Vipassana meditation was the cloest thing to prison that I ever hope to experience. The idea is that you go to this little meditation center in the countryside with about sixty others, (half male, half female but the sexes never mix) who you will make absolutely no contact with for ten days but you will spend ten hours or more each day sitting several feet away from each other. At the start, you sign your life away saying that you will promise to stay for the duration of the course and follow it's rules. No sex, intoxicants, killing, lying, media entertainment, communication with the outside world and no communication at all except to the staff and teacher. The whole deal sounded rather crazy to me when I first heard about it but I was told that while it was very challending it would also be very rewarding. Attracted mostly by the craziness of it, I signed up.
The practice itself is in the footsteps of what the Buddah did to become Buddha all those centuries ago. It has been passed down in an unbroken line of teachers ever since. For awhile it was lost to India but kept alive in a neighboring country until a guy brought it over to India during the middle of the last century and it has garnered a solid following. The basis of it is this meditation technique in which you focus all of your intention on the flow of respiration through your nostrails. Not trying to control it, simply keeping your attenion focus solely on that and drawing your mind back whenever it wanders. If that sounds cool to you try it. It's hard for a few hours but after a day or it gets fairly easy. My own mind wanders a lot but as long as you stay focused its easy to pull it back and hold it for longer and longer and longer. And longer. And longer still, until the novelty has worn off and the boredom sets in.
The boredom was too much for me to take. Try to imagine not thinking for an entire day, not having one single completed thought for hours at a time. You probably can't. It's maddening and I couldn't stand it. The idea is that by learning to focus your mind so completely and finely you can later probe deep into your own being. I'm sure it works, and the whole 'probing of your true self' does have some attraction but to me, spending whole days forcing my mind not to think just to expereince the universal truth that the entire cosmos and everything in it is interconnected and made up of gazzilions of particles that jump in and out of existence in an instant, just like our own lives - ehh, not my cup of tea.
Apart from the boredom there was also the environment in which it took place. The grounds were very beautiful, but also very small and with only one 'walking path' that was about one hundred yards long and ten wide. There was no where else to go to stretch ones legs apart from up and down that long dirt strip overhung with trees. And you really needed a place to stretch your legs. For hours upon hours, starting at 4:30am until 9:30pm you are expected to sit cross legged on the floor in very serious concentration. There are breaks evenly spaced out and meals, a meager vegetarian affair but otherwise you sit on a pillow in total silence in a stuffy hall and meditate. The directions for the meditation come from a voice on a CD, because appearently the only person in the world qualified to teach this technique is the guy who brought it back to India. There are perfectly qualified teachers present who can answer any questions you might have, but only one man is capable of telling you to, "Focus on the area the edge and inside your nostrails. Follow the respiration in and out, in and out. Notice how sometimes it comes in the left nostrail... sometimes the right... sometimes both nostrials...." He says this several times at the start of each session and in three languages Tamil, Hindi and English (the whole course, except for the breif chanting to begin and end each session is in three languages).
Over all, it was very impersonal and on second thought, prison probably would be better - atleast you can enteract with your fellow inmates. After about 48 hours there I decided that I'd had enough of Visspannu and of Buddhism overall, but that's a seperate issue, and so I decided to get out. First, I had to plant the seeds the night before I wanted to go. I did this by saying how I was very bored and didn't really believe in or like the technique and then asked a few very pointed questions about Buddhism in general. This led to a very lengthy disscusion on the subject, which only furthered my belife that I want absolutely nothing to do with it ever again. That however, is a whole other topic. Then I informed him as soon as I could the next day that I wanted to leave. This was very tricky since you're only supposed to talk to him during certain times and so I wasn't able to tell him until noon. Another lengthy talk followed on the subject of why I should stay and how it was perfectly normal to absolutlely hate the technique before you had mastered it. I told him that I had no doubt that he was right, but all the same my mind was made up and I leaving. " Thats ok", he said, just try it until after the afternoon session at five and then give me your final answer and you can go.
I was content at that point. Freedom was within reach and I'd be back to civilization by night fall. Then the rain started. It was torrential, thunderous and flooded grounds of the center, which stood up a slight hill from the main road. It began at 1:30 and by 2:30 I knew that no car would be able to make it to the center. By 3:00, walking the half kilometer down a country road comprised of mud, cow shit was starting to look in doubt. Half an hour later, I informed the teacher that I was leaving, he implored me to stay another night and leave in the morning due to the rain. I however, was already fantasizing about Tandoori chicken, a beer and a good movie. So, I told him not to worry - where I was born it rains all the time and a little water wasn't gonna stop me. Quickly I set off on the road, bags in hand, pants rolled up to my knees, coat tied around my neck then thrown over my backpack and mosoon in full force.
