Sri Lankan "Spa"

Author's Note:  I know most people won't read this anyway because there are no pictures, but germaphobes especially should skip this.  Don't say I didn't warn you.

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My empty stomach and aching feet were really looking forward to a quick foot massage before going back to the hotel for a big dinner.  Pulling off the highway, our guide bumped into a dirt parking lot in front of a small building.  We went inside and up to the front desk, where it was quickly apparent they did not have a 20 minute foot massage option.  After a brief haggle (I was exhausted and weak from hunger), I acquiesced into the full two hour "special", composed of three different "treatments", for the reasonable cost of $45.    After declining the offer for the couples version, we headed to our respective "locker rooms" to change.

I was escorted by a very nice Sri Lankan lady into a small room, which had a few nails in the wall to hang clothing, and a bit of plastic surrounding a shower head.  She motioned to me to undress, saying, "Underwear okay!".  Yes I will leave it on, thank you very much.  The only problem was that what I was left to change into was a faded gray-ish towel that that was no bigger than a dish towel.  I tried to cover myself as best I could and headed out.

The Sri Lankan lady brought me to a room, where - surprise! - David was laying on one of two vinyl massage tables.   So much for declining the couples option.  David was also looking a bit uncomfortable, as he was being massaged by a young Sri Lankan man.  (I admit I giggled a little inside.)  The massage went on for 45 minutes, and it was fine, but the masseuse used so much oil that I would squish when I turned over.  Not to mention that our room was next to the freeway, so every 45 seconds or so a semi would zoom by, rattling the windows.  Between all of this and me hoping the male masseuse in the room wasn't ogling me, it was less than relaxing.  But the second treatment should be better, right?

She tapped me gently, saying "Okay, miss, all done!" and I followed her bowlegged - remember the all that oil?  it was now all soaked into my underwear - into the next room.  It contained only what looked like a wooden casket.  She opened it up, steamy heat blasting out, and inside was a sort of platform where you were supposed to lay, the only cushioning another wet threadbare towel that had somebody else's body print in it.  I hesitated a second, hoping she was going to change the towel, but no luck.  I threw modesty out the window for the moment, laying my own oil soaked towel down on top of the other one, where my oily-but-at-least-relatively-clean towel was now quickly soaked through with someone else's steamy sweat.  Shoot, I sure didn't think that one through.

Laying on my back, she closed the casket, where my whole body except for my face was enveloped in steam.  I tried to finally relax and appreciate the warmth, but the towel she draped around my neck to keep the steam from escaping to my face had a long black hair on it.  Okay, I'll just close my eyes then. Pretend none of this is happening.

The lady came and got me after 20 minutes or so.  We were finally at the last stop, something that was billed as a "special herbal sauna".  It turned out to be a small beehive shaped room, about four feet round and less than five feet tall, with whole spices in a wooden grid on the floor.  Which would have been nice and cozy if THERE WEREN'T ALREADY THREE OTHER PEOPLE IN THERE.  They looked up at me briefly, with sweaty, hollow eyes.  "It's a party!" I noted cheerily.  Everyone just looked away.  I settled in, hoping this wouldn't last long.  I don't care for saunas in the first place, but I usually compensate by placing a towel over my face.  Too bad the one one available to me was the only thing between me and the large, fidgety Russian man sitting next to me, who kept muttering, crossing and uncrossing his legs.  Which may have not been too distracting, but his towel was no bigger then mine and his just did not cover enough of what it was supposed to.

At intermittent intervals, the door would open with a rush of cool air, and someone would be granted escape.  Finally, I couldn't take it any more, and left the tiny torture chamber before my time was up.  My masseuse looked surprised to see me, and followed me to the locker room, asked repeatedly if I enjoyed my spa experience.  "If you like, you pay me tips?".  She did not leave my side until I got my purse and handed her $5.  She took the money, smiling, and disappeared immediately.

Our guide met us at the car, and I thanked him for waiting for so long, asking if he got a massage as well.  "Yes, but I don't have to pay since I bring guests."  Of course.

Finally getting back to the hotel room and throwing my underwear in the garbage, I took a really really long shower, scrubbing off the layers of oil and who-knows-what-else.  Finally feeling clean, I put on my pajamas, and much to David's irritation, refused to leave the clean sheets of the bed, ordering room service and eating in bed.

Note to self:  Next time pay the $100 for the hotel massage!

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For those who made it all the way to the end, here's a picture of my Sri Lankan masseuse...

Sri Lanka - Day 2 Part 2

Back in the car for the afternoon, not sure where we were going next, but a good guess was that it was probably buddhist and old!   Again, our guide parked the car, got out and started walking without saying a word.   You could actually see this monument from the parking lot, so we knew to follow him, so that was nice.  Paying a small fee for someone to watch our shoes, we headed in.

Ruwanwelseya is the name of this dagoba, and at almost 30 stories high, it's one of the tallest monuments in the world.  I never quite caught on as to why some of them are all white, but it sure was pretty.

Buddhist flags around the base.

In case you're wondering, here's what the colors on the buddhist flags stand for.

