Trinco Uppevelli Beach
Ella Rock view!
Me and Mr P doing some maths!
Mr Niel presenting me with a Certificate on my last day.
A traditional Kandayan Wall hanger- a gift from the office
Listening to music at the Men's Special Needs
Using the new donations at the Men's Special Needs
March-April 2012
March 2012
5th March.
Today, Aaron and I coached 60 kids at football pretty much in a quarry!
6th March
Taught bakery boys and I met a university lecturer and she spoke to me all
about the education system here in SL for about 1 hour. She told me all about
how competitive it is in SL to go to University and how
education is so highly pressured by parents.
7th March
Poya Day, the day of the full moon in SL and a festival for Buddhists. We
all went along to the local cricket game and I met the Minister of
Education Bandulla Gunawardena, and asked him about a job in SL, and he said no
problem!
8th March.
Today I have been to the Men’s Special Needs. I really got to know Amal and
discovered that he is only 22 and has no parents and has lived there for 12
years.
9th -11th March-
My computer application class was cancelled and I was Mr Niel’s personal
assistant for the morning at a volunteers award ceremony. Here I met
people from all over, including Jaffna. There was a presentation on and awards
for young people, I handed out stickers to those that were ‘young volunteers’ I
then watched the ceremony and it was delivered in Tamil, Sinhala, and English.
I watched traditional Tamil dancing, which had a faster pace and lots of
piercings in comparison to Singhalese, which was more about flowers
and sensual dancing, no piercings! That afternoon I then got on a coastal bus
and headed to the beach in Hikkadua!
Night in
Hikkaduwa
10th Spent
the day walking lazily around Hikkaduwa, looking in shops etc. Met a man on the
beach and held his monkey and I poured water into my hands and he drank from
it. Unawatuna and Natalie’s 30th in Unawatuna- we partied in
Riddan’s after having a lovely meal at the Ceylon Veggie restaurant.
11th Day
in Unawatuna, falling over in the sea and then back to Hikkaduwa for the night,
defined by ginger tea and avocado roti at the rotti restaurant. I sat talking
to Mike who told me about Indonesian village life in Sula Wesi known as ‘death
tourism’- a village where they prepare all their lives for the celebration of
death, a freaky conversation whilst drinking red Sri Lankan wine on the beach
at the hostel Hansa which means ‘swan’ in Sinhala.
12th Day
back from Hikkaduwa, I headed in the afternoon the Marhabodi girls orphanage (I
got lost!) The girls had another ‘tea party’ and the teacher in charge gave us
some egg sandwiches, cake, bananas, and fish cutlets. We taught the girls about
weather and had them draw and play games. That evening we all sat together
again and had another lovely tea cooked by Amma.
13th I
tried string hoppers, at the Youth Centre, for the first time this morning for
my breakfast; they are sweet packed with caramelised coconut. We taught a
lesson in Haynat’s (Hayley and Natalie ;-) ) restaurant today with our bakery
class. We taught them about English dinner etiquette and had a table set for 4
people and did a role-play as they came into the classroom and sat at the
table. After the lesson, I sat with Damith for 20 minutes and went over a bit
of English with him. He told me every day to get to school he gets a 5 hour bus
to the Youth Centre and has to leave at 4.30am every morning and sometimes
does not get home until 8-9pm. In the afternoon, I worked in the office with Mr
Neil. Then went to buy some fruit and I tried Bali fruit for the first time,
which was not the nicest fruit I have ever tried, and so I gave it to Amma as
she loves it.
14th We
did some SL Volunteers group training at a Workshop on challenging behaviour
and understanding that– 'all behaviour is communication' in Colombo by
the Psychologists from UCL. They are here to educate in Sri Lanka about
psychology, as it is not yet recognised as a way of treating mental problems,
for example, you cannot do a degree in Psychology here, and all treatment is
medical, they are introducing CBT.
15th Today
I went to the Men’s Special Needs in the morning and to the Sanhinda mixed
Orphanage in the afternoon. We got caught in a slight Sri Lankan down pour!