However, during the final meditation session, while the rain was making the possibilty of leaving less and less likely, I did have one really cool exerience wth the meditation. The irnoy is that you aren't suppose to have experiences like this and if you do you're suppose to snap out of it and drag your mind back to, "...sometimes it comes in the left nostrail... sometimes the right... sometimes both nostrials...." About half an hour into the session I saw in my mind a wavy, fuzzy, somewhat spikey shape, which upon relfection looks something like a roll of film. Still following the breathing technique, I found myself focused upon it and then in a sense I was drawn in. All of a sudden I was completely immeresed in memories from my grade school days. Hundreds of them, one after the other and all quite random events that I had not thought of in many years. In each memory it was like I was there, reliving it in prefect detail. All the sights, sounds, smells, feelings (both physical and emotional) were incredibly vivid and spanned my entire grade school experience in Seattle. After what seemed a long time I became aware that I was barely breathing at all and my hands, which were clasped in front of me, fingers interlocking felt as if they were holding something that was slightly squeezable. I was able to go back into the memories and stayed there for what I thought was a very long time. When I opened my eyes, the whole thing could not have lasted for more than ten minuets.
Anyways, that didn't stop me from leaving...
Shortly after departing, I made it to the nearest 'hotel', which in these parts means a restaurant with a conveience store and tea stand out front, not the kind with rooms. I'd written down a few names of cab companies and after unsucessfully trying the pay phone about a dozen times and each time getting the, "The user you are trying to reach is unavailable," I was handed a cell phone by the lady at the store, got a hold of a taxi only to discover that she didn't speak any English. The guy at the store came over and I handed him the phone. I have no idea what they talked about for the next 15 minuets, my guess is that he spoke Tamil and she Hindi but either way, things looked in doubt until a construction crew showed up. There was a young engineer with them named Sandeep who spoke good English and was able to tell the guy with the phone what I was saying, who was then able to tell the dispatcher and an hour after I arrived, I had a ride set for later that evening. Sandeep bought me a cup of tea, so full of sugar and milk that one could mistake it for cheap hot chocolate and I set my dung/mud caked flip-flops a few yards away, sat down and watched a cloud of flies numbering in the hundreds swarm about them while I waited for the taxi.
Tuesday, August 24, 2010
Wednesday, August 18, 2010
INDIA!!!!
India is awesome. There's an electricity here that's contagious. I'm only in the transportation hub of Chennai but it's vibrant, bustling, amazingly dirty, embedded with history and perfectly friendly. It only took me about an hour to fall in love the place. In Sri Lanka the dogs out number the people on the streets after nine o'clock, here it's as alive as ever. People everywhere going about their business, and great food can be found in harshly light restaurants which are open to the street and often have "Hotel" somewhere in their name. In Sri Lanka, the good food is almost always home cooked, here I've eaten in places that I wouldn't walk into in the U.S. for a free meal, and they've been awesome. One was advertised as a xerox shop in the old British fort, but out front a guy prepared coffee and the smell coming from inside was unmissable. Coffee is prepared by filling one small cup or glass with bubbling milk/cream and then pouring hot water through what amounts to a giant tea bag filled with coffee, into another small cup and then mixing the two by pouring them back and fourth. This pour starts out close together and then is extended until one cup is at waste level and the other above the head. Tea is made in the same manner and hopefully I'll get a picture or video of it one day but I must confess, it seems quite unnatural to pull out the camera and take photographs here, I simply forgot to do so while walking around at dark in search of dinner the past two nights.
A great dish here is Masala Dosa, a thin and very large, crispy pancake that is sometimes filled with potato and onion (or even more, each place does it differently - today one had several other ingredients including what I can only call between a pea and pinto bean) and served with several sambars (dahl-like curries) on a metal plate covered by a banana leaf and eaten strictly with your right hand. The left was, before the invention modern conveniences, used for sanitary purposes. It is also quite improper to lick your fingers, there is always a wash basin in the back.
More to come...