The six vertical bands of the flag represent the six colors of the aura which Buddhists believe emanated from the body of the Buddha when he attained Enlightenment:

Blue: Loving kindness, peace and universal compassion
Yellow: The Middle Path – avoiding extremes, emptiness
Red: The blessings of practice – achievement, wisdom, virtue, fortune and dignity
White: The purity of Dharma – leading to liberation, outside of time or space
Orange: The Buddha's teachings – wisdom

The sixth vertical band, on the fly, is made up of a combination of rectangular bands of the five other colours, and represents a compound of the other five colours in the aura's spectrum. 

An old lady leaving her offering:

Obligatory shot of the two of us...

The main attraction of this place is actually a tree.  "Just a bit of a walk down this way..." our guide told us.  About a mile later in my bare feet (remember we had to leave our shoes at the entrance), we came upon the Bodhi Tree.  The story goes:

The Bodhi Tree, also known as Bo, was a large and very old Sacred Fig tree located in Bodh Gaya, under which Siddhartha Gautama, the spiritual teacher later known as Gautama Buddha, is said to have achieved enlightenment, or Bodhi.

According to the Mahavamsa, the Sri Maha Bodhi in Sri Lanka was planted in 288 BC, making it the oldest verified specimen of any angiosperm. In this year (the twelfth year of King Asoka's reign) the right branch of the Bodhi tree was brought to Anurādhapura. The Buddha, on his death bed, had resolved five things, one being that the branch which should be taken to Ceylon should detach itself.  From Gayā, the branch was taken across the sea; finally it arrived at Anuradhapura.

I was excited to see such an important (and old) pilgrimage site, apparently people come from all over to see the this.  What I didn't know before I walked all that was was that you can't actually see most of the tree, as it's surrounded by a wall.  See that big tree toward the right?  That's not actually the tree.  But see that limb that's held up by stakes?  That's part of the tree.  The closest thing you can get to is a branch that sticks out.

You can go inside the little temple and look through some gates to see the trunk.

This girl was so pretty I had to take a picture of her.

Having had enough of a tree that I couldn't really see, we walked all the way back in out bare feet, and were on to the next site.  

I don't know the name, but there were some carvings on the rock, look to the lower left of the picture.

A laughing elephant!  I love anything with elephants on it, I'm not sure why.

Here's what's inside.  Our guide kept asking us if we could tell if the buddha was sleeping or enlightened.  I kept guessing and always got it wrong.  I think this one is "enlightened".  Something about the long ears maybe?

Oh look, a cave...

With more bats!  Great.

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At this point in the journey I was exhausted and starving.  I inquired about lunch, and our guide said, "I think you will eat back at the hotel."  "Oh, okay, um, how long until we get back to the hotel?"  "Oh, three to four hours, maybe."  Wait, what?  We hadn't eaten all day!  He had much to learn about the American appetite.

We stopped at a small pastry shop in a nearby town, which I tried to play it safe by ordering a vegetarian pastry, which turned out to be a mistake because it was one of the most unbelievably spicy things I had ever put in my mouth.  Downing my lukewarm 7-Up, and trying to recover, we started talking about how expensive the hotel spa was.  "Oh, I know a very good place, much more cheaper", he assured me, "and very nice."

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Next up:  I wanted a 20 minute foot massage.   What I got was so much more.

Sri Lanka - Day 2 Part 1

Man, we had a jam packed day.  Our driver picked us up smack on time at 8am, and we were off.  A quick 2 hours of dodging cows and passing trucks on a two lane road, we were at our first monument.

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I can't remember the name.  I tried looking it up, but there wasn't anything that looked close.  Anyway, it was old.  Like, 1st century AD old.

The ruins of the surrounding monastery.

Below is the main dagoba (or stupa).  Remember that these are structures that you can't actually go in, they just usually have a religious relic parked inside somewhere.  We took our time here, wandering around the outside, not knowing if this was a big deal or not (the driver was fairly vague as to what exactly we were doing that day).  I did learn that dagobas symbolize a meditatiing buddha:  The spire is his crown, the square is his head, the vase shape is his body, his legs are the steps, the square base is his throne.

Detail of the pillars.  More naked ladies to come in the following days.

I'm pretty sure that this was not the elephant's original intended purpose (holding the extension cord).

We had just started to get to know our guide at this point.  He was from Sri Lanka, and could reel off tons of facts about the monuments, none of which were written down anywhere I could find so of course I can't remember.  He would never tell us what our next destination was, or how far away it was.  He often just parked the car, got out, and started walking away.  Were we supposed to stay in the car?  Follow?  We were also to learn that he didn't eat lunch.  Which means that we didn't eat lunch.

Like here.  He just stopped the car and pointed.  (I found out later it was called Kuttampokuna).  "Oh, pretty, should we get out and take pictures?"  He just shrugged, "There is much else to see, there are just pools."  We got out and took a couple of pictures anyway.

From Wikipedia:

"The faces of the pools were cut granite slabs which includes the bottom and the sides of the pool. A wall was also built around the pool which encloses the compound. Flights of steps are seen on both ends of the pool decorated with punkalas, or pots of abundance and scroll design. Embankments were constructed to enable monks to bathe using pots or other utensils. Water to the pools were transferred through underground ducts and filtered before flowing to the pool and in a similar fashion the water was emptied.

