NYC – Colombo – UnwantedTuna

We woke up this morning and watched the sun rise while sitting on the sand eating delicious fruit breaky in Unawatuna, Sri Lanka; a beautiful view, with moon stone blue water, sandy half moon shaped beach and stunning Buddhist temple. Our Lonely Planet guide told us that this place was a small town that had been demolished in the tsunami of 2004 but was quickly rebuilt with a lot of help from foreigners who hold this place near and dear to them. Looking down the beach at all the guest houses and restaurants one would never know anything so tragic happened to this place. It is now bustling with people (Lonely Planet is a wee bit outdated as far as that goes), restaurants, resorts, guesthouses, and jewelry shops. We’ve found multiple vegetarian and vegan restaurants, there’s yoga in the sanctuary gardens every morning from 8 a.m. to 9 a.m., and internet cafes are out while free wi-fi at restaurants and cafes are in. It wasn’t always so easy though. Lets rewind a couple days and start at the beginning…

Drew, our beautiful friend Aparna, and I set sail on Friday, January 22nd, 2010 from JFK airport on a non-stop flight to Mumbai, India. Unfortunately we couldn’t all sit together since we didn’t book together but luckily Drew and I wound up sitting with a sweet man named Raj. Raj was born and raised in Mumbai and came to the states in the early 80s to attend the University of Pennsylvania Law School. He now works for Berkshire Hathaway so he and Drew got a kick out of talking about what a cool guy Warren Buffet is. He answered all of our silly questions about India and persevered with us getting up and sitting down since he had the aisle seat for the entire 14-hour flight. It honestly was a truly quick 14-hour flight. We watched what I believe to be the worst film on 2009 on the flight, 500 Days of Summer. Another 20something movie that name drops The Smiths and Belle and Sebastian as new discoveries and Zooey Deschanel talking about her love for Springsteen and the afore mentioned made us roll my eyes in disgust. I must say though, we did get a kick out of watching ‘2.5 men’ on the flight. Ahhhh guilty pleasures!

As soon as we landed in Mumbai we exited the plane onto the tarmac and hopped on to a bus. We parted with Aparna here as she went off to visit her Grandma and would meet up with us in roughly a week in Sri Lanka with her husband, and one of our favorite people David. The first thing we noticed upon arrival was the intense humidity (it was 10:30 p.m.) and the construction. It looked as if the entire airport was under construction and from what we can gather it’s that way through much of India. We had 6 hours to kill in the airport before our flight to Sri Lanka so we killed it watching BBC news and sleeping. Another thing we noticed almost immediately were the mosquitoes. Even in the airport we were bombarded with the little buggers! Once in Mumbai we changed into shorts and flip-flops and quickly noticed we were the only ones. We couldn’t have looked more American or touristy…

We took our flight to Chennai, India where we had a layover on the way to Sri Lanka. This is where things got sticky. Everything was going smoothly until it was time to board the flight to Sri Lanka. They made us go through immigration and customs and it was there they stamped our passports with the dreaded “No Entry for 2 Months” stamp. Now, most of you don’t know this but a few weeks ago (after we paid $200 for our Indian Visas) India made a new rule where you cannot reenter the country after leaving for 2 months. The thing is, we never even left the airport! How dare they stamp our passport with that garbage! We knew it was going to be something we had to deal with at some point; we just didn’t know it would be this soon. The only option for us was to visit the India High Commission and get permission in Sri Lanka so we could continue with our trip as planned. We wound up staying in Colombo, Sri Lanka for an entire extra day spent at the High Commission amongst other westerners waiting… and waiting… and waiting. 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. Awesome. As they started to call other’s names to the desk we saw one person after another get DENIED. There was even a guy there from Canada who had applied for an Indian Visa and they granted it to him but screwed up the dates that he had written down making it so he couldn’t go when he needed. They were unhelpful and told him to reapply, which is a $50 and 2 week process. I can’t even imagine being in his shoes. When we finally heard our names called and saw we got permission “for humanitarian reasons” it was a huge victory and a giant weight off our shoulders. We asked no questions, said many ‘thanks you’s’ and went next door to one of the fanciest hotels in all of Colombo, the Galle Face Hotel, sat in their court yard that over looked the ocean catching the last few minutes of sunset, and had our victory drinks! The next morning we were headed on the first bus out of town to Unawatuna. We forgot to add that the first day while walking around trying to find the High Commission Blair started not to feel well and wound up puking behind a gas station amongst black birds and dogs. We forgot about the fact that you aren’t supposed to take your malaria meds on an empty stomach. We are slowly but surely getting our travel legs underneath of us even if it means learning the hard way!

We landed in Unawatuna yesterday and took up residence at a guesthouse called SurfCity. Back in the late 1970’s southern Sri Lanka greeted its first surfers from Australia. Ever since it’s grown into a popular tourist destination; we seem to overhear mostly Brits and Germans/Austrians and the clientele here in Unawatuna is mainly older (50+). I must be honest and tell you I was hoping for something a little less populated and touristy but I would be silly to even complain. As we look out over the ocean all we can think of is the fact that we’re looking out over the end of the world. If we had superpowers and could see for miles and miles the next place we’d be looking at is Antarctica. It’s interesting to see the amount of big vessels and ships out on the horizon being that it’s a major route along the ocean between Japan, china, and other Southeast Asian countries and Africa, India and other eastern (or western depending on where you’re at) destinations.

Drew and I are moving guesthouses today to somewhere a little bit cheaper. $17 to stay on the beach is a little out of our price range so we’re moving across the street. We met a great dive master and are planning a reef dive for the afternoon and are going to scout some other beaches as we wait for Greg, Aparna, and Dave to join us in a week or so.

See our photos of Sri Lanka!!!

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