A great dish here is Masala Dosa, a thin and very large, crispy pancake that is sometimes filled with potato and onion (or even more, each place does it differently - today one had several other ingredients including what I can only call between a pea and pinto bean) and served with several sambars (dahl-like curries) on a metal plate covered by a banana leaf and eaten strictly with your right hand. The left was, before the invention modern conveniences, used for sanitary purposes. It is also quite improper to lick your fingers, there is always a wash basin in the back.
More to come...
Leaving Lanka
Leaving Sri Lanka:
6 weeks was more than enough time. Before coming an old boss, who was originally from India he told me that, "No, I've never been to Sri Lanka, why would I want to go there?" Or something to that effect, and on some levels he was correct. Sri Lanka is very beautiful but in the sense that the show girl at a boxing match is good looking. Physically all there, but not exactly someone you're dying to talk to. There just isn't a lot for me to say about the culture. Buddhism abounds but it was hard to see any effect on daily life apart from the monthly full moon festival. In various places at various times it can be a huge deal. Complete with parades of elephants and dancers and entire streets turned in markets. Markets which sell cheap plastic nick nacks, clothes that have made their way here from various events in the united states such as some College Football bowl game of years ago and as many forms of sugar as one can imagine.
Usually though, it's a laid back place, living perpetually by 'Island Time', the highway to Galle was supposed to be finished years ago but no signs of construction exist. Island time is a great way to vacation but after weeks of chilling at the beach or killing time over pots of tea at the old dutch fort, listening to stories of the owner it starts to get old. Cricket is huge here and the one match I went to was a lot of fun due to it's historic nature, but to paraphrase the Lonely Planet Guidebook, 'It's like listening to someone countdown from 1000 to 1 and getting really excited around 10.' That really just leaves the beach and it's various vices for entertainment.
Upon arrival I was told great tales of the parties at the beach on the weekends, and with enough cheap coconut liquor even I can get into disco rave kinda thing but there is one huge catch: complete lack of girls. The breakdown of attendance is pretty much 80 local guys, 10 foreign girls and 10 foreign guys. Great odds for the ten girls. Local girls are never seen out. Ever. To make the situation even more interesting many of the local guys at the beach parties have wives or girlfriends at home. I don't what they think the men are doing on weekends, but it ain't very pious. I get the impression that even in a society where arranged marriages are no longer officially common, the promiscuity and it's acceptance that came from that system still lingers. And divorce is a process that takes years, requires connections and in the end is very rare. The beach scene also illustrates another interesting aspect of Sri Lankan life: mistrust.
The guys from the Lucky Tuna don't like the guys from the Happy Banana and somehow the guys from the Kingfisher don't like someone, I never bothered to figure it all out. And the guys from the beach aren't welcome in the city on the grounds that they are dumb beach bums and they get all the foreign girls. On the surface it's all laughs and smiles for the Westerners but underneath it all no one likes each other. Even the adults don't trust each other. In Kandy, Ian the guy I stayed with was able to get his spacious house in the best neighborhood in the city because he was an expat and the owners would only rent to foreigners. Renting to locals in the past had proved troublesome as payments were usually late or nonexistent and the house left in very bad condition.
The family I stayed with thought that the Tuk-Tuk driver, Priyantha who lived next door and drove all of the volunteers was trying to overcharge and so they conspired to put him essentially out of business. He was in fact just playing favorites, giving the volunteers whom he liked (yours truly and friends included) rates that were cheaper than local prices (there are two prices for everything in Sri Lanka - local and foreign and it's really damn annoying) and a lot of times free rides if convenient. The family bought the boy friend of the younger daughter a tuk-tuk, which was probably part of the dowery for the wedding next year, supposedly so that he could drive it to work and then one of his friends would drive it as a tuk-tuk for hire during the day. He has a motorbike and has never driven the tuk-tuk to work, while Priyantha is basically screwed.
More evidence of this distrust comes from their attitude towards the night. Many people won't go out late at night and there was a curfew at the home where I stayed. We were told that it was for our safety and so if you're not back by lock up time between ten and eleven you gotta find somewhere else to sleep. Locking up the house consists of a front gate, two deadbolts and a key lock (which even from the inside can only be opened the key kept by the owner) on the front door as well as the same deal with the second floor balcony door. There's also a large dog in a cage out front, but he only barks at people he knows - seriously.
...That's where I had to get on the plane to go to India and now that I am here I can't be bothered to finish this post. First impressions of India soon to come.
