New Year's Eve

John woke early and decided to walk down to the Temple from our hotel. There is a lovely view from the front porch of The Secret Kandy.

The commercial stretch that leads to the center of the town is busy and interesting, but not exactly beautiful. There are little remnants of the old colonial town. I wish more of them had been preserved.

John did notice one slightly decaying remnant of colonial days, the “Old Boys Club” for the Anglican secondary school. 

He found his way down to the temple and palace complex. There is a lake in front of it created by the Kandyan monarchs. It is still remarkably lovely.

We probably could have spent some more time in Kandy, but we had a train to catch. The British loved to build railways in their colonial possessions, so it was no surprise that Sri Lanka is criss-crossed by railroad lines. One of the main purposes of these rail lines was to get tea from the highlands to the coast where it could be shipped back to Old Blighty where people could huddle by a coal fire with a “cuppa.” Now these lines carry people mostly and the line through the tea country is popular with tourists. 

Tharindu brought to the the train station. We were struck by the “uplifting” message we saw there and wondered who paid to put these up.

We wait around for a while though the train was not particularly late. Tharindu is driving to the Hatton where we will get off the train and I think he wanted to make absolutely certain that we were on the right train. 

It finally pulled in, about ten minutes late. Of course for Amtrak, that would early….

We had a seat in the air-conditioned first class car. John checked out second class and third class. They were like  something you see in movies. From my seat I watched as the country became more and more mountainous.

We saw some odd sights along the way.

 

 

At times I became a little bored of reading and editing photographs and decided to drive John a little crazy by hanging off the edge of the train.

 

 

More sensibly he would just stick the camera out for some photos.

 

 

 

 

We arrived at the railway station in Hatton somewhat before Tharindu did. It was a small but remarkably congested station with rather little light so none of our photographs came out that well.

 

Our accommodation for the next two nights is a “bungalow” on a tea plantation. It is lovely old building from the English period. 

 

 

 

It has some incredible views from the terrace where we were served tea after our arrival.

 

 The interior of the house is beautiful as well.

 

 

 

We went exploring the grounds which have small but lovely gardens.

 

 

  

And one large, and not so lovely bird. 

Our room is nothing special, and John is a little disappointed there. But it is the only thing remotely close to decent wifi I have had on this trip so I am jubilant. I can finally publish all these blog posts I have been writing! There are only four rooms here and the staff to guest ratio must be about 2 to 1. Unfortunately for us, all the other guests now are an extended French family. It is awkward as we almost feel like we are crashing their New Year’s Eve family reunion. Plus, only a couple of them speak anything other than hotel check-in English. I am sure they are wonderful people and we would all be good friends if we could communicate. But we can’t. 

We had our New Year’s Eve meal early and we plan to hit the sack before midnight. Happy New Year to all!

Caves, Kandy, and a Tooth

We have grown quite fond of the Lake Lodge, so it was not easy to leave it. John will miss his balcony overlooking the rainforest. 

We loved a lot of the quirky touches at the Lodge like the bicycle tires turned into holiday ornaments.

We will miss the warm and helpful staff

and our charming Swiss German host.

Dambula is mostly a central location for exploring Sri Lanka’s “Cultural Triangle”, but it has one important attraction of its own, the Dambula Caves. This is an important historical site for the development of Sri Lankan Buddhism and it contains some extraordinary Buddhist sculpture and painting. Not so extraordinary is the modern Golden Temple built at the base of the shrine. 

The caves are actually just small indentations at the top of a two hundred foot granite outcropping. But before looking at the caves some history is naturally in order. According to ancient chroniclers, in the first century before the common era, King Valagambahu was exiled from the capital of Anuradhapura. He found refuge in the caves with the Buddhist monks who were living there. When he was finally restored to the throne fourteen years later, he established it as a pilgrimage shrine. Over the centuries various monarchs have adorned and re-adorned the caves. They are now not only centers for Buddhist piety but also treasures of Sri Lankan art.

There are five caves and each is decorated slightly differently. The most famous is Cave 2. 

 

But the other caves have spectacular imagery as well.

We continued on to our next destination, the old royal capital of Kandy. Along the way we stopped at a word working shop. This was not scheduled, but I had thought that John might be interested in some of the famous wooden masks from this island. But we were hit with such a hard sales pitch that both of us felt that the last thing on earth we would like to do is buy anything here. We also stopped at a small spice store with a spice garden attached to it. Here we also had a “tour” but the man was fairly low-key and and the products quite reasonable priced. We bought some curry powder. 

