Hands on in Sri Lanka

I’m sure this is the same way for any person, but I first arrive in a country and am being driven away from the airport, I am always transfixed by the sights, sounds, and smells of those new locations.  This was particularly true with Colombo, Sri Lanka.  I’m basically tagging along with my cousin’s husband and his family here.  He is a native of an area near Colombo, so I am very fortunate to be offered this unique experience of staying with a Sri Lankan family, rather than in a hotel in a touristy area.  As of this writing, I have spent two days lounging in a beach down near a historic town near Galle. 

I was picked up at the airport in Colombo and drove several hours through the capital and other areas to this location.  This is one of those situations where try as I might, words just won’t describe what I’ve seen so far.  In many respects, Bangkok and Colombo are total opposites.  They do both share the fact that they are Asian capitals and teeming with a mass of humanity.  The easiest way of putting it, though perhaps not the most accurate, is to say that Colombo is simply not as developed as Bangkok.  Signs like a skytrain or other form of imposing mode of transportation, the numerous Western chains dotting the landscape, and the wide mix of people in terms of racial origin are lacking in Colombo and in the whole of Sri Lanka. 

The one other interpretation I have so far is that things here are much less frenetic and intense.  Well except for the traffic.  The traffic here, like in many other countries, can certainly get your adrenaline pumping.   Aside from that, however, life in Sri Lanka is much more casual and laid-back.  This is obviously true staying in a beach town.  In all of my trips, I have always been constantly on the go.  In fact, I got a lack of sleep in Bangkok because I’d try to get up at the crack of dawn to maximize the things I can do.  This is one of the only times during my travels where I have chilled out like this. 

On the way here, I witnessed many signs of the tsunami that hit Asia several years ago.  Remains of destroyed buildings were left standing.  Numerous small plots of graveyards, some with just a few headstones, littered the roadside.  The amount of beach space looked very school.  The craziest part was when my cousin’s husband talked to a maintenance guy at the hotel who survived the tsunami.  He was retelling the stories of the event.  Unfortunately he was talking in Singhalese the whole time.  In one of the limited translations provided, he explained the eeriness of the ocean waters receding and then seeing a huge black wall of water engulfing him.  The hotel I stayed at was three stories tall, and the water went up to the second story.  The guy also told of how he saw a woman clinging to a try with no clothes on and high enough where she could safely climb down.   The waves both tore her clothes off and brought her up high off the ground.  The area is apparently being rebuilt, which is a good thing since the area obviously is still trying to recover economically. 

For those of you who wonder what Sri Lankan food is like, the only thing I can really compare it to is South Indian food.  Like many other Asian countries, rice is the staple food.  People here eat mounds of it, as it is naturally cheaper than any other food.  There are also traditionally other dishes such as curries eaten as well.  There curries are cooked in a sauce for hours and have a lot spices in it.  Curries will have some meat in it, chicken, fish, or beef.  Vegetables are more common, but also cooked similarly, slowly and with a great deal of spices.   On the whole, Sri Lankan food is the spiciest I’ve had.   When I say that, I mean both hotness and the amount of seasonings added.  The result of slow cooking with lots of spices equals food that brims with flavors and aromas. 

Texturally, everything is made in sauces and slow cooked, which lends itself to be eaten with rice by hand.   What Sri Lankans do is essentially mix everything up with their fingers.  Because everything is cooked in sauces, it all just kinds of gels together.  You then scoop up some food off the plate and shovel it into your awaiting mouth. 

For me the toughest thing to get used to was eating strictly with your hands.  Or rather hand.  The right hand.  In many Asian cultures the left hand is known to be used for sanitary purposes.   Accordingly, it is considered impolite to handle food or do other personal things with the left hand.  It’s a pretty crappy practice if you ask me. 

Here's my food sampling so far in Sri Lanka...

Sri Lankan food

 This is actually my second meal in Sri Lanka.  My first one was at a place near the airport, and I just forgot to bring my camera.  It was a buffet setup, as many restaurants are.  My favorite dish was in the upper right hand corner of the plate.  That would be eggplant in can't notice.  I think it is only found in Sri Lanka, but it is eggplant.

Sri Lankan food

 As you can see, the food does look repetitive, and it is.  Sri Lankan meals, as I have already pointed out, consists pretty much of a mound of rice accompanied by curries or vegetables.  This is a bit different, though, since there is shrimp and fish in this meal.  Needless to say, the seafood was fresh and tasty, unlike the stuff in Tucson.  We were at the beach after all.  The place was totally open air and faced the ocean.  It was kind of cool eating in that setting.

Me eating traditional Sri Lankan style at a open beach front restaurant

 When I first arrived in Sri Lanka, I was very hesitant to eat with my hands, which is okay as all restaurants to have cutlery available.  But when in Rome....   It was tough to get used to.  There's something liberating, however, to eat with your hands.  It also connects you more to the food. 

Beach near the hotel

 From what I understand, the beach is much shorter, most likely due to the tsunamis.  This area is populated with small hotels that cater both to foreigners and locals.  You can't really tell, but this shot faces a cove that many Sri Lankan families were swimming in.  Behind me in this shot are the small, boutique kind of hotels.  Most foreigners are from Europe, particularly from Germany. 

Sri Lankan breakfast of string hoppers, sambal peas and curried beef at the hotel

 So we changed things up a bit by swapping rice for string hoppers.  As you can see in the pic, string hoppers are essentially thin noodles.  It's eaten the same way as with rice.  You kind of mix and mush all of the items on the plate and eat.  For hotel food, it was pretty damn good. 

Chicken with biryani

I like to thing everything I eat overseas is wonderful.  There are a seldom few times when I can say that the food was decidedly not good.  This is one of those unfortunate cases.  The chicken, much like my humor, was overly dry and perhaps a bit stale.  I think this dish actually has seen one too many moons.  The amount of rice there is about the standard amount Sri Lankans eat.  I'm Chinese and can eat rice, but Sri Lankans eat way more of the stuff than I can in one sitting.  I felt bad that often times, I left behind a lot of food.