16th, 17th-18th Trinco
for the weekend. ... We planned to get the ‘night mail’ train, which leaves
Colombo at 9pm and gets to Trinco at 5. After my morning project, Nat and I grabbed
a bite and got the bus to Colombo. When we got there, we decided to head to The
Old Dutch Hospital area, in the Fort. It was an amazing area, with a heavy
military presence as the area is home to the president’s house, the Ceylon bank
and the twin towers of the world trade centre. The area had previously been
targeted by the LTTE with catastrophic effects. We had a lovely lunch then went
to wander around where the presidents house is and stood at the guards gate for
a few moments and we asked if ‘Mahinda was home’ but he was at his office in
Kollupitiya. We then carried on strolling around the fort and decided we
fancied a swim. So we went into a 5 star, to the roof top, and persuaded they gave
us half price entry to use the pool and facilities, which by this point had got
a bit windy! Nonetheless, we enjoyed it and then we enjoyed a steam room, shower,
and headed for food in one of the pepsi hotels!
We met
the boys then got on the train. It was possibly the most uncomfortable train
seat ever known to man! I tried 20 different positions at least every 15
minutes for the whole duration of the trip! When we arrived in Trinco the sun
had risen and it was like a dream world. Walking down the streets, half dazed,
it was like a ghost town. Everybody’s shop/home had shutters down and we
spotted the ‘evacuation route’ signs from the Tsunami in 2004. We didn’t have a
room booked, and headed on the bus to Uppeveli, but a man on his bicycle took
us to a guesthouse which was lovely. We napped and headed to the beach. It was
a wide stretch of sand and very quiet, which made it so peaceful and the sea
was very calm compared to Hikkaduwa and Unawatuna. We spent all day there, then
we went and explored a stretch of beach that was covered in barbed wire and
there was a mini island at the other side and we swam and chatted to the
locals. We headed back for a Lion bear, then I met a beautiful dog on the beach
that fell asleep in my arms, then I went back to the room. One thing that
struck me about Trinco was the amazing sky... the stars were absolutely
beautiful. The next day we got up early and headed into Trinco town. Whilst
there we visited the Kovil Hindu Temple where I spoke with some locals who said
they pray to Ammal. Then we headed to Fort Frederick and its beautiful Hindu
Temple, also heavily militarised then we went in the sea and had a snorkel!!
After that, we headed back for the bus to Colombo.
19th- I
went to the Men’s Special Needs alone this morning, at first it was very
daunting as there are at least 35-40 service users, but it ended up being a
great experience. I made Mr P’s his own Maths Book and he was out of his
bedroom, which was nice. I made Amal another note that he stuck under his glass
desk in his room and half way through was hijacked by the girls from the all
girls home and I ended up singing titanic to them all. Later on in the evening,
I organised on the white board that everyone should create 2 lesson plans for
the orphanage syllabus.
20th- This
morning I went in to The Youth Centre on the back of Mr Niel’s motorbike, I
watched part of the opening ceremony of the disabled sports contest that was
going on over 2 days and consisted of 12 cities and regions from SL, a man told
me that was the first one to be held in Sri Lanka. After we had the bakery boys
lesson, and taught them more on laying a dinner table, ordering food, and then
going to the supermarket. Later I spent 20 minutes sat with Damith explaining what
Positive, Comparatives and Superlatives were. I later went and printed out and
laminated 10 animal pictures, which cost 700 rupees (roughly £4) and was my
first contribution from the Laurel Bank fund. I also checked the CVs and
emailed all the pupils feedback, a lot of it was similar feedback as they had
made similar errors. I then spoke with some of the youths participating in the
event, I could not sign with them but I tried!
My
afternoon lesson was cancelled so I did the CV work then wandered back to Homagama
on the bus.
That
evening Mr Neil was telling me how Sri Lanka has been targeted by false images
and press in the Civil War, especially in the west. The truth being that the
Sri Lankan army helped thousands of Tamil Civilians... it was the LTTE, that is
now in massive Diaspora in Canada, Switzerland, and England. The main war zone
was Pudukuruiruppu and the war officially ended in the 19th May
2009. The leader- Prabakaan. I enjoyed listening to his facts and
passion about those facts.
