Pictures from Paris

Here's a preview of what I did...
Christmas in Paris

Sri Lanka Day #4, part 2 to the end

I think I was saying something about our train ride back to Colombo...

The train takes about 4 hours, and when we got back to the city, my husband graciously agreed to stay in a nice hotel for the last evening. I threw my backpack on the floor, grabbed my toothbrush, and headed for the only real hot shower I would have that week. Oh, Ramada, thank you again.

We headed out in search of a good local place to eat, only to end up walking for 5km and in about the same spot as our hotel. Fortunately, I read something about a weekend activity that takes place on the oceanfront lawn of a nearby hotel. When we came to the place, it was full of locals flying kites, fishing, eating food, and having fun with their families, so we searched for something good to eat. We picked out some tasty-looking samosas, and after a bit of haggling, sat down to enjoy them. Much to my surprise, I soon felt an intense burning sensation on my lips and throat, forgetting that Sri Lankan food can be spicy! In Kuwait, we are used to pretty bland samosas, filled with either cheese, ground meat, or vegetables, so I was expecting the same. This was the only time I ever really thought my face could be on fire.

After trying to douse "the fire," with lots of water and another type of snack, we went to a nearby pub and ordered some English fare. Of course, I decided to leave my camera at the hotel that day, so I don't have any pictures of this little adventure.

The next day we woke up really early in order to make our flight, something like 4:45am. We packed everything, checked out, hailed a took-took to the bus station, caught a bus to the airport station (which took forever, by the way), took ANOTHER bus from there to the actual airport (through security and what-not), and finally got there. I am one for allowing extra time when flying, while Chris is not so adamant. In fact, he likes minimize airport waiting time as much as possible, so on the last several trips, we have cut it quite close. On this very occasion, we made it just in time again, and were the last passengers of our flight to go through customs, security, and board. Is this a guy thing?

Needless to say, we made it back safely and taught a few weeks of school before my next trip. We are incredibly blessed that we're able to see so many parts of the world while living in Kuwait, mostly because we can cut out the exorbitant expense of flying across the Atlantic Ocean. Since we've been here, I think we've traveled to 9 or 10 different countries together and few others separately. We thank God that he provides for us, and that he allows us these opportunities.

Bells in Kuwait

Okay. I am still catching up with entries and pictures from events past, so here is the link from when our friends Mike and Destiny came to visit. They were only here for a few days before they trekked back to the US for Christmas, but the time was sweet. We had lots of good Arabic food, went to church, visited the Scientific Center and Aquarium, barbequed on the beach, and generally wreaked havoc across the State of Kuwait. Sort of.
Bells in Kuwait

We miss you guys, and all of our friends and family scattered over the Earth during this time! We're glad for the good year-end reports we've heard so far, and hope that everyone was able to spend time reflecting on the birth of Jesus, the real reason for celebrating the Christmas season.

Christmas '09

I'm back from vacation in Paris and I have plenty of posting to do. For now, I'm off to spend some time with Chris. "Merry Christmas to all, and to all, a good night!"

Sri Lanka day # 4, part 1

Yikes- it's already December 18th and I haven't finished posting about Sri Lanka. Sitting here in the Istanbul airport, waiting on a delayed flight for the next trip, I decided it would be best to work on it before I forget the juicy details. So, here it goes:

After a good, mosquito-free sleep, we awoke to the amazing sound of crashing waves. We gathered all of our things and headed down for a quick breakfast, again, prepared by the establishment's owner/operator and his wife. The tea on this side of the world is nothing short of spectacular, so we were sure to take full advantage of drinking it with from-the-cane sugar. Then, to the main road we went, waiting for another bus to take us to Matara. There, we would catch the train and head back to Colombo.

In lots of third world countries, there is a local price and a non-local, "white" price. When we caught the bus, among other instances, the guys in charge of collecting money always charged Chris and I the "white" price. We literally saw people paying 10 rupees for the bus, while we were asked to pay 40 a piece. Generally speaking, Chris is good at bargaining and haggling a price. At this point though, the idea of that was relatively futile, so he coughed up the whole dollar or two and we were on our way.

When we got to Matara, we hailed our final took-took and made it to the train station. Once there, we got second class seats and boarded for the 4-hour ride back to Colombo. We sat across from a nice family of which only the father spoke English. We traded cookies and local treats back and forth, and tried to make conversation. Mostly, we just slept, and Chris' arm is still peeling from the sunburn of hanging it out the window.

After the long ride, we arrived at the hustle and bustle of Colombo Fort Station.
To Be Continued...

Day #3: Mirissa

After we walked out to the main road, we waited for the bus to take to Mirissa. The trouble with catching a bus in Sri Lanka is that they only slow down long enough for 1 or 2 people to get on it. After being passed by two of the right bus that we wanted to catch (once we were sure which one it was), we took the third and headed for Mirissa. With our trusty Lonely Planet book, we scouted out a beach hotel that was cheap and included half board, but didn't have A/C. We decided to go for the true "beach" stay and enjoyed the 40 minute ride along the coast.