When we arrived in Kandy, a couple hours later, we were not instantly charmed. Like so many old cities, its narrow streets are choked with traffic and with the exhaust from cars. Ugly cheap modern architecture seems to blot out what remains from and older era, much of which has fallen into obvious disrepair. But we were charmed by our hotel which has the somewhat bizarre name of “The Secret Kandy."

It seems to be an old colonial-era house. The rooms are large and spacious.

We had lunch here and insisted that Tharindu join us. John wanted to go an antique store and to see the botanic gardens. We decided to pass on the “cultural show” — basically a folkloric dance show for tourists — that had been part of the scheduled tourists. 

For some reason, we failed to take pictures at the antique store. We had a pleasant time here, and John bought a statue of the standing Buddha for our garden and a couple of decorative items for my new office. We were relatively charmed by the surprisingly large botanical gardens.

It is fundamentally an arboretum, and I saw some species here I have never seen before like the “Cannonball Tree,” Couroupita guianensis, a native of South America.

We walked across the suspension bridge

and looked down at the river, apparently one of the longest in Sri Lanka.

As sunset approached, Tharindu picked us up at the entrance to the gardens and we headed toward the Shrine of the Tooth Relic, the holiest Buddhist shrine in Sri Lanka. A few words on the Tooth Relic itself. Not so much about relics in general as that is a subject that is best left to historians and anthropologists, but about the idea of Buddha’s tooth as a relic. According to Buddhists, after the Buddha died he was cremated. Most of his remains were interred nearby in eight stupas, but his disciples kept four teeth and three pieces of bone. One of these teeth, a left canine, was given to the king of the Indian kingdom of Kalinga. It was kept safe in a temple there, but when Kalinga was invited the tooth was taken to Sri Lanka for safekeeping. The relic had further misadventures including been stolen by Indian invaders and subsequently returned, and an attempt by the Portuguese to destroy the tooth. Sri Lankan Buddhists claim that the King of Kandy hid the real tooth and allowed the Portuguese to destroy a fake. It is obviously not possible to independently verify the provenance of this tooth. What matters is that to Sri Lankans it embodies the very presence and nature of the Buddha himself and is therefore inexpressibly sacred. 

Sri Dalada Maligawa is the Sinhalese name of the Temple of the Sacred Tooth Relic. It was built by the last Sinhalese king of Kandy, Vira Parakrama Narendra Sinha, in the early 18th century. Tharindu, who is a very devout Buddhist, arranged for us to be at the Temple in the early evening when the reliquary containing the tooth would be briefly available to viewing. The tooth itself is seldom shown, but the tooth is contained within seven nested caskets, and this is what is displayed each morning and evening. The Temple was absolutely jammed with people.

Once inside it was hard to take pictures. Tharindu pointed out a fresco showing the relic being carried by an elephant through the streets of Kandy.

It is absolutely forbidden to take pictures of the reliquary when you are right in front of it. So Tharindu put John and I into a line to come close to the Tooth Relic while he used a camera to photograph it from a respectful distance. It was not easy to do in such limited light.

As night fell, we caught a glimpse of the old royal palace behind the Temple. 

It has been an exhausting day. Time for bed!

Polonnaruwa and Pachyderms

Our day began early again. Tharindu wanted us ready by seven thirty, but it was nearly eight o’clock when we finally pulled out. Our first destination for the day was the ancient city of Polonnaruwa, the second capital of the Sinhalese kingdom, and perhaps the most important archeological site in Sri Lanka.

The history of the city is somewhat complicated, and, as is usual in Sri Lankan history, involves many long names. Here is the short version. Toward the end of the tenth century, the Cholas conquered Sri Lanka. Despite the similarity in spelling, these were not bad Mexican girls but a south Indian kingdom. However, in 1070, a certain Vijayabahu led a force of Sri Lanka rebels which defeated the Cholas and restored independence to the island. Vijayabahu was acclaimed king. He decided to establish a new capital at Polonnaruwa to replace the completely ruined first capital of Anuradhapura. But Vijayabahu did not actually do much building. Instead the credit for actually creating the city rests with his successor, King Parakramabahu. And so our visit to Polonnaruwa fitting began with a visit to the statue of that great monarch.

