12-29-05
475/3A Thimbirigasyaya Rd
Colombo 05 Sri Lanka

Ron and I have finally gotten a morning routine. We get up at 6:00 and take a brisk walk for 45 minutes, come home shower and have breakfast and he reads the paper until time to go to work at 8:15. At home, we used to get up at 5:00 and he left for work at 6:40. Ah, island life...The walks have been interesting because there to so much to see when on foot. One thing for sure, we are reminded daily of how incredibly wealthy Americans are (for the most part) compared to folks here. Let me explain. There is a place called Suki's Wok. It's a take out place, with a counter on the street. You don't go into the shop, just stand at the counter and order your food. Yesterday we realized the owner (manager? worker?) sleeps on the counter at night. That's his home. There's another food stand on our walk and we are pretty sure they are sleeping in the tri shaw that is parked next to it. A tri shaw is what I ride around in. It is sort of a motorcycle with covered passenger/driver area. Let's just say it ain't made for sleeping but this couple seem pretty darn creative in terms of how they have converted it. This morning we walked past the Independence Memorial Hall. There is a concrete pond on the site and we observed a disabled man who sits uses a bicycle where you peddle with your hands instead of your feet. At any rate, he had hoisted himself up on the concretre wall and was brushing his teeth in the pond. Mailmen deliver mail on bicycles, the newspaper men are walking or on bicycles. Notice I said men, not boys. Many trishaw drivers are drving barefoot although I can see their shoes on the floor. We have alos spied a man on a bicycle with a big tin container on the back. He is selling bread door to door at 6:30 in the morning. I know not everyone in Amercia is wealthy but our standards are so different than those here.

We have had our first two language tutoring sessions. We love the tudor, Chandani and are having fun learning Sinhala. We will have to work around our travel schedule as the next three weeks we will be on the road starting next week on Wednesday.

The weather here has changed. The rains have stopped and I miss them as they helped to cool things off. Ron thinks it's cooler but I think he has acclimated. I checked today the the past week it has been 86-90 degrees. That doesn't take into account the humidity factor that can add 5-10 degrees. The low has been 68. The morning walks have been wonderful as the sun isn't up and it helps. By the way, being so close to the equator, we get 12 hours of light a day year around. I still sweat due to the humidity but I think I am starting to acclimate also because when I first got here I couldn't stand walking anywhere, now I go at a good clip to the internet cafe and back. I cannot fathom wearing jackets but many motorcycle riders have them on. Maybe it is for protection in case of an accidents. I'd pass out if I had on a heavy jacket.

I don't know what news you get there but there has been a series of killings in the north. This is in the LTTE controlled area. We are hopeful that the civil war won't resume. If it does, we would need to leave in a hurry. Everyone says no one wants the war to start again. There is a lot of pressure from the international community for peace talks to resume. So please send peace and love vibes to SL now! Thanks.

Last Monday we spent the better part of the day getting materials for a clothesline. Our wonderful driver Mr Kularathne took us to a scrap yard for the posts. First we tried a hardware store that sepcialized in aluminum stock but they only had 12 ft lenghts, no ability to cut it and didn't sell saws! Then Mr Kularathne stopped by a construction site and talked them into welding up the posts with the t-top. Ron went to numerous stores trying to find eye bolts. Guess what, ain't available here or least no one knew what he was talking about and he did a great drawing of one but with no luck. Today I found some nylon rope that we will use for the clothesline. No one here has a dryer. I have been using a couple of wood racks but I will be able to do larger loads and it will dry much quicker. It takes about 30 hours to get towels dry using the racks. I felt like I found a treasure yesterday when I was in a hardware store that had wooden clothes pins. No one uses clothes pins her. All that I have seen available before yesterday was these flimsy plastic things that fall apart after one use.

This week I mailed two packages to our kids in the US. Postage here is about one third of what it is in the US. It cost $70 to mail two jackets (they cost $50 for the two) and a small shopping bag. I won't be mailing anything else at that rate.

Tonight we are having our after work party with drinks and snacks. I'm looking forward to meeting more of Ron's coworkers. About 20 are expected.

Well that's it from SL, where the weather is sultry, the men are goregous and Ron and Tricia are having an adventure.