Please excuse the numerous typos, I'm sending this from a dirt stained computer in an 'internet cafe' in Chennai that costs 25 cents an hour.
6 weeks was more than enough time. Before coming an old boss, who was originally from India he told me that, "No, I've never been to Sri Lanka, why would I want to go there?" Or something to that effect, and on some levels he was correct. Sri Lanka is very beautiful but in the sense that the show girl at a boxing match is good looking. Physically all there, but not exactly someone you're dying to talk to. There just isn't a lot for me to say about the culture. Buddhism abounds but it was hard to see any effect on daily life apart from the monthly full moon festival. In various places at various times it can be a huge deal. Complete with parades of elephants and dancers and entire streets turned in markets. Markets which sell cheap plastic nick nacks, clothes that have made their way here from various events in the united states such as some College Football bowl game of years ago and as many forms of sugar as one can imagine.
Usually though, it's a laid back place, living perpetually by 'Island Time', the highway to Galle was supposed to be finished years ago but no signs of construction exist. Island time is a great way to vacation but after weeks of chilling at the beach or killing time over pots of tea at the old dutch fort, listening to stories of the owner it starts to get old. Cricket is huge here and the one match I went to was a lot of fun due to it's historic nature, but to paraphrase the Lonely Planet Guidebook, 'It's like listening to someone countdown from 1000 to 1 and getting really excited around 10.' That really just leaves the beach and it's various vices for entertainment.
Upon arrival I was told great tales of the parties at the beach on the weekends, and with enough cheap coconut liquor even I can get into disco rave kinda thing but there is one huge catch: complete lack of girls. The breakdown of attendance is pretty much 80 local guys, 10 foreign girls and 10 foreign guys. Great odds for the ten girls. Local girls are never seen out. Ever. To make the situation even more interesting many of the local guys at the beach parties have wives or girlfriends at home. I don't what they think the men are doing on weekends, but it ain't very pious. I get the impression that even in a society where arranged marriages are no longer officially common, the promiscuity and it's acceptance that came from that system still lingers. And divorce is a process that takes years, requires connections and in the end is very rare. The beach scene also illustrates another interesting aspect of Sri Lankan life: mistrust.
The guys from the Lucky Tuna don't like the guys from the Happy Banana and somehow the guys from the Kingfisher don't like someone, I never bothered to figure it all out. And the guys from the beach aren't welcome in the city on the grounds that they are dumb beach bums and they get all the foreign girls. On the surface it's all laughs and smiles for the Westerners but underneath it all no one likes each other. Even the adults don't trust each other. In Kandy, Ian the guy I stayed with was able to get his spacious house in the best neighborhood in the city because he was an expat and the owners would only rent to foreigners. Renting to locals in the past had proved troublesome as payments were usually late or nonexistent and the house left in very bad condition.
The family I stayed with thought that the Tuk-Tuk driver, Priyantha who lived next door and drove all of the volunteers was trying to overcharge and so they conspired to put him essentially out of business. He was in fact just playing favorites, giving the volunteers whom he liked (yours truly and friends included) rates that were cheaper than local prices (there are two prices for everything in Sri Lanka - local and foreign and it's really damn annoying) and a lot of times free rides if convenient. The family bought the boy friend of the younger daughter a tuk-tuk, which was probably part of the dowery for the wedding next year, supposedly so that he could drive it to work and then one of his friends would drive it as a tuk-tuk for hire during the day. He has a motorbike and has never driven the tuk-tuk to work, while Priyantha is basically screwed.
More evidence of this distrust comes from their attitude towards the night. Many people won't go out late at night and there was a curfew at the home where I stayed. We were told that it was for our safety and so if you're not back by lock up time between ten and eleven you gotta find somewhere else to sleep. Locking up the house consists of a front gate, two deadbolts and a key lock (which even from the inside can only be opened the key kept by the owner) on the front door as well as the same deal with the second floor balcony door. There's also a large dog in a cage out front, but he only barks at people he knows - seriously.
...That's where I had to get on the plane to go to India and now that I am here I can't be bothered to finish this post. First impressions of India soon to come.
Please excuse the numerous typos, I'm sending this from a dirt stained computer in an 'internet cafe' in Chennai that costs 25 cents an hour.
Monday, August 16, 2010
The Trip to Ella Part II: The best meal I've had in years.
