It’s a Wrap! Thank you!

Hey guys!

Before wrapping up our amazing experience in Sri Lanka, we thought we’d take this opportunity to thank all of you who have helped and supported us throughout this wonderful 2014 project/experience.
Personally, we would like to thank our awesome friends who helped us with our cake sale back in November, our school St Michael’s for providing us with many boxes of books for the school, family friends that gave us more books, the teachers and students at the school in Sri Lanka who gave us this opportunity and of course our very supportive families! 🙂

It is very hard to summarise our experience in words, so we have put together a video on Youtube with some clips that we took. Apologies in advance about the quality of the video- its our first one. It will get better, I promise! 😀

-K & D

Keeping up with the culture

Hi guys!
This post should have been made much earlier so sorry for the delay!

During our stay in Sri Lanka we had many opportunities to wear traditional Sri Lankan outfits. For most of our time spent at school, Kasia and I wore Shalwars/Punjabi whilst teaching. Even though in that heat it may have seemed like an inappropriate choice of clothing, it was surprisingly comfortable, light and airy, so we decided to dress like this for school on a daily basis.

The day that grabbed many people’s attention was on the Prize Giving Day held for students at the school at which we volunteered. In order to try and blend in with the people attending the programme, both Kasia and I decided to wear  half-sarees (basically a saree). To be perfectly honest I think Kasia was absolutely enjoying herself, as she claimed we were ‘playing dress up’-also she really couldn’t say no to pink!.

Kasia and I wearing a half saree:)

My mum in the middle in a Saree.

– D

 

Life in the Countryside

Hi guys!

On Wednesday, after an 8 hour journey, Kasia and I arrived in one of the villages in the North-east of Sri Lanka. During our 2 week volunteering time at a school we decided to stay at my Grandparents house. Unlike most of the places we have visited so far this village is much more leafy, spacious and warmer. Large pieces of land in this small village means that many of the residents grow their own food crops- whether it is vegetables to cook or just delicious organic fruits. This only issue is that the creepy crawlies in this area become unbearable during the night.

The Beach on the way to the North-east of Sri Lanka.

Look at the texture!

Home grown Bananas yet to ripen.

Meet my Grandparents cute little dog, Siddhu.

He looks kinda scary in this photo though.

-D

Shopping in Pettah Town

Hello everyone!!

I’ve never had a shopping experience like it! Even though we live in London, one of the world’s shopping hubs, it doesn’t compare to Colombo retail. People shouting at you and bartering left right and centre, not to mention the fact that I had to hide my face just to make sure they didn’t hoik up the price of their goods.Thanks to Deepika and her lovely parents I managed to pay pennies for a spree that would have costed over £100 back home!!

punjabi shopping

my purchases 😀

Another thing that really struck me are the colours (of everything), I mean even the lorries were works of art; houses were painted lime green, electric blue and hot pink. The markets where you can find anything from dried fish to toy spidermen to sweet pineapples the size of a cricket ball were also bursting with colour. It’s like you’re looking at everything with colour filters!

And after a day’s hardcore shopping in 40 degree heat we stopped in a street cafe for some refreshing faludas (rose flavoured milkshake-like drinks with vanilla ice-cream on top yummmm)

-K

 

Paradise Island

Hey guys!
So the time has come for our first trip to the other side of the world. Kasia and I have always wanted to volunteer abroad and since an opportunity opened up in Sri Lanka we decided to jump at this chance.

We will be spending the next three weeks in Sri Lanka volunteering at a School. Unlike the other times I’ve been to Sri Lanka, our main goal is to aid some of the children with their ability to speak English. With the help of many friends, family and school staff members we raised enough money to collect over 250 English books to donate to the school. As our first project is more about giving to the community than a holiday, we’ve decided to share our volunteering experience under the page “Volunteering”.

These photos were taken during my trip to Sri Lanka in Summer 2013.

These kids living near a Tea Factory were so excited to see my camera and asked me to take a picture of them:)

-D