Dear everyone,
Hope you're all well and enjoying the winter in NYC... God I miss that
January NYC weather.... NOT. hee hee...
I’m having the most amazing time here in Sri Lanka... After spending a
week in Galle partying with a crazy bunch of expats I set off a week
ago on my own towards a sleepy beach town called Mirissa. Here I made
some friends on the second night which was very satisfactory as I
admit I was just starting to feel the slightest bit daunted by the
prospect of being quite so alone for the next few weeks. I found
myself hanging out with 2 east
Londoners and an Aussie, all men, all very funny and sweet and all
absolute gents. After hanging out on the beach for a couple of
days, we rented a van and drove into the rainforest together, and then
went on a hike into the jungle the next day (Thursday) with the
owner of our guest house who doubled as a very good guide.
We walked through thick forest until we reached the most stunning
waterfall and a huge pool of water to swim around in - was quite magic. I jumped from a very high rock into the water, which I don't think the boys thought I would actually be brave enough to do. ha.
On the way there and back we all got 'leached.' I wore trainers and
socks but still the little buggers managed to get inside my shoes.
When I stopped half way to check my feet I pulled down one sock to
reveal rather bloody ankles and two leeches sucking away! They are
completely harmless so I knew there was nothing to worry about -
pretty nasty though. Being the only girl in a group of what had now
become 6 of us (2 more brit boys joined us on the trek) I was quite
impressed at how I handled the situation I must say.. I mean, while
they all thought it was fun to see how long they could leave the
leaches on for and watch them get fatter as they sucked away at their
blood, I would politely ask one of them to "get it the fuck off me!"
which one or other of them would sweetly oblige by squeezing lime and
salt over the fuckers. But I didn't completely freak out. What
really got me though was on the way back, we'd reached our van to take
us back to the guesthouse, I'm thinking I'm safe and sound. But oh no… I took a piece of chocolate out from my little emergency stash in my rucksack, and keenly gobbled it up.. But then couldn't seem to get the chocolate off my front tooth...
I rubbed it off with my finger, looked down and there was a little
squirming leach that had somehow, god knows how, got in my mouth. At
that point a proper wheel squeal came out and all respect from the
boys diminished. Damn.
Anyway, I am now in the mountains. Took an amazing train ride this
morning through the hills from a beautiful little town called Ella to
where I am now, Nuwara Eliya . I sat at one of the open doorways,
listened to my i-pod and sucked in the fresh mountain air and the
spectacular views. One thing I am loving about traveling through this
country is that there are so few tourists... this is basically because
there is a war going on, which is awful, but does mean that you can go
for miles without seeing one other westerner.. which is great. On our
walk to the waterfall and back for example we passed the odd Sri
Lankan jungle man chewing on beetle nuts, a few monkeys, loads of very
high interesting trees, funny looking lizards and giant squirrels but
no tourists at all. The war is in the north, and I'm in the middle..
so perfectly safe in that respect just in case you were worrying about
me.. hee hee.
This town i am in now is rather grotty, but staying here just one
night in order to get up at 5 tomorrow morning to go and check out
'Worlds End,' in the Horton Plains, a plateau with a stunning sunrise
view for miles and miles.. exciting..
The Sri Lankans are very gentle, eager to please people.. not so in
your face as the Indians. Most of them are Buddhist which I must say
is a religion that makes a hell of a lot of sense. There are temples
everywhere. I visited one outside Galle on Poya day (full moon day)
to watch how they all pray. So magical.. as the sun went down and the
moon lit up they all climbed to the top of this hill where the temple
stood over looking paddy fields. A big statue of the buddha sat
underneath a huge Bodhi tree. There were candles burning everywhere
and family after family all went round little incense and muttering
their prayers.
The landscape is very diverse and beautiful.. I have seen stunning
beaches, loads of paddy fields, rainforest, tea plantations and
mountains in the space of about 5 days... pretty cool...
Even though I'm having rather a fabulous adventure (so far so good) I
am missing you all lots and wondering what you are all getting up
to... so please please send me a short e-mail with a little news /
gossip / whatever.
love to all of you,
Jax xxxx
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