A truly unforgettable meal is a very rare event over the course of life as I have experienced. Rarer still, is the unforgettable meal that relies simply of food to leave it's mark. We all have found memories of that one Thanksgiving when the power went out but the meal went on, or the magnificent Graduation dinners when all sides of a family come together in celebration, these are events more than meals and the food takes a back seat to the attendees and circumstances. Less common are the meals in which food is more an art than sustenance. I think immediately of my 21st birthday dinner at a world renown, 5 star restaurant. Flavors that are vivid and precise, altered through ingenious techniques that defy explanation and perfectly overwhelm the senses. It's the thin film like glaze of an ingredient laid carefully over a flavor infused piece of meat or the frozen ball of sorbet filled with the bursting taste of basil, surrounded by half a dozen different ways to prepare a tomato - each one impossible in the average kitchen of even the most dedicated gourmet. That is the type of meal that leaves you dazzled and amazed by every sensation on your tongue but lacks a the hearty satisfaction of fullness that we expect from food. Perhaps the most unforgettable of all meals is the one that delights you with flavors in the same way as was just described, but at the same time does not distract you from them through fancy preparations or artsy displays. It is one prepared with quality ingredients and perfect recipes, in an almost careless fashion but nonetheless will shock the eater with flavors that seem to come out of nowhere.
The meal in Ella was such a meal. A heap of soft rice surrounded by no less than nine curries - pumpkin, beet, dahl, caramelized eggplant, green beans, some sort of leafy greens, one that can best be described as having the look and texture of moist stuffing the day after Thanksgiving - but with an incredible flavor which I can't even begin to describe, date fruit (Not a date as we know it but more like a potato. I know, it makes no sense to me either.) and garlic. The pumpkin is phenominal, big chunks of pumpkin and enough chili to leave a sweet and fiery burn in your moulth. The beet curry is thick and sweet, the dahl - a light dish of lentils, the date fruit could fool you for a potato, the green beens - spicy and crunchy and the leafy greens are pure fire. The carmalized eggplant, known by some strange name to the Brits are at once mushy and chewy, a strange texture made overwhelmingly sweet by the sugar. To properly describe them would take more time than my attention span will allow and no matter what, come up short. They were all unique, all fantastic, all memorable, and all nothing compared to the garlic curry. Full cloves of garlic that had been cooked in a coconut milk based curry sauce until they were so soft that they melted in your moulth like butter. The cooking process also maed it possible to eat cloves of garlic by the moulth full, most of the pungent flavor had been cooked into the suace and the cloves themselves still had tons of flavor but were in no way over powering.
The meal in Ella was such a meal. A heap of soft rice surrounded by no less than nine curries - pumpkin, beet, dahl, caramelized eggplant, green beans, some sort of leafy greens, one that can best be described as having the look and texture of moist stuffing the day after Thanksgiving - but with an incredible flavor which I can't even begin to describe, date fruit (Not a date as we know it but more like a potato. I know, it makes no sense to me either.) and garlic. The pumpkin is phenominal, big chunks of pumpkin and enough chili to leave a sweet and fiery burn in your moulth. The beet curry is thick and sweet, the dahl - a light dish of lentils, the date fruit could fool you for a potato, the green beens - spicy and crunchy and the leafy greens are pure fire. The carmalized eggplant, known by some strange name to the Brits are at once mushy and chewy, a strange texture made overwhelmingly sweet by the sugar. To properly describe them would take more time than my attention span will allow and no matter what, come up short. They were all unique, all fantastic, all memorable, and all nothing compared to the garlic curry. Full cloves of garlic that had been cooked in a coconut milk based curry sauce until they were so soft that they melted in your moulth like butter. The cooking process also maed it possible to eat cloves of garlic by the moulth full, most of the pungent flavor had been cooked into the suace and the cloves themselves still had tons of flavor but were in no way over powering.
The Trip to Ella (The post I couldn't be bothered to write for some time) Part I: Tea Time
The end of last week was supposedly exam time for the teenage monks of Galle. Supposedly because they said that they weren't going to have our English class from Tuesday through Friday so that they could study, but when I came to help out with the younger class on Tuesday morning and there was a cute American girl helping out, they suddenly had no studying to do. Can't say I was surprised, what they have in holiness they severely lack in work ethic. Laziness seems to be the main tenant of their lives, which they display by not showing up to class, refusing to do work and at times just being a bunch of little shit heads.
