Keith in Sri Lanka

The weather was appalling today - the monsoon rains were back with a vengeance - and although the teachers were in - there was no point in getting drenched when I had so much work that I could do from home. I was going to go in when the rain stopped, but it carried on all day, and I got so into my Monitoring and Evaluation Report for the Rotary International Project that I lost track of time. I have now passed the half-way point of my 3-month visit here, and it is a good time to reflect on the experience so far. It has been a much tougher time than when I was here for 3 months at the end of 2019, but I am still enjoying it immensely, and I always believe I can learn from whatever I am faced with each day. I am confident I will achieve what I set out to do, even if it has been tricky! I chatted to Tim Pare (who founded the Tea Leaf Trust with his wife Yasmene Shah) a few days ago, and he told me that I would probably look back on this 3-month visit as a time that I appreciated for what ...

School was open today, but only for the teachers, who were conducting online classes for the students, which is going to continue for the rest of this week - and maybe beyond, but it is difficult to plan that far ahead now, as you just don't know what is around the corner. I spent the morning working on my monitoring and evaluation report for the Rotary International Project, which is progressing well. In the afternoon, I did some report writing training with Vino and Aruni. I know I can write a decent report, having spent the last 20 years of my life doing just that, but explaining to someone else how to do it, is a different matter, so I just hoped they managed to get some positive pointers from me this afternoon. They seemed to think it went well, so I hope they weren't just humouring me! I took no photographs at all today, so today there are a few more from my wonderful day out yesterday. I took a few from the rooftop of Gobi's house (a flat roof, obviously!), and I hop...

I had a lovely day today socialising. I took a tuk-tuk to Norwood, where I waited for a while for Gobi to pick me up to take me to his place. Whilst waiting, I spotted some artwork at the bus shelter, which is the rather unique work of the very talented Kumaravel Dayaneethibabu (Daya for short!). Daya is very community minded and, as you can see, manages to combine this with his passion for superheroes!. Gobi told me that the road to Bogawantalawa was terrible - and he wasn't kidding! It was easily the worst main road I have travelled along in Sri Lanka - more potholes than road in places. It made for a very uncomfortable journey to Gobi's place, although you do travel through some scenic countryside. I find this whole area stunningly beautiful, with lovely powerful waterfalls after all the recent rain. I have enjoyed working with Gobi immensely, and it was so good to see his wife Kavi again, as the last time I saw her was at their wedding in November 2019. Since then, there ha...

I had a pretty relaxing morning today, with a late breakfast at 09:00, then sorting out my blog, diary, emails etc. - all very leisurely, although I did edit 3 Student Profiles for Mr. Sivabalan and email them to him, and I was very moved reading them, as I have edited 6 of these over the past couple of days, and they have been written for the students with the most difficult of personal circumstances. I had arranged to meet Mr. Rizvi around lunchtime. He teaches at Mottingham T.V. School (that really is Nottingham spelt with an 'M' - it's not a typo!) and has been on the most recent batch of the 6-month Training Programmes (having conversation sessions with Peter Hopwood). I met him the other day at Portree Primary School, and I had discovered that he lives less than 10 minutes' walk from me! He had been out this morning, so he came by Ananda's to meet me, and we walked the back way into Maskeliya. Our first stop was the Catholic church, where a wedding was in full...

To continue from where I left off yesterday, I then went to visit a second school with Gobi - Ireby T.M.V. School, where we met 4 more teachers from different schools, including Mrs. Chandra, who has been having conversation sessions with Jan Mackenzie, and Ms. Devika, who has just started having conversation sessions with Liz Westbrook. They gave us a very warm welcome indeed. Mr. Nicksonlenin, from the second 6-month Training Programme, had invited us for lunch at his house in Norwood, and on the way there we passed an enormous queue of people trying to buy kerosene. We met 8 teachers at his house, including Mrs. Florance, who has also been having conversation sessions with Liz Westbrook, and Mrs. Vanitha, who previously had conversation sessions with Jan Mackenzie. One of the teachers told us that she had joined the kerosene queue at 08:00 in the morning, before any kerosene even arrived. They were giving out tokens with numbers on, and she was number 200 in the queue. By 16:00, whe...

Yesterday was probably my most disappointing and frustrating day so far, so it was great to be able to bounce back again today with what turned out to be one of my best days so far! It was an incredibly busy day, and I was quite exhausted by the end of it, which is why it has taken me a while to get my blog done - and it was another day that will carry over into two blogs, as one blog will not do it justice! I got an early morning tuk-tuk to the bus station, to catch a bus to Hatton (getting off at Norwood), but before we got to the bus station we met the Hatton bus and the tuk-tuk driver flagged it down. I had to quickly pay the tuk-tuk driver, grab my stuff, and jump on the back of the bus, which then drove off immediately, and I would have fallen back out of the bus if someone hadn't grabbed me to pull me on! I got to Norwood early, so I popped in to see Daya for an hour, and Gobi picked me up from there to go on a mammoth day's visit to see two schools, the first one hostin...

Tea Leaf Vision made the decision to close all three of their schools for the rest of this week, which was inevitable given the fuel situation in the country, as although there will still be a skeleton service of government buses, there will be no private buses, so the journey to and from school will be impossible for many students. This meant another day working from home again, which is no great hardship. I had a WhatsApp group call with Yad and Jesa this morning to discuss what I should be doing next. I have been in Maskeliya for the past 5 weeks now, so I was hoping to be able to return to Nuwara Eliya, but sadly, that is just not going to happen. Given the current situation in the country, I am of greater use to Teal Leaf Vision here in Maskeliya, which I know makes sense, even if it is disappointing. A Zoom Meeting chat with my very good friend Charles Hayward cheered me up, as I felt a bit more connected with what is going on back home. This evening I also chatted to Val through...

I was in school this morning, and the puppies were still there, as you will see from today's first photograph, but I don't know if I will see them again, as the students were only in for one hour, before being sent home again because of the bus situation, and I heard this evening that all schools will be closed now for the rest of the week, as pretty much all transport in Sri Lanka is now grinding to a halt. With no petrol, diesel or gas left, the roads will soon be empty, and many people are now relying on firewood to cook. Inflation is out of control - the official figure was 21.5% in March and went up to 33.8% in April, although people tell me the real figure is much higher. The Energy Minister announced today that petrol prices would go up 20-24% and diesel prices 35-38% with immediate effect. This means that even if the country can import more petrol and diesel, it will be unaffordable for the poorest people, and it will automatically raise the cost of public transport. Th...