

To this just a few days later in Sri Lanka:

And in between, we saw some beautiful art and artifacts at the Museum located throughout the Mumbai Airport: