We can all enjoy Christmas. It is not necessary to focus on baby Jesus and the traditional story of shepherds and three wise men.
Last Christmas was spent in Sri Lanka, a country with only 10% Christians but where the Buddhists (70%), Hindu and Muslim all joined in the celebrations.
We had to dress as Santa and his helper [Read more…] about What Does Christmas Mean For Non-Christians?
On one of my educational cruises we had three or four PE students with us to help conduct deck games when we were at sea.
On this day we were sitting in the shade enjoying a cold drink after visiting the pyramids: beside me one of the students a young lad of about nineteen, starting speaking. He didn’t realise he was expressing his thoughts aloud and his voice was filled with awe. [Read more…] about Travel Journal: Whereto next?
The first snow of winter fell in Eastleigh town centre yesterday. What, you missed it? You can’t have been in the right place at the right time.
I have to admit to being a bit of a Grinch when it comes to starting Christmas festivities too early.
If I could get away with it (and I rarely can) decorations wouldn’t go up until Christmas Eve [Read more…] about 2014 Eastleigh Christmas Lights Switch on: Snow Has Fallen
By Susan Gulliver
Kenya Project UK is a small charity started because a couple of teenagers from Chandler’s Ford wanted to do something to help in a third world country.
In year 2000, Reverend Maz Allen from Chandler’s Ford United Reformed Church had a contact in Kenya and through that set up the first visit.
Since then [Read more…] about From Chandler’s Ford To Kenya, With Love
Today one of the boldest, most audacious and exacting feats of space engineering will be attempted. The European Space Agency (ESA) will attempt to land Philae, a lander module, from the Rosetta spacecraft onto a comet known as 67P Churyunov.
Rosetta has already made 3 orbits around the sun and is near to completing a fourth. [Read more…] about Comet Rendezvous
By Andy Milner
First – a bit about the Jubilee Sailing Trust (JST).
The charity was formed in 1978 and has two tall ships (Lord Nelson and Tenacious) that have been specially adapted so that anyone over 16 can crew.
The crew is made up equally of able-bodied and disabled people – some who have never sailed in their lives before. [Read more…] about Atlantic Crossing With Jubilee Sailing Trust
Have you had to learn new things because of your children or grandchildren?
Horses have never featured much in my life. Not since, as a boy, I was put on one and sent off onto the beach at Cleethorpes. The horse ambled into the middle of a tidal puddle and sat down. I fell off into the cold water and the horse ran away. [Read more…] about Learning From Children – Horse Play
Off Vancouver Island last Monday, we saw a Killer Whale with baby. It went on to take a seal – this type of Orca is a mammal (rather than fish) eating one. Baby seals and dolphins are its main food.
Oddly enough an adult seal on seeing an Orca will take to land. Baby seals [Read more…] about Neighbourhood Killer And Child
In 543 BC a group of sailors, traders, adventures and probably an assortment of ruffians arrived in Sri Lanka after sailing down the east coast of India from the region of Kolkata. They established a kingdom in Anuradhapura, which lasted 1400 years. [Read more…] about Ancient Vedda Tribe Becoming Extinct
µWhat do sick people do in Sri Lanka? Anyone can see a doctor free of charge.
If they go to the hospital, they will be seen. Any required medication is provided free. Repeat medications can be obtained from the hospital.
There is no general practice as we know it and some rural patients [Read more…] about Traditional And Modern Medicine in Sri Lanka
Yesterday my son and I went to see Mr and Mrs Brown again, at Eastleigh Museum.
In 1938, Mr & Mrs Brown lived in Eastleigh with their son Arthur, who was an apprentice at Eastleigh Rail Works. Mr Brown was an engine driver, who earned about £5 a week. [Read more…] about Mr & Mrs Brown At Eastleigh Museum
Everyone who stays in Sri Lanka has to have an extension to their visa at some time and the visa run to the government office in Colombo is one of those things that ex-pats have to do. ^
The train leaves Kandy at dawn before the sun colours the land. [Read more…] about Dawn Train Down The Mountain To Colombo
Tourists know Kandy for the Temple of the Tooth. They are bussed in during the late afternoon and dine in a hotel. The next morning they are conducted around the Temple of the Tooth after leaving their shoes at the gate. Then they are back on the bus and off to Nurawa Eliya and the tea plantations.
Tourists don’t see Kandy City, nor do they see the Tooth. It is too sacred. [Read more…] about A Temple For A Tooth?
Not as big an event as in Glasgow but Hillwood College Sports Day for the Nursery and Playgroup was great fun.
We knew we were to be invited but when the invitation came it specified us as “special guests” and that, before the prizes were distributed the special guests would make a speech. We thought we had better try to speak in Sinhala. How would you do it? [Read more…] about Commonwealth Games In Kandy
Anuradhapura is about 100 miles from Kandy. On our travels, Bernard, our driver, advised us that we passed through the best area in Sri Lanka for mango.
He sampled a few before advising us which to buy at 12p each. The farmers are keen to sell at the roadside stalls. If they sell wholesale they get only 2.5p each. Six weeks later the season was almost over and the price was 25p each. Never mind, they are still very good. [Read more…] about Life On The Road
The ubiquitous tuk-tuk makes Asia work. Just a motorised Rickshaw, a driver, a bench seat for 2 passengers and an engine. No doors, no safety belts, no baggage space, no in car entertainments but what a lot of fun.
The warm air blows around you, when stuck in traffic you can strike up a conversation with the people in the tuk tuk alongside you. [Read more…] about Tuk-tuk: My Transport Of Delight
No, not Orlando Gibbons’ anthem of John the Baptist, but another John who served his community in Sri Lanka for 15 years and what happened to him next.
Who was John?
Three cities, Kandy, Anuradhapura and Polonnaruwa form the three angles of the Cutural Triangle.
Kandy has Temple of The Tooth, Anuradhapura is the site of an ancient kingdom dating back to 600 BC and is the site of arrival of Buddhism about 200 years BC. [Read more…] about The Cultural Triangle Of Sri Lanka
“…That there’s some corner of a foreign field
That is for ever England…”
(Poem by Rupert Brooke)
A heavy tropical rainfall had snarled-up the traffic on the road so my driver took an unfamiliar detour. The narrow road twisted and turned alongside the river and was hemmed in by jungle trees and elephant grass. [Read more…] about There’s Some Corner Of A Foreign Field
Sri Lanka is not a place for haute cuisine but if you enjoy fresh and exotic fruits and the complex favours of curries you will be happy with the culinary experience.
Thanks to a homesick Victorian Scottish tea estate manager, there are all the familiar European vegetables grown in the highland area around Nuwara Eliya where the climate, at 5000 feet above sea level is similar to UK. [Read more…] about Sri Lankan Food