The most important building at Polonnaruwa was naturally the king’s palace. In fact, it was probably the largest buildings anywhere in the world in its time. It was seven stories high and was supposed to have had over 1000 rooms. All that remains now is the foundation and the brickwork of the first floor. 

Like most ancient cities, Polonnaruwa was both a secular and a sacred site. The Sinhalese kingdom was devoutly Buddhist and its claim to having the Tooth Relic, perhaps the most sacred of the relics of the Buddha. Not only was this the only part of the Buddha’s body to survive his cremation, but it was so important that any king who pledged to protect the Tooth Relic obviously had the right to rule. Not surprisingly, then, the second most significant building in Polonnaruwa was the ancient temple that housed the Tooth Relic. Built in the form of a vatadage, a circular structure enclosing one or more stupas, it is still an architecturally intriguing building. Today in the center of the building where the stupa of the Tooth Relic had once been, there is only a statue of the Buddha.

But it is far from the only statue of the Buddha. There are statues of the Buddha and of bodhisattvas throughout the entire city done in a variety of styles and one of the delights of wandering through Polonnaruwa is seeing so many different pieces of Buddhist art. 

There are also stupas throughout the site. Many are small, but a few are absolutely enormous. This is the Rankoth Vehera, a massive brick edifice of over 100 feet. 

While I found much of the art and architecture of Polonnaruwa moving, I confess I had an instinctive revulsion to this building. It just reminded me of those hideous Victorian churches designed by A. N. W. Pugin that seem to litter central London. Its smaller whitewashed companion did not appeal to me much either. 

I liked the Lankatilaka Temple a bit more

even if it did vaguely look like the work of a Buddhist William Butterfield.

The great highlight of Buddhist art at Polonnaruwa is the Gal Vihara. This historic shrine features four statues of the Buddha in different forms and each is a masterpiece of Sinhalese art. The Buddha is depicted as standing,

seated,

and reclining.

The most sacred image of the four is actually the smallest 

but it is the focus of the most intense worship.

We did have some less reverent moments while at Polonnaruwa. John stopped for a bit of faux meditation in the only Hindu temple there

and I found watching the monkeys endlessly fascinating.

After a couple hours, however, our brains could not absorb much more information and we were hot and sweaty. Tharindu insisted — and he was certainly right to do so — that we dress appropriately for visiting sacred sites. But I am too much of a Southern California lad to enjoy wearing long pants when the temperature is hovering about 90 and the humidity is even higher than that. We went off to have an absolutely dreadful buffet lunch and we both changed into shorts we had secretly packed away. 

Our afternoon adventure was something we had added to the itinerary, a visit to a national park to see elephants. Sri Lanka has a large elephant population, and, in fact, you have to be quite careful when you are driving on certain parts of the island because you may just find an elephant crossing the road. We drove past one as we were heading towards the park. 

Tharindu arranged the safari for us. We expected to be crammed into a jeep with a half dozen other tourists, but to our surprise, it was only the two of us along with Tharindu and the jeep driver. 

We drove for quite a while before we entered the park. And once we did, we waited endlessly in line for admission. It seemed like there were hundreds of people who also thought that this was a good day to try to see elephants. After we finally made it past by the gate, we drove on wretchedly bad dirt roads for what seemed like a bumpy eternity without seeing much of anything. I began to think that a glimpse of a monkey might be my only wildlife sighting of the day.

After a while, we were stuck in traffic. All the rain had created muddy conditions and one of the jeeps had sunk into the muddy road.

I had just about decided that the safari was going to be a fiasco when we came to a large plain by a lake and saw our first herd of elephant. Of course, we were not alone.

But the elephants seemed pretty unconcerned with the jeeps and the clicking of cameras. 

They allowed us to come remarkably close to them, but a telephoto lens is still the safest option.

John and I were both delighted, 

but we could not match this young man’s exuberant happiness.

After that, it seemed like was saw hundreds of elephants. We saw many mothers with babies. I am not quite sure why young elephants are so adorably cute, but they are. 

We saw a couple of elephants bathing in the lake.

We saw several, umm, amorous males. I will spare you the picture of the one who had, as Tharindu put it, five legs. It was pretty intense.

However prudish, I prefer to focus on more domestic scenes.

We spent a couple hours looking at several herds grazing on the large plain. But as night began to fall, we had to leave and the elephants would be heading off into the forest for the night as well.

It was an utterly amazing day. This trip to Sri Lanka has not been cheap, but what we saw this afternoon made it worth every dime for me.