First weekend in Colombo

Easter weekend! After a couple more days of catching up on e-mail correspondence between the NOC/CGA and other parties along with a few small tasks, I reached my first weekend here in Colombo.

One of the streets in Pettah.

I had expressed wishes to visit Pettah, an older part of Colombo and location of the crazy and bustling marketplace. That had surprised the staff I work with as they perceive the place as sketchy and not a place for a female to be alone. So on Thursday after work, they decided that they would go with me (with a male – our driver) to walk around a little and check it out. Crazy it was! People were everywhere weaving in and out between the traffic which itself was nuts. I’m glad I didn’t go alone as it was a very different part of town. As neat as it was, I don’t think I will be going back. There are deals to be had, but quality is definitely lower than those in stores and it's not worth the effort in dodging vehicles and stares! After that brief outing, we all went to do more shopping at Arpico, Sri Lanka’s version of Wal-Mart. I picked up the last of what I think I’m missing at home, had some popcorn, and got dropped off at my place. I have to thank the lovely ladies that accompanied me on this trip and our very patient driver. They are all so caring and patient!

Local Bus

The office was closed for Good Friday so one of my colleagues, Dinushi, made plans to meet with me in the morning to go to the National Museum then head to the Univesrsity of Colombo where her friend was working on a final project for one of his classes. However, the National Museum was closed for Good Friday so we went to Gangaramaya Temple via public bus! Dinushi took care to get us on one that wasn’t crowded, but it was a very jerky ride as the drivers tend to brake pretty hard here. Not too bad when it’s not crowded, but it looks like a very different journey when people are packed in there like sardines during rush hour.

The temple was quite different from the temples I’ve seen in Malaysia, China, and Japan. Those ones were all so clean and looked like they really catered to tourists. Although this one had tourists, it really looked like a well-worn and locally used temple. Things weren’t all polished, shiny, and bright. Instead, it looked liked it really had a lot of character. And then there was an elephant. Sacred animal indeed, but it didn’t look too happy.

Afterwards we hung out at my apartment for a little while after picking up some lunch packets. I had Dinushi teach me how to eat with my hands! You can see my attempts at eating. I was rather slow, but I think I’m slowly getting it! Still out of my comfort zone, but I hope it will become more normal. The curry here is so delicious!

My friendly colleague, Dinushi

After lunch, we headed to the University of Colombo campus where Dinushi’s friend was shooting a music video as a school final project. We sat around and enjoyed the scenery while they shot a scene. I don’t understand anything they’re saying, but I’m enjoying trying to decipher the mood and tone of the conversations just from facial expression and body language. One thing I noted to Dinushi is that in the Western culture, when we agree with something we nod up and down. Here in Sri Lanka, they nod side to side. 

Saturday was a very rainy day. Like Vancouver, but very warm. It did provide some welcome relief to the very hot weather. I finally connected with video on my Skype with the family and Chad in the morning (yay!). After spending some time on the computer in the morning and cleaning a bit, I took a cab to Crescat Boulevard in Colombo 3 (Colpetty). It was nice and definitely more like malls in Canada, but tiny compared to what we’re used to! That’s very unlike Majestic City which is the mall that I live close to … which I compare to more like a bunch of shops in a strip mall (or for those of you in Burnaby, Crystal Mall). However, there are three floors and each one has shops side by side that are crammed to the brim with merchandise!

After a bit of a sleep in on Sunday, I set out on a long walk. Walking north on the street I live on (RA de Mel Mawatha) I got to see a couple clothing shops. First was Fashion Bug then I passed through Beverly Street. These stores carry so much merchandise I really didn’t have any motivation to look, but prices are pretty affordable for most things. Because the clothing industry is so big here and in India they get a lot of overstock here. However, the styles seem a little on the old side compared to what we have. At one of these shops, I saw an overrun of an Eddie Bauer skirt for $8 CAD. I also saw an H&M button up shirt that I own in Canada for $6 CAD here. I almost got to Kollupitiya Market when it started to pour. I quickly hailed a tuk tuk (lucky a metered one came down the street while I was unsuccessfully bargaining with a non-metered one) and set out for ODEL. Considered one of the higher end labels in Sri Lanka (prices are comparable to ours) I went to their main store which is like a department store. I spent an hour or so trying to wait out the rain amusing myself in trying to find some steals (i.e Zebra print Zara dress, $16 CAD). When the rain stopped, I went and continued my walk through Colombo 7 around the area I work, then caught a tuk tuk back to the area I live. I stopped in on House of Fashion which was a mad house with clothing, homewares, toys, luggage, etc. Ridiculously cheap clothing here too! Again, so much to sort through … save that for another day. Lucky for me it’s only about three blocks from my apartment.