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On to the next site, but I can't remember the name of this place, either... Wait, I found it, Anuradhapura!  That's it!

This buddha was supposed to show a different mood depending on which way you looked at him.  You be the judge (his name is Smadhibuddha):

Left side:

Right side:

I couldn't tell the difference.

The remnants of another seated buddha:

I swear these colors are not enhanced, the moss really was this stunning green color.

Any guesses what this stone canoe was for?

Apparently the entire thing was filled with rice, enough for 5000 monks that used the refectory.  Here's a shot of what used to be the rest of the kitchen.  Or library?  Again, there were no signs.  The guide could have said it was the bathroom and we would have had to believe him.

A Guardstone, located at the front steps of another temple nearby.  Here's the story:  "Two lovers emerge from the dragon's mouth above the cobra king, who has in his had the pot of abundance, signifying prosperity.  This is said that fertility generates prosperity.  (7 - 9 century AD)."  Can't find who the little guy is at the cobra king's feet, maybe the "whimsical dwarf" we would start seeing everywhere.

We met this family along the way, they wanted their picture taken.

She started to get a little shy when I zoomed in...

The Moonstone is one of the more famous features in Sri Lanka, placed at the entrances of most of the temples.

The lotus flower (Nirvana) is at the center, followed by a row of swans (distinction between good and bad), a ring of foliage (worldly desires), followed by a line of elephants, lions, horses, and bulls, symbolizing the four stages of life:  growth, energy, power and forbearance.  Or birth, decay, disease and death, depending on if you're a glass-half-empty kind of person.  Here it is inverted and up close:

You're supposed to start at the outside ring and go in, ending up at the lotus flower (Nirvana), right before you enter the temple.  Or the other way around, I supposed, as you leave and go back into the world.  Clever.

Another dwarf guarding the entrance.  Good parting shot, I think.

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Had enough for one day?  Ready for dinner?  Too bad, this was only the first half, not even lunch time yet.  Back in the car, off to the next one temple...

Sri Lanka - Day 1

Quick!  Fast forward to present day!  Well, not present day, but close enough.  December 2011.

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David and I took a return trip back to Singapore last December to visit friends, eat at the places we had been dreaming about the last few months, and go to a friend's wedding.  While we were out there we decided to take a side trip to Sri Lanka.  "Why Sri Lanka?" was the question most asked about this choice, and basically it was because it was one place we hadn't been in SE Asia that wasn't a pain in the arse to get to.  And I had heard great things about Sri Lanka, how beautiful the country was, and everyone was talking about it being the next great undiscovered travel spot, blah blah blah.  In general, I pretty much knew nothing about Sri Lanka before I went there.  I knew it was close to India and was hoping for some good food, but that's about it.

After a bit of stress trying to plan a last minute trip to a foreign county (beach area or ancient city, beach or ancient city!?  Ancient city it was, it was the rainy season anyway), we put all the planning in the hands of a travel agency who booked a room and guide for us.  Done.

Arriving at 3am, we were able to get in a few hours of sleep before we headed out for our first day in Sri Lanka.  Here's the obligatory first shot from our hotel room in Columbo.

The first day we drove from the main city of Columbo out to where our hotel was in the Central Province.  It was only about 150km (90 miles), how long could it take?  Hours and hours, thats how long.  There are no freeways in Sri Lanka, just windy, curvy, crowded two lane roads.  Luckily there was lots to see.

There were a lot of rubber tree plantations along the way. It really does come from trees, you know, not a lab somewhere.  Trees!

Some street shots in a small town we passed through.

No, the bike is not that big - this guy was just that little.

Sri Lanka is known for its cashews, here's the lady that we bought our first package from.  David went a little nuts (no pun intended) and paid $25 for five tiny packages.  There was a bit of an argument about the cost ("This is not the state fair, David, don't just pay these amounts because they ask you to!"), but David won out, supporting the local economy.  They were pretty good, though.

Oh, look at the river and the pretty trees!  What's in the top of the tree?  Birds?

Wait, are those.... BATS?

Yes.  Yes, they are.  Dozens of them.

More nice (bat-free) scenery of the Sri Lankan countryside...

We stopped at a tea factory along the way, where we thoroughly enjoyed learning about Ceylon tea - the processing all the way from the green leaves to drying and sorting for the highest grade.

Getting late in the afternoon, we drove us through the main city of Kandy.  We chose not to stay overnight here as most do, I think the only thing to see was the Buddha Tooth Temple, which we had seen others in other countries as well, so we took a pass.  Who thought I'd ever say I'd seen too many Buddha Tooth Temples?

David has bought a mask in almost every country we've visited, and luckily again there was not a shortage of them available.

After a couple more hours of driving, we finally made it to the hotel where we both had bad car-headaches, but ready to get some sleep and see some cool stuff tomorrow.

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This is what we woke up to the next morning, bright and early.  Houseguests!  I love the tropics.