As I had nothing to do for the rest of the week I decided to make a trip up north to meet up with a traveler I had met a few weeks prior, named Kiron. An interesting English fellow, he had quit school half a dozen years ago, been more or less traveling ever since and was going back to college in September. The idea had been to meet in Ella, the tea country and trek around there for a few days before he headed off to India and I to the city of Kandy. From Kandy I would go a visit some famous cultural site before heading up north to the city of Jaffna. Jaffna had recently been opened to public traffic after being closed off for many years due to the civil war which had just ended last winter. The story I was told by the locals, and which makes some sense given what I have read, is that the general of the Tamils, the group trying to break away had tried to surrender but the Army killed him on the spot and ever since there has been peace. Don't quote me on that, it's just the story I've heard. Anyways that last part fell through because foreigners still need permission from the Ministry of Defense and I don't have the connections to make that happen.
So on Wednesday morning I found myself on another all day train ride from Galle to Colombo to Ella. Again the scenery was breathtaking. Flat jungle and rice paddies leading up to steep hills and mountains where the train clung to the side, the land falling away nearly vertically, giving brief glimpses of villages and farms a thousand meters below. As we climbed into the hill country the air cooled and several of us stood at the doors enjoying every second of the first cold air felt in some time. The landscape also changed, the leafy palms and massive palm-like shrubs gave way to tall stands of pine trees not unlike those found in Northern California. Though they seemed to much taller and narrower and beneath them was thick cover of tall grass several feet high, swaying in the wind. Later we came upon stands of tall birch trees and also a plethora of streams that gushed downwards over flat rocks, forming waterfalls by the dozens. After twisting along the mountain sides and plunging through black tunnels that filled with the engine's smoke, we came upon an endless valley filled with small hills wrapped in neat hedge like rows of tea bushes.
I arrived sometime in the night and after getting a quote from the Tuk-Tuk drivers for 100 rupees to take me into to town I guessed that it couldn't be more than a kilometer and so I set off with a map that I had copied down from the Lonely Planet guide. The first place on my list was full and right as I was about to head to the second, a group of five French backpackers came in by Tuk-Tuk, looking for a place to stay. The owner ran up to me and gave me directions to another possible place to stay and from there the race was on. Luckily, I had the upper hand because the Tuk-Tuks carrying the Frenchmen were forced to circle around the base of a hill and back up to the next guest house, while I simply cut through a side yard to the backdoor. I arrived and was told that there was no room, but dinner was about to be served and there was room next door, at her sister's place. On this one hill in Ella there were three guest houses owned by a trio of sisters and I ended up in the smallest - a house with just two rooms for let but with a patch of tea plants in the side yard. The owner would harvest and then bring the leaves to the factory every year and the tea was simply phenomenal. I do not know how to properly describe what a great tea tastes like but let's just say that if you took the flavors found in your average cup of black tea from the states and then multiplied it by ten - you would have something close to this tea. Now if you could get a pot of it for 30 Sri Lankan Rupees (25 cents) that would be even better.
On the afternoon of my first day, when I was reading and the owner brought over a pot of her tea and we got to talking about all of the tea plantations in the area and how tea was made, etc. About fifteen minuets after we finished talking, she came back and brought with her the gardener/handyman/housekeeper and announced that I should go with him up to see the plantation where his family worked and lived. He spoke about as much English as I do Sinhalese, that is to say we could mutter hello, goodbye and about a dozen words in between. Experience has taught me that when the language barrier comes into play it can either be very frustrating or lead to a nice little adventure. Since no money was involved here, I was guessing for some sort of the later. My guide, whose name I can only remember started with an S, was the proud owner of the longest ear hair I have ever seen. The shock of hair atop his head was garish-white and his pencil thin mustache was dotted with grays, but out of his ears shot only black hair like a thick, stiff row of wheat. I've seen some interesting ears in the past month - the head monk is perfectly bald but for handful of curly cues coming from his - but doesn't stand up to the ears of my guide for the afternoon. I swear he must have combed them every morning, that's how perfectly they stood at attention.
