It’s morning, and the heat is slowly beginning to build. Every day the temperature is between 30 and 35 degrees, so you really appreciate the gentle breeze from the ceiling fan on the terrace. Sarah is sitting outside, painting her latest project: a picture of two dogs’ bodies with peacocks’ tails. A gallery owner in Hikkaduwa has commissioned her to do it.
The birds are competing with one another in the garden. The birdlife here is incredible: tiny birds that look like hummingbirds, yellow-and-black birds the size of blackbirds, and small, plump grey birds hopping around on the grass. The garden itself is something special, with so many different plants and flowers. You could sit on the terrace for hours watching the birds and all the shades of green. Every now and then a troop of monkeys comes by, making a racket and stealing mangoes from the tree. The garden is very private. Surrounded by palm trees, with dense jungle at the far end, it feels as though ours is the only house on the road.
At Jupiters Guesthouse, which manages the rental of our house, we met an Englishman who is one of the many people who come here every year. He’s 80 years old. Puffing gently on his pipe, he tells us that he spends four months in Sri Lanka every year. He returns to England on a Friday towards the end of March, and by Saturday he’s got his boat ready and is sailing out from the English coast for a week.
We’ve rented the house in Hikkaduwa for just one week. It has three bedrooms, a good kitchen, two bathrooms and a dining room. We can hear the roar of the sea from the house, but we can’t see it because we’re 800 metres inland. It’s the perfect place to gather our thoughts after three months in Sri Lanka.
I potter around the house a little. On my morning walk I found lots of white frangipani flowers, which I’m arranging in a small bowl. There’s something soothing and peaceful about doing little household chores. I want the house to look nice for this evening.
For the first time in two and a half months, we’re having guests over for dinner. We’ve met another travelling couple from Amsterdam. They’ve already been travelling around Southeast Asia for nine months and are now turning their compass back towards Amsterdam. But first they have another month in Iran before bringing their journey to an end.
It turned into a really lovely evening. We laughed about all the silly things you end up doing when you travel and exchanged plenty of useful experiences. It’s always good to get advice from people who’ve just been to the countries you’re heading for, especially when it comes with the company of two cheerful, positive people.
This stop in Hikkaduwa has been absolutely perfect before we finish our Sri Lankan journey in Colombo. It’s given us a chance to gather our thoughts, reflect and make one final return visit.
We went back to Weligama, where we’d lived for a month. One last time we took the train there, and once again we struck up conversations with local people. An elderly man with no teeth thanked Christian for helping him get his large luggage settled on the train. Walking through Weligama’s busy, narrow streets and down to the beach felt like coming home. Our friends at Fish Point greeted us with big smiles and hugs. One last time we ordered the enormous prawns, crab and butterfish, and once again we had to admit that the best fish in Sri Lanka is served at Fish Point.
There were new tenants on the first floor of our Sri Lankan family’s house. “Amma” sent “Thaththaa” off to buy some cake, and before long we were sitting in their kitchen again, drinking tea and eating pancakes and cake. But there was something especially lovely waiting in the garden. Little Elly, the stray puppy Sarah had helped, was running around and actually peed with excitement when she saw Sarah. The family had now adopted her, and she would be living in the house with their two other dogs. You really have to say that Elly is one lucky dog.
Our final visit in Weligama to our private tuk-tuk driver was something special, too. He made sure we got safely back to Hikkaduwa. In his little tuk-tuk, he drove the long journey from Weligama to Hikkaduwa — an hour and a half — just to take us home.
My office in Denmark has been replaced by an “office” at JAVA Café in Colombo. There’s good internet, wonderful cappuccino and air conditioning. Several people are sitting here working on their computers; some are probably students, while others are businesspeople getting through the day’s tasks. I’m here to take care of my work for educational institutions in Denmark.
Our final week in Colombo has been a working week for all three of us. Sarah has been working with Embark, an organisation that cares for street dogs. They look after the dogs and then find new families for them. She’s been thrown into all sorts of new tasks and has embraced them enthusiastically. One minute she’s phoning businesses to get their email addresses; the next she’s lovingly tending to dogs at the animal hospital. And would you believe it, she has even designed and drawn a print they could use on T-shirts. Well, a parent can only be proud.
Christian is building websites for our friend at Villa63. He takes special photographs of the garden and the house, and they discuss various marketing opportunities. Teaching our friend’s 12-year-old son takes an entire afternoon, but the boy is impressively quick to grasp everything. His father, however, has decided that he is going to study politics — and when the man of the house has made a decision, no one questions it.
But our journey in Sri Lanka is also drawing to a close. Today we’re picking up our visas for Vietnam. Our good friends from Amsterdam recommended getting our visas at the Vietnamese embassy before leaving, rather than applying online or on arrival. It turned out to be excellent advice. We were granted three-month tourist visas without having to show onward tickets. That gives us enormous freedom, because we still don’t know where we’ll go after Vietnam — or, for that matter, exactly how long we’ll stay there.
In general, we’re travelling more and more according to the motto ‘Give it a go’, and we’ve become better at simply booking things as we go along. But with only two days until we leave for Vietnam, we’d better get around to booking our first night’s accommodation in Ho Chi Minh City.
It will be a little bittersweet to say goodbye to Sri Lanka. But all three of us are ready for new adventures and challenges.
We’ve now arrived in Vietnam.
So here are a few pictures of us on our first day in Ho Chi Minh City.
AND YES — Christel managed to find a beer bar serving the long-missed IPA beer. YUM! 🙂
