We made it to Hikkaduwa without incident…which is amazing me more and more these days. And settled into our free upgrade of a room with the most incredible view over the Indian Ocean with huge waves crashing constantly. We spent our first day being lazy on the beach-playing in the huge waves and pool, reading good books and maybe I took a nap:)
We met a tuk tuk driver who happened to be wearing and Arizona State hat and found out his wife went to school there and got to talk about all things Arizona! Small world!
The second day we went on a little tour and stopped by a turtle hatchery and got to play with my little friends again! Man I love those little buggars-more so when we aren’t being chased by crazy Mexico beach turtle people!
Then we went to a Tsunami memorial and photo museum. I use the word museum loosely in that the actual structure we were in was a house that had been rebuilt after the tsunami…but it was the original floor. And the set up wasn’t quite what you would find in NYC museums, but it definitely hit home. The pictures, stories and quotes all over the place…they just hit your right in the gut. The lady who led us through the museum had lived in this house prior to the tsunami…she was lucky her entire family survived.
We had driven by and see many structures that were abandoned or looked run down but hadn’t put two and two together that these were all part of the aftermath of this incident 11 years ago. We read that the product most needed immediately following the tsunami was body bags. Just crazy to imagine.
The rest of our time in Hikkaduwa was spent kind of just relaxing. More beach time and wandering around little shops, eating rotty, curry and other delicious treats. We met some very nice people in Hikkaduwa. A lot of the locals have this very distinct head waggle almost-its a side to side waggle and I love it. It’s like they do it when we would shake our heads up and down for yes.
We also had the SAME conversation with everyone. Where are we from, how long in Sri Lanka, first time in Sri Lanka, do we want a tour??? And when we were eating there was a lot of people standing around trying to continue these conversations…we decided they were trying to practice their english but it was really funny and awkward. But I gotta say we definitely liked Sri Lanka more after Uda Walawe and Hikkaduwa.
And the food here is just great. Seriously, the curry is outta this world. The second to last day we discovered a place with the most amazing chicken tikka masala so of course we went back the next day to eat it right before we left…and don’t worry we had rotties earlier in the day to tide us over!
We continued to fear for our lives every time we got near the roads, but magically we made it safely everywhere. I really didn’t think we would think driving was worse after Bali, but I guess we were wrong! We took an overnight flight out of Colombo to Bangkok and have started trying to adjust to being in an actual city again. Sri Lanka was a great place to visit, a beautiful country and by far the most different from what we are used to. But we had some amazing experiences and are much better at charades now than we ever thought we would be!