We climbed upwards on a well paved road (the only place I've great roads in Sri Lanka has been in the tea country) past the turnoff for a scenic hike I'd done earlier in the day and into the forested hills where the way was lined with a single row of evenly spaced and massive birch trees. We followed the road for a handful of kilometers until coming upon a sign for the 'Finlays Newburgh Estate' and arrows pointing straight ahead for the 'Office,' 'Tea Factory,' and 'Bungalows.' First came the Factory. All we got to see was guard house which stood in front of a winding road to a tree encased factory with a green barbed wire fence running the length of the property. A Sri Lankan guard met us at the entrance wearing a khaki uniform complete with shoulder stripes, a walkie-talkie and a blue hat with stripes and a red 'LA' Dodger's logo. When I began asking him questions, mostly along the lines of, "Can I visit the factory?" He simply pointed at a sign which read, "VISITORS WITHOUT PERMISSION WILL NOT BE ENTERTAINED" I was not entertained.
The man with the ear hair led me further upwards into the hills to the Office. Here I was not entertained either. Despite the fact that his son worked there, as did his family and they lived the Finlays 'Bungalows,' No permission was given. For USD$20 I could go and visit a black tea factory a few hours a way, but I was not to be allowed into the green tea factory. When the question of why came up I was told that there are, "Many reasons." None of which I was given the privilege of knowing. In the heat of the moment, I forgot to take a picture of the Estate's Mission Statement which was posted in several places, but I distinctly remember that 'fair wages and working conditions for employees' was fourth on the list. Among the things that came before included protecting the environment and the usual corporate jargon. I was told by my hairy friend that the workers made 300 rupees a day (roughly 110 rupees to USD$1), another later said 500. Either way enjoy, that cup of tea.
Next we journeyed across the hill to the 'bungalows' which in Finlays terms translates to a long bunker divided into 'bungalows' by concrete walls. The living spaces are three rooms - a front room, living room/bedroom and kitchen. The living room is pitch black in the absence of artificial light and the others aren't exactly airy. The doorways and shutters are the same forest green as the Finlay's sign and the residences are distinguishable only through the jagged lines marking the end of one family's paint job done to their front wall and the start of the next. Even for Sri Lanka, these accommodations were sub par and were made to seem even more so by the quality of roads in the area and the sophistication of the layout of the tea fields - perfectly neat rows, red brick retaining walls and cobblestone paths. In a dirt field near the village a dozen kids play a game of cricket. Taking turns pitching and hitting, occasionally momentarily suspending play by belting the ball into some far off bush, it reminds me of countless pick up baseball games back home. No real differences, just kids playing after school.
As I had nothing to do for the rest of the week I decided to make a trip up north to meet up with a traveler I had met a few weeks prior, named Kiron. An interesting English fellow, he had quit school half a dozen years ago, been more or less traveling ever since and was going back to college in September. The idea had been to meet in Ella, the tea country and trek around there for a few days before he headed off to India and I to the city of Kandy. From Kandy I would go a visit some famous cultural site before heading up north to the city of Jaffna. Jaffna had recently been opened to public traffic after being closed off for many years due to the civil war which had just ended last winter. The story I was told by the locals, and which makes some sense given what I have read, is that the general of the Tamils, the group trying to break away had tried to surrender but the Army killed him on the spot and ever since there has been peace. Don't quote me on that, it's just the story I've heard. Anyways that last part fell through because foreigners still need permission from the Ministry of Defense and I don't have the connections to make that happen.
So on Wednesday morning I found myself on another all day train ride from Galle to Colombo to Ella. Again the scenery was breathtaking. Flat jungle and rice paddies leading up to steep hills and mountains where the train clung to the side, the land falling away nearly vertically, giving brief glimpses of villages and farms a thousand meters below. As we climbed into the hill country the air cooled and several of us stood at the doors enjoying every second of the first cold air felt in some time. The landscape also changed, the leafy palms and massive palm-like shrubs gave way to tall stands of pine trees not unlike those found in Northern California. Though they seemed to much taller and narrower and beneath them was thick cover of tall grass several feet high, swaying in the wind. Later we came upon stands of tall birch trees and also a plethora of streams that gushed downwards over flat rocks, forming waterfalls by the dozens. After twisting along the mountain sides and plunging through black tunnels that filled with the engine's smoke, we came upon an endless valley filled with small hills wrapped in neat hedge like rows of tea bushes.