21st
- Today- I got a lift in with Rajitha on the back of his bike
at about 70mph!!! Joy and I taught the computer hardware lesson on Countries
which was really fun and worked really well and I learnt from the monks that
Sri Lanka, Bhutan, Thailand, Cambodia, Burma are Buddhist Countries. That
afternoon I spent fixing my USB stick and planning my animals’ lesson. They in
the afternoon we went to the Hiripitiya Boys home. We started by splitting the
lesson... the younger boys and the older boys and we taught the little ones the
alphabet and the others learnt about the weather. We started to lose them a bit
so we went outside and tried to start a game.. Then I managed to think on the
spot and put all the flashcards down and then we played run to the right on. It
worked really well we all had to stand on the wall and Emily shouted the
weather and we ran. It lasted about 15-20 minutes. I realised that the
orphanages should just be fun and learning, not just play on its own or written
work on its own, it is very important to combine the two. I find the orphanages
really difficult but for that 20 minutes I felt like no matter what that day I
had succeeded in making some of the children laugh and smile so that felt
really good.
22nd Special
Needs/Sanhinda- My animal Handouts. Today was a great success! It started with
a 7.30 am wake up, then we headed to the Men’s Special Needs. I handed out the
animal flashcards I had made the day before. And the men loved them. It was a
great success, we did noises with them, drawing pictures, Mr P did his maths book,
and singing and dancing, he told me his mum and dad were coming to visit him. After
this we wandered around Maharagama and me and Ellie found some fabric and went
to the tailors and I ordered a skirt. We then headed to Sanhinda orphanage.
I led
today’s lesson and it was a brilliant feeling. I had good feedback from Aaron,
but my biggest feedback was that the kids were listening and they loved it. I
got them to sit down, I wrote all the animals on the whiteboard, and they spelt
the letters at the same time. They then all sat down in a circle, I put the
animal pictures on the floor they then had to draw all the animals on a piece
of paper, and they did this really well for about 20-25 minutes. Then we played
a great game, where I got them into little teams and I showed them 4
flashcards, covered them up and shuffled them then asked the children, one at a
time and demonstrate this by using actions that others must be quiet and pick
one that has to watch who will answer. This makes them all concentrate on
trying to find the card. It worked really well. After this, the group spilt
again and we played, ‘duck, duck, goose’ and then Aaron’s side played ‘In the
water, up the mountain, on the beach’ Prepositions game, in line on chairs. We
stayed for 2 hours, one of the longest times we have been there without losing
them totally! That evening, Alyia and I planned that we would go to Ella for
the weekend.
I also
created and ordered some more resources with the fund:
Donations
Today:
· Another
Laurel bank contribution, flash cards of countries for the Youth Centre 240
rupees
· Another
Laurel Bank Contribution on order for 6 more animal flash cards, 550 rupees.
23rd-
25th Deaf School with Alyia, Ella for the weekend. I went to
the deaf school and had a wonderful experience. I watched Aliya and learnt all
about her style of communication and how the classes run. A student also drew a
portrait of me. After that, we got the bus to Colombo then headed to Ella for
the night. We got to Ella at midnight and stayed at the dream café. It was soo
cold at night! We woke up the next day and climbed Ella Rock! We nearly died as
we didn’t take enough water and we also had fun walking across the railway
line, eating tomatoes we found on the farm. Aliya and I also shared a sneaky
orange without the boys whilst en route to the top, it was the nicest orange I
have ever had! We reached the top it was beautiful. Later we went around a Tea
Factory, I was hit by a van on the walk back to Ella which was a crazy
experience and more of a shock really as the driver was a bit drunk and the van
was really full of people! I was fine though, more of a shock, it managed to
break before it hit me that hard. That night we went for a lovely veg curry and
rice and had 2 cups of tea with a chocolate bar! We went to sleep, worst sleep
ever, we had caught a cold, and we coughed and sneezed all night! On the
Sunday, we woke up and the men in the hostel looked after us gave us plenty of
hot water and blankets! Later we went to a waterfall and climbed to the top
where there were beautiful monkeys and butterflies. We later got the most
amazing bus ride from Ella to Hambantota, across the south to the west to
Matara. We looked around a temple built in the sea, I had a go at making a
hopper (failed miserably), then we got the bus to Unawatuna.
