Sitting in Changi Airport after a sojourn in Sri Lanka, my conscience is flooded by a myriad of beautiful experiences. From our early morning arrival driving through the southern streets of Columbo watching the men of the town play a casual game of cricket at three in the morning, to feeding a wild elephant watermelon and bananas from the car window.
It’s a unique mix of tropical paradise akin to places like Cuba + Fiji while being juxtaposed by a vibrant combination of religion and colonialism. With the three major influences battling for harmony, the people are left smiling, welcoming and gracious happy to invite and encourage anyone that is willing to return the smile.
Enjoying our first surf in the hot and humid climate and bath like waters along side a hotel on an island some 30m from the shore line, we were met by the first of many locals insisting we join them in their home for Arak and stories.
Traveling north and east from Wadagama, we met Yannik, Yevin and Tavish in Arugumbei. Three guys that really made it for us all. Taste testing their caffine injected concoxions at Hideaway Blue Cafe, sitting in the dry rice fields or sharing waves at Pottuvil Point. Five days of epic sand bottomed point grinders with a few of your closest mates and then getting to share a few beers on the waters edge bathed in the pink hue of the everlasting sunset… pretty shit
By S D J Morgan
Photo credits:
C.Holland
L.Goldsworthy
T.Foster
S.Morgan