I also picked up a internet dongle (def: “A device that is connected to a computer to allow access to wireless broadband or use of protected software” (google.com)). However, I currently can’t get it to load the driver or software properly onto my computer to have access. 

I had promised to show some of you how dirt just sticks to everything here. Here are some examples: 

The dirty side of the cotton wipe is from cleaning my face after a full day of walking around the streets of Colombo.

See if you can tell which part of the couch I have cleaned!

I'm off to Wellington in two days ... 6 hours in Hong Kong on the way there, about 10 hours in Hong Kong on the way back. Going to enjoy HK airport! 

First few days ...

Hello again everyone! I've got internet at work right now, but not at home as I haven't found a plug adapter for our Canadian/American 3-pronged plugs so I can power my laptop. However, work has provided me a laptop which they don't mind if I take home ... so I just might do that for the next little while!

So it's day 3 and I'm struggling a bit to figure out where I'm going to meet people. I've decided that will be my focus once I return from more training in New Zealand. So lets recap from the last few days...

April 18th, 2011

After a slight delay in Hong Kong I arrived in Colombo just after 1am. I was met by Maxwell, the Secretary General of the Commonwealth Games Association and National Olympic Committee of Sri Lanka. He and one of the drivers from our organization drove me to my apartment; my home for the next year. Unfortunately to our surprise, I was going to spend the first night without bed linens or pillows. Lucky I have my sleep sheet and sleeping bag! I tried to sleep but with the time difference I was unccessful. At about 10am I was picked up again by our driver and wisked away to the office for my first day!

I was greeted warmly as I walked into the office. They even created a banner to place at the entrance to welcome me (so sweet!). It was the first day back for everyone just after New Years holidays so we started the morning with a feast of traditional Sri Lankan treats. So tasty! After filling up on the delicious sweet and savoury treats, we retreated to the boardroom where a number of presentations were made to me about the organization, Sri Lanka, and the education system pertaining to sport and the Olympics. All that was followed by lunch. After lunch I spent some time in my new cubicle being able to check e-mail, update Facebook, etc., a few staff members took me shopping for the household goods that I was missing in the apartment. So nice of them! After getting home I cooked my first meal in Sri Lanka ... just a simple meal that I would make at home generally as when we went shopping I got some staples (i.e. garlic, onion, salt, etc.). However, I added a new condiment that I'm sure will be a fixture in my diet in the next year ... sambal!

My new workspace.

I have a TV, lucky me. :) It has one English channel which has some local programming along with CNN programming. There are occasional sports updates, but NHL updates are few and far in between! I've only been able to follow the playoffs through reading articles online at the moment.

"Home" is a little dirty I suppose compared to our standards. I don't know if it's because of the humidity but it seems like the walls are permanently dirty (in general). I'm also sure it didn't help that it seems like no one had lived in the apartment for a few months and I think the last tenants didn't treat it all too well. The organization was so kind to send a couple staff members to check it out and make sure that things were in working order and to help clean up. I'll probably be cleaning a fair bit this weekend so I finally feel more comfortable! I'll post photos when I am finally all cleaned up an unpacked. That might not happen until I return from New Zealand though!

April 19th, 2011

2nd day was a little more "normal" as I spent the whole day at the office. I was given the task of catching up through reading the correspondence they've had regarding the Isle of Man Commonwealth Youth Games coming up and their e-mails. Also they had me start working on a database in MS Access for all their Olympic Course Alumni (which I finished today). Things that are a little different in the office here compared to what I'm used to:

• Open floor concept. We're all in cubicles or a desk in the middle of a large space with the exception of the Secretary General. That means a lot of noise, phones ringing, and loud conversations. Nothing is private. For me, I usually like quiet spaces when I work and this will be a major adjustment!