26th Galle:
England Test Match with the Barmy Army! Me and Emily, went to the hospital
first as I had cellulites and she had to get a rabies injection for her monkey
bite. The hospital was manic, we missed the first part of the cricket but made
it there for 11 and spend the day chilling, dancing, and watching the cricket!
That night we headed back to Homagama and I finally caught up on my sleep.
27th Last
Bakery and Netball Lesson both went really well! We asked the bakery boys to
tell us what they had learnt and enjoyed a little party at the end where we ate
cake and listened to music and showed off family pictures as we themed the
lesson as ‘family’. After that, I spent some time with Damith and I taught him
about using articles in the English Language. After that I spent my afternoon
in Mr Niel’s office and then went to my netball lesson where me and Emily
taught the girls the history of netball, they sang the national anthem and I
also, attempted to sing the English one. I had a lovely lift home on Mr Niel’s motorbike,
then went for my haircut, and picked up my new skirts that I dropped in at the
tailors to be made. I walked home and admired the view of the stars and the
dark dim roads. That evening Joy and I planned the Monks last lesson and we
planned to do story telling with them.
28th-
This morning I taught my final lesson for the computer hardware lesson. It was
good, except the monks could not join in with any dancing, singing or acting! Later
that afternoon we went to Hiripitiya boys home and I took the animal
flashcards. The lesson was again similar to Sanhinda and it worked really well.
We taught in class then we went outside and played run to the card. Using
Laurel Banks donations towards flashcards has contributed to some of the most
successful lessons taught at the orphanages whilst I’ve been there!
9th-
Today has been a very odd day. First, it started with a trip to Special needs,
my final trip. I bought oranges and chocolate too the price of 550 rupees,
another donation from Laurel Bank! Then, I bought a bubble gun, plastic guitar,
and badminton set again with the fund, that came to a total of 600 rupees. When
I arrived at the special needs, I was overwhelmed with how the men were so
excited for the oranges and chocolates and I stupidly forgot to buy enough.
That meant I had to run to the shop and buy more bananas and chocolate
biscuits, which came to 400 rupees! However, it was worth it and I’m sure
Laurel bank will be happy with the donation. Although the food was only short
term, it was still a nice treat for the men. It was quiet emotional and I felt
sad when Mr Bali was annoyed that I did not bring enough, nor bring him an
individual gift! But we enjoyed the day, I gave a banana and some biscuits to
Mr P and he was very happy!! I played Frisbee with Addi and other activities
throughout the day. After, I went shopping to buy some family gifts then back
to Homagama. Here I printed out the last 5 animal slides and a world map, all
in colour and A4, which cost me 650 rupees- another donation from laurel bank.
We then went to Sanhinda and I did my lesson plan on continents, countries that
tied in with the previous lesson plan on animals. We drew a world map on the
board and spoke through different country locations, and then showed them the
animal slides, then we drew them on the map then handed paper out, and all the
children drew. We then played duck, duck goose and the ladders game, where all
the children sit with their feet to a partner, each set have an animal, when
their animal is called out they must run around the outside then down the middle
of the ladders. I felt happy and sad; again, the flashcards had been a success
but emotional leaving the project too. Emily and I went to the doctors that
night. After the pain of the doctors cleaning our infected bites, we went home
in a tuk tuk with Rajitha and I had a big shock to find Polly (one of the
guesthouse puppies) was very un-well, in a coma like state in the corner of the
room.