I arrived sometime in the night and after getting a quote from the Tuk-Tuk drivers for 100 rupees to take me into to town I guessed that it couldn't be more than a kilometer and so I set off with a map that I had copied down from the Lonely Planet guide. The first place on my list was full and right as I was about to head to the second, a group of five French backpackers came in by Tuk-Tuk, looking for a place to stay. The owner ran up to me and gave me directions to another possible place to stay and from there the race was on. Luckily, I had the upper hand because the Tuk-Tuks carrying the Frenchmen were forced to circle around the base of a hill and back up to the next guest house, while I simply cut through a side yard to the backdoor. I arrived and was told that there was no room, but dinner was about to be served and there was room next door, at her sister's place. On this one hill in Ella there were three guest houses owned by a trio of sisters and I ended up in the smallest - a house with just two rooms for let but with a patch of tea plants in the side yard. The owner would harvest and then bring the leaves to the factory every year and the tea was simply phenomenal. I do not know how to properly describe what a great tea tastes like but let's just say that if you took the flavors found in your average cup of black tea from the states and then multiplied it by ten - you would have something close to this tea. Now if you could get a pot of it for 30 Sri Lankan Rupees (25 cents) that would be even better.
On the afternoon of my first day, when I was reading and the owner brought over a pot of her tea and we got to talking about all of the tea plantations in the area and how tea was made, etc. About fifteen minuets after we finished talking, she came back and brought with her the gardener/handyman/housekeeper and announced that I should go with him up to see the plantation where his family worked and lived. He spoke about as much English as I do Sinhalese, that is to say we could mutter hello, goodbye and about a dozen words in between. Experience has taught me that when the language barrier comes into play it can either be very frustrating or lead to a nice little adventure. Since no money was involved here, I was guessing for some sort of the later. My guide, whose name I can only remember started with an S, was the proud owner of the longest ear hair I have ever seen. The shock of hair atop his head was garish-white and his pencil thin mustache was dotted with grays, but out of his ears shot only black hair like a thick, stiff row of wheat. I've seen some interesting ears in the past month - the head monk is perfectly bald but for handful of curly cues coming from his - but doesn't stand up to the ears of my guide for the afternoon. I swear he must have combed them every morning, that's how perfectly they stood at attention.
We climbed upwards on a well paved road (the only place I've great roads in Sri Lanka has been in the tea country) past the turnoff for a scenic hike I'd done earlier in the day and into the forested hills where the way was lined with a single row of evenly spaced and massive birch trees. We followed the road for a handful of kilometers until coming upon a sign for the 'Finlays Newburgh Estate' and arrows pointing straight ahead for the 'Office,' 'Tea Factory,' and 'Bungalows.' First came the Factory. All we got to see was guard house which stood in front of a winding road to a tree encased factory with a green barbed wire fence running the length of the property. A Sri Lankan guard met us at the entrance wearing a khaki uniform complete with shoulder stripes, a walkie-talkie and a blue hat with stripes and a red 'LA' Dodger's logo. When I began asking him questions, mostly along the lines of, "Can I visit the factory?" He simply pointed at a sign which read, "VISITORS WITHOUT PERMISSION WILL NOT BE ENTERTAINED" I was not entertained.
The man with the ear hair led me further upwards into the hills to the Office. Here I was not entertained either. Despite the fact that his son worked there, as did his family and they lived the Finlays 'Bungalows,' No permission was given. For USD$20 I could go and visit a black tea factory a few hours a way, but I was not to be allowed into the green tea factory. When the question of why came up I was told that there are, "Many reasons." None of which I was given the privilege of knowing. In the heat of the moment, I forgot to take a picture of the Estate's Mission Statement which was posted in several places, but I distinctly remember that 'fair wages and working conditions for employees' was fourth on the list. Among the things that came before included protecting the environment and the usual corporate jargon. I was told by my hairy friend that the workers made 300 rupees a day (roughly 110 rupees to USD$1), another later said 500. Either way enjoy, that cup of tea.
Next we journeyed across the hill to the 'bungalows' which in Finlays terms translates to a long bunker divided into 'bungalows' by concrete walls. The living spaces are three rooms - a front room, living room/bedroom and kitchen. The living room is pitch black in the absence of artificial light and the others aren't exactly airy. The doorways and shutters are the same forest green as the Finlay's sign and the residences are distinguishable only through the jagged lines marking the end of one family's paint job done to their front wall and the start of the next. Even for Sri Lanka, these accommodations were sub par and were made to seem even more so by the quality of roads in the area and the sophistication of the layout of the tea fields - perfectly neat rows, red brick retaining walls and cobblestone paths. In a dirt field near the village a dozen kids play a game of cricket. Taking turns pitching and hitting, occasionally momentarily suspending play by belting the ball into some far off bush, it reminds me of countless pick up baseball games back home. No real differences, just kids playing after school.
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