I had expected to spend the majority of my time in Colombo, sipping tea and sketching from a comfortable sea-side perch. Colombo was not the city I expected. Colombo is not even a city. Colombo is many little cities with no space in between them. Really--they even have names, like "Pettah", where the train station is and "Havelock City", where my hostel was. Alternatively, you can call them "Colombo 01" and "Colombo 05" respectively. Imagine, if you will, a metropolitan area of 4.5 million people AND NO CITY PLANNING WHATSOEVER. That's Colombo. My hostel, quite removed from any beach or metropolitan center was located smack dab in the middle of this gigantic dog's breakfast called Colombo.
I gave it day. I found the ocean but there wasn't any beach. To my amazement, instead of developing the Oceanside property with walkways, bike paths, basketball courts and the like, inexplicably there was only a railway. Well, at least the passengers would have a nice view! I was walking along the coast when I was convinced to go to a Buddhist-temple by a would-be scammer who insisted that we go see the "elephant ceremony" that would miss if we didn't go right away. I must admit, the temple was interesting, but the "elephant ceremony" ended up being a chained up baby elephant eating plantain leaves. By that point, I was well aware of what was going on--he was taking me on a tour that I hadn't asked for, and would bill me for it later. Leaving the temple, I told him to take a hike, and then had it out with the tuk-tuk driver that had brought us to the temple: our clever tour guide's accomplice. That evening, I had some drinks with some of the others staying at the hostel. The lightweights were weeded out over a game of King's Cup and the rest of us eventually found ourselves at a very forgettable nightclub. We had a round of drinks and left. The next morning, I decided Colombo wasn't worth another day. The hostel lacked sufficient guidebooks, or maps, so I went online, picked out five tourist attractions, found them on a map, and wrote them down in my notebook, in what I thought was a logical order and headed for the train station. The names I wrote down were: Anuradhapura, Sigiriya, Kandy, Adam's Peak and Galle.
I found the train station and after some tribulation, namely standing dick to ass in a a ticketing room for half an hour, I procured my first class train ticket for one thousand rupees and got on the train to Anuradhapura. I could have gotten third class for two hundred-fifty, but the thought of standing dick to ass in a hot, sweaty cab for three and a half hours deterred me. I arrived in Anuradhapura somewhat after dark. As I got off the train I was immediately aware of two things: I had no idea where the fuck I was, and if I didn't start looking like I knew where I was going immediately, I would be accosted by throngs of tuk-tuk drivers like so many mosquitoes at a Colombo hostel. So I just started walking in the direction I assumed was towards town.
Before long a van slowed beside me and the man inside predictably asked me where I was going. I said downtown. He said I could jump in. So I did, but instead of dropping me off downtown, he just kept driving, insisting that I see his hostel. Seeing as how I had no idea who this nutter was, I told him to stop the fucking van or I would jump out. Only when I had the door half way open did he relent and turn the van around. This time he passed through town and took another turn, saying that I should check out the hotel he decided to drop me off at and if I didn't like it, he would take me to his hostel. I told him in no uncertain terms that I was not going with him anywhere and that he should fuck off. He still waited for me to come out of the hotel, and I had to tell him to get lost again. I waited until he was out of sight until I started walking. I made my way back into town, found a restaurant, hired a tuk, and eventually found a decent place for a reasonable price.
The next day, I hired a tuk-tuk driver named Douchematar (I remember his name because it's one letter away from being "Douche Master") to take me to Sri Jaya Maha Bodhi--the oldest intentionally planted tree in the world, which grew from a cutting from the tree under which Siddhartha Gotama reached enlightenment. I had hoped against hope that I would be able to meditate under the tree. No such luck: it was raised on a platform out of reach from ordinary folk. On all sides foolish people prayed to the tree and offered it lotus blossoms. Neither for the first nor the last time during the trip I though to myself, these people don't understand Buddhism at all. I was quite a nice tree as trees go, however, and I was able to procure a couple of leaves which had fallen to the ground.
The rest of the morning and a few hours into the afternoon, Douchematar drove me around and endless succession of ruins and stupas, for which I had to buy a ticket for twenty five hundred rupees (ouch!). Douchematar first asked that I buy a ticket for him, but when I refused, it turned out not to be a problem, as he could drive around the sites anyway. Nice try, Douche. When we finished, Douchematar dropped me at the bus station (the wrong one) and drove off with a cool fifteen hundred rupees. I think that must have been my most expensive day in Sri Lanka! Eventually I found the right bus stop, crammed in, and made the very stressful and uncomfortable journey to Dambulla.
To be continued in part two...
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