We had a
lovely last dinner of pumpkin curry, dahl, spicy mushroom, peppered tomato and
cucumbers. Then we feasted on pineapple, cake, crisps, and all kinds of yummy
things. The problem was I couldn’t really enjoy it knowing Polly was so ill and
she was in the corner
. Later
on, we put Polly in my room and I told Amma I would look after her all night
and then Becky called me to look at Polly and she looked as if she had woken up
and was stretching but she was actually dying, it was horrific! It was so sad
we tried to stimulate her heart and I was blowing into her mouth, but nothing
happened, she died and my head was under her head it was so unbelievably sad. I
cried so much and it was sad to see Amma cry and other people upset. The others
went off to dig the grave and me and Aliya cleaned her. I then wrapped her in
my cardigan and we buried her outside of the house. It was very very sad. When
we walked away, I looked up at the stars and I thought of Polly. I could not
get to sleep that night, Polly’s death was so sad for Amma, it was clear she
had not received the right treatment from the vet or the correct kind of
injections. She died from Parvo-virus.
30th-
Last Youth Centre, lesson with the Computer Application Assistants. I did
a good interactive lesson with them, we did role plays and Bollywood and I
taught this lesson on my own. After that, I went to the office to say goodbye
to everybody who works in there. They presented me with so many gifts! After
that, I got my last bus ride into Colombo. I spent the afternoon roaming the
Pettah and visited the Dutch Museum. I then took a tut-tuk- (which a guy
randomly in the street gave me 100 rupees towards) to the deaf and blind show
in Cinnamon gardens. I waited around for the other girls in the common tea cafe,
sat, and indulged in a cup of tea and chocolate mousse-what a treat! That night
we watched an amazing performance then Aliya and I headed back to Homagama. We
arrived to find Hugo (the other pup) was really sick, so I cuddled him for a
bit and then I went to sleep. That morning we woke up and had breakfast and me
and the new girl set off for Hikkaduwa. We found a spot on the beach and
chilled for hour. We then met the others and I went shopping and had a yummy
pineapple drink! That night we got ready, I went to the rotti shop with Rajitha
and Emily, and we had rottis then went to get ready. We had drinks at Aaron and
Joe’s place and then headed to Funky de bar where we danced and Mambos. I was
not happy with how Rajitha was being treated (a local Sri Lankan) and I wanted
to just stay with him. So when he was told to pay 1000 rupees and also when he
wasn’t allowed to stay in the club, I left with him. The next day I got up
early and headed to the beach. We spent the day there, and then headed back to
find Hugo had died. It was such a sad day that nothing felt right at all.
2nd So
today is my last day in Sri Lanka. I woke up at 7.45, had breakfast, and packed
my bags. I went into the town and printed out my 2 lesson plans for the
orphanage file and some more laminating of flashcards which cost 100 rupees. I
also bought Amma some new drinking glasses as a leaving gift and a
contribution to the guesthouse for the volunteers! I came back and said ‘see
you later’ to everyone and then set off to Colombo on Rajitha’s bike. It was an
amazing experience; he drove so fast, we stopped off in Wellewatta for a king
coconut and stood on the beach to drink it. My massive bag was also on the
motorbike wedged in-between us! We met Natalie and Stu in Galle face for a
drink and then Raj drove me to Cinnamon gardens after a tour of Colombo as we
struggled to find it, I remember him going fast along Galle Face Green and it
felt amazing! So much fun that, I don’t think I could drive a boring car again!
After I got to the flat, I sorted my bag, had a quick wash, said goodbye, and
set off in a tuk tuk to the bus stop. Now I’m just sat here in the airport
attempting to even think about the last 8 weeks and how much I have experienced
and learnt. It is crazy and I cannot put it into words. It was one of the most
mind blowing, eye opening experiences of my life and I have learnt so much
about the world, other cultures, people, myself and Sri Lanka. Next stop...
Cambodia via Singapore.
Favourite Sri Lankan snacks:
Masala Wadi (chickpeas, fried food)
Rulan (coconut, powder, cereal)
Cokis
King Coconut drink
Egg Rotti
Coconot rotti
Fish roll
Mangustine fruit
Kottu Rotti
Avacado Rotti
Hoppers
Pancakes
Dosa (Thosai) and potato curry
Oranges
Portello Fanta
Ginger Tea
Hot chick peas
Casava Crisps (manioc, chillies, salt, friend in veg oil)
Most useful expression in Sinhala: ‘Prasheak-ner Machang' which translates to ‘No problem my very good friend!’ Other words, 'Mama powel'- Im sad...., 'Maga pattia' my darling..
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