When we arrived, we chose a 2nd story room as Chris didn't think he could do the bungalow experience; with the idea of already having to use a mosquito net while we sleep, he didn't want to be any more exposed than necessary. The view was awesome because we could look down on the grass courtyard-type area with mago and coconut trees, and the water was just 50 meters away. We don't have too many pictures from Mirissa, because we spent most of our day playing in the waves, which were much better and had less seaweed than in Unawatuna. The weather was amazing!

In the evening, we went down to the hotel's dining room, where we were served a freshly caught and freshly cooked fish, rice w/ curry, french fries, and the most amazing citrus salad I ever tasted! We met the couple staying next to us, who were from Germany, and also spoke with an Eglishman who is currently working in Dubai. It's funny being an expatriate and swapping stories with people from other countries, especially when one encounters a language barrier; it can allow for some embarassing moments. The German girl I was talking to was a part-time flight attendant for Lufthansa, but could not possibly remember where Kuwait was. Apparently, my English really is slipping from teaching these kiddos, because she understood what Chris said the first time he said something about Kuwait. "Oh, KuwAAAAit," she said. Bother.

That night, Chris and I sat out by the tide in a couple of beach chairs at a cafe, just laughing about different things we've said and done. When it started to sprinkle rain, the beach waiter brought an umbrella out and put it over us, presumably so we'd stay longer.

Day 2: Unawatuna, Sri Lanka

Yes, Unawatuna. That's Sinhalese for you.

On the second day of our travels, we got up and ate a regular Sri Lankan breakfast: coffee and tea; fish, potato, and dahl (bean) curries; hoppers (fried eggs in some tape of pastry bowl); stringy hoppers (some sort of rice/vermicelli/noddle-like carbohydrate); and juice.

We then took a 15 minute took-took ride to Unawatuna, a small bay town that is also on the southern coast of Sri Lanka. We stayed at a place called the Full Moon Resort, but don't be fooled by the "resort" in the title. The hotel and restaurant were owned by Italian management, allowing me to eat a quite tasty eggplant parmigiana, and our room was complete with A/C and mosquito net. The water here was the clearest that I've ever seen, and not too rough for swimming, but we spent a lot of time sitting on the beach. Our room was literally 20 feet from the water's edge! At one or two points, I'm sure I feel asleep...so, we spent most of our day just lounging.

After dusk, we went for a walk to admire the hotel lights. Because we were right on the bay, all of the hotels/bungalows' outdoor cafe lights were reflected by the water. Pretty cool. The only undesirable part of that was the incredibly loud music being blared from the bar next door to our hotel, not exactly romantic.

The following morning, we awoke again to move on. After a quick breakfast with real pork products (just for measure), we walked out to the main road. On our way, we saw the typical stray dogs and a gigantic scorpion in a 1-foot deep drainage gutter. Maybe six inches is not exactly gigantic, but it was a SCORPION! Kind of awesome.

More Sri Lankan Fauna

The goats were roaming around, and the crabs were all along the rocks at any point on the sea. We saw the scorpion in a drainage gutter on a walk, and the cows and monkey were pictures from the train ride from Matara to Colombo.

Here are the photos. No tags or descriptions on them yet, but I'm working on it.
http://picasaweb.google.com/thecsfreemans/SriLanka#

Sri Lanka: Day1

In the morning, we slept in because of the late night the evening before. We woke up around 9 or 9:30 and went out to the balcony for breakfast. Our hostess brought us tea and coffee in a cute service set, and we had a filling, mostly American style breakfast with fresh pineapple juice to boot.

After a quick shower and organizing our stuff, we took a walk around Galle Fort (pronounced Gawl). The town and its limits are actually much bigger than the Fort itself, but because our hotel was inside the Fort, it was a much quieter stay with quaint, small streets. We started on the lighthouse end and worked our way around the ramparts, watching roaming goats and talking with people who tried to sell us odds and ends and give us information about the area. One or two guys were trying to sell us old coins found from ship wreckage, while another was asking us to dare him to dive in the shallow waters. The things they do for tourists' money...

We moved on and sat down at the edge of a high wall, with our feet dangling over the sea water- a beautiful view. As the waves crashed against the rocks that broke the tide, we watched schools of fish and crabs fighting for rock space. Crazy. When we started to walk back to the hotel, we saw this gigantic (ok, maybe 3 feet long) lizard, birds, and stray dogs, as well as other young couples out for an afternoon stroll. We didn't linger because the rain clouds were coming, and in Sri Lanka, you don't mess with rain clouds. The night before, we witnessed a torrential downpour as soon as we left the airport.

We got back to the hotel, rested, read, and headed out of the Fort into the more modern area for a Thanksgiving dinner, Indian style. We had chicken biryani, rice with fried vegetables, chicken and egg soup, and sweet and sour chicken- not Indian, but it was good; there's nothing like mom's turkey. After a brisk walk through streets that were too dark, we made it to the hotel, read some more, and rested for the next day in our A/C room. We were totally on vacation!