• Tea time! We have tea time at 10am and around 2:30pm every day. It hasn't been overly social but we get served tea at our desk at these times.


• At SOBC we all had lunch together ... here's a little more casual that we go any time between 12pm and 1pm. However, major difference is that lunch only lasts about 15 minutes!


• 9am to 5pm. It's nice and especially that I live only about a 5-10 minute tuk tuk/cab ride away from work. I may start walking home soon as it'll probably be a slow, sweaty, 30-45 minute walk I really won't want to do in the morning.
• My cubicle is beside the accountant and he likes to break into a few lines of song every once in awhile during the day. =)

I also got driven to work in my very first tuk tuk ride. BEEP BEEP!

After work I did a bit of exploring around my residence with the new city map and city guide that the Commonwealth Games Association (CGA from now on) provided me with. I'm finding that people are generally very friendly and many speak at a least a bit of English. Most signs also have English on them so that helps! About a 10 minute walk from my place is a bubble tea place run by a Taiwanese lady! I couldn't resist and had to try it. It was decent ... definitely not as good as back home, but good to know it's here!

So on my way back home I got caught in my very first thunderstorm downpour here. Got totally soaked walking just one block.

Well, that's my update for now!

Ready to depart ... I think?

It's the day. I'm at YVR officially writing my first blog. It's been a whirlwind of a week after pre-departure training in Ottawa in the first week of April. I'm excited and nervous. Also, I never thought saying goodbye would be so hard ... even though it's only temporary.

A quick re-cap of pre-departure training:
Myself and 14 other like-minded young Canadians who love sport and want to use it to make positive change overseas went through 5 days of exciting and intense training. We learned more about the structure of Commonwealth and Olympic organizations, grant/funding opportunities, how to be cross-culturally effective people, and much more. It was such an interesting week especially with such an amazing group of individuals! Special thanks to Raymond, our facilitator for most of the week who wished us "all the pain and suffering in the world, but not in a bad way." We were definitely warned that this year will not be easy, but I felt it also really fired me up to take on any of the challenges I might face.

So what was all this training preparing us for? 15 of us going to 15 different Commonwealth countries and nations around the world including the Caribbean, South America, Africa, South Asia, and Pacific Islands. All of us are Capacity Support Officers (CSOs) placed by Commonwealth Games Canada (CGCs) to countries and nations that applied to have a Capacity Support Officer. All of us only have one part of the internship description in common: Zeus. Zeus is Commonwealth Games Federation's (CGF) games management system that stores and manages data for national teams. We will be learning with someone from our host organization what Zeus does then assist them in designing what they need it to do and implementing it. Then we teach other staff/volunteers/athletes/delegates to use it (or at least that might be the goal). So aside from that, my projects with the Sri Lanka National Olympic Committee (NOC) and Commonwealth Games Association (CGA) may include grant writing, fundraising, evaluation of National Sports Organizations (NSOs) and improving their use of social media. My workplan will be developed over the next month or so with my supervisor once I arrive.

So what else can I tell you? I have an apartment that is close to work ... and I'm deathly afraid of cockroaches. They make spiders pretty insignificant! I settle in for just over a week and then on April 27th I make another long trip to Wellington, New Zealand for a week where we'll go through intense Zeus training. Then it's back to Colombo, Sri Lanka until our midterm about 6 months from now in a place to be determined. Colombo is not easy to get to but if you are thinking about going on an adventure, please come visit!

So I have no idea where this will take me and I'm excited for this opportunity and any others that will arise. But I do know that the last two and a half years at Special Olympics BC had a large part in shaping me into the person that was able to successfully become a Capacity Support Officer with Commonwealth Games Canada. So, thank you to everyone that I got to meet and work with at SOBC. Thank you to my friends and family in the last little while in supporting me to go on this journey. You all mean the world to me and I'm so happy to know that I have a reliable network to lean on when I need it. And to my new network of friends with CGC, I'm looking forward to developing an even stronger bond with all of you!

Alright ... I think it's time for me to start moving to my departure gate. 13 hours to Hong Kong, then 7 hours to Colombo. Until next time I have internet!!!