sri lanka

i seldom travel more than once in a month but somehow in august this year, i explore sri lanka and china. while the beauty of sri lanka was still playing in my mind, i was forced to let it go and be mesmerized by the beauty of the middle kingdom. how did it happen? the answer is easy, cheap airfare from mas + continuous public holidays.

anyway, i will try to bring back the magic moments that was given to me by sri lanka and translate them into words. i have travelled many places before but none of them offered me like what sri lanka is able to give to travellers. sri lanka might be small but it isn’t short of interesting places to visit. in just a short span of 8 days, i was able to turn back times and seen the greatness of its ancient civilizations, enjoyed the best tea in the world, walked under the southern asian sun at the world renowned beach, spotted wild animals in a national park, paid tribute to buddhism, learned dutch colonialism and the best of all, shopped like nobody business in the bustling capital, colombo! yes! sri lanka is amazing!

sri lanka has 8 world heritage sites and i explored 6 of them. from the 6 of them, polonnaruwa is my favourite. when i was there, i felt like i have been transported by a time machine to ancient sri lanka. by looking at those ruined monuments, i was able to picture how great polonnaruwa was during its glorious days. besides polonnaruwa, other world heritage sites are worth visiting.

if i am a writer or a musician or having a job that requires me to have like 101 fresh ideas, i will definately soak myself 24/7 in the southern town, galle. the charming town is just so inspiring and relaxing. gosh, i do wish im there now sipping black ceylon tea, enjoying the gentle sea breeze touching my skin while looking at the sun sinking into the indian ocean.

before the trip, i didn’t expect myself to shop like a mad man in sri lanka. never before i bought so many things in a single trip! so people, if you are going to sri lanka, make sure you include budget for shopping and i am sure you wont regret it.

is sri lanka really worth to visit? By looking at the stunned faces of those who had seen the photographs i took over there, the answer is a sure yes. sri lanka has something for everyone. the only not so fantastic story is the food! wherever I went, there were only two things in the menu which were rice and curry and fried rice. coming from a country where menu can be ranged from Indian to baba nyonya, having just rice and curry three times a day is just not right. anyway, i survived.

the highlight of the trip was meeting my pen-friend for 15 years. however, these days we are more connected by the creation of mark zuckerberg, the facebook. meeting up for the very first time after exchanging letters for 15 years was so overwhelming. oh yeh lasanthi, thanks for the great dinner. let’s hope we will be able to see each again in the future.

to view the photos i took at sri lanka, click here!