August 30, 2015

Yesterday was Nikini Full Moon Poya Day marking the end of the Perahera.  The moon was so bright that it outshone the street lamp that is in front of the house.  Even with my lousy phone camera, you can see how bright it was.

As I stood outside watching it, huge fruit bats were flying all round.  A real vampire of a night.

August 28, 2015

Marked my ballot for the Canadian federal election this morning and will mail it today.  I love democracy!

Veenitha and I continue to worship the Buddha.  I don't think it has any effect, but she believes in it.

Veenitha has been doing the flowers since we moved to the new house.  She does a lovely job.

Here she is doing her sadhu

The cat came home the other night after only being out for a few minutes with a bad limp.  She couldn't put any weight on one of her back legs.  I felt around and found that it was badly swollen.  She was purring a lot, so she must have been in some pain.  Seems she sprained something.  She stayed in all that night and hardly moved.  By the morning she was still limping, but was eating and generally more lively, so it was clearly not a snake bite.  I was a bit concerned about this as I caught the tail end of an enormous rat snake slinking into the shrubbery the other day.  As you can see, by the second day, she was feeling much better.  She was able to jump up on my bed and have a nice sleep.

Yesterday was art group at Judith's.  She has a beautiful house and garden.  Here are a few pics.

The view of the great room from the upstairs lounge.  Ava is waving.

Judith in the blue is our hostess, Ava on the left.  Getting ready for tea/coffee before art.

Judith has some amazing pieces of furniture.  Even though this piece is machine carved, it is still magnificent.  I love the curved glass.

She calls this her monsoon room.  The table on the right matches the hutch.

A small courtyard outside the monsoon room and the great room

One of her terraces with a lovely lawn like a golf green.  She cuts the lawn by hand with scissors.  We had after lunch drinks down here.  Very Raj!

Her garden is mature and lovely

The front veranda where we had most of our activities except lunch which was served inside.

August 23, 2015

Exactly nine months today that I am an illegal immigrant.  Although I am not worried about it, I did have a dream the other night that they came to deport me.  It all worked out in the end, so I am sure it will be alright.

I received my voting package from Elections Canada in the post the other day.  So glad I can vote to remove that horrible man Harper from office.

Some plants from the garden.

I don't know what the cascading white flower is called above the Bridal Bouquet, but when the flowers dry, they are lovely and soft like lambs ears and make for great decorations.

In a bowl

For the Buddha

This is called a Handkerchief Plant.  The new leaves are white while the flowers are orange.  This one grows at the foot of my outdoor staircase.

My crazy cat using one of my agave plants as a pillow.  I guess she doesn't know it is a cactus.

August 19, 2015

The general election was 2 days ago with full results yesterday afternoon.  Sri Lanka is safe for 5 years anyway.  One of the world's most corrupt and evil dictators has been defeated for a second time.  Happily, the former opposition party, the UNP, has 106 seats in the 225 seat parliament.  Rajapaksa's coalition, UPFA got 95 which means that unless the UPFA can form a bloc with the Tamil ITAK, which will happen when hell freezes over, the country is saved. 

On the sadder side, it was a close run thing showing that the country is still divided.  Virtually all Tamils and Muslims voted for either the UNP or ITAK.  The south voted for the UPFA almost as a block.  With the exception of 2 districts, the UPFA got no seats north of Ratnapura.  The Sinhalese vote was almost evenly split between the UNP and UPFA. 

The new government will have its work cut out for it.  They will have to build bridges (not the one suggested between Jaffna and India) as well as deal with the vast corruption perpetrated by the Rajapaksas.

Have a look at this link if you are interested in detailed results:

http://adaderana.lk/general-election-2015/index.php

Another victory for democracy.  Good luck to Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe.

August 14, 2015

Three days away from election day.  With any luck and hopefully good management, the United National Party will get in and Sri Lanka will have a reasonably bright future.  I don't want to think of the alternative.  The former president/dictator is running with a full slate of candidates and although the current President has said he will not appoint him as Prime Minister, there is a slight danger he may get a majority of the seats.  Under the Sri Lankan constitution, the Prime Minister is not necessarily the leader of the party that holds the most seats in Parliament.  The Prime Minister is appointed by the President as the person he deems most capable of establishing an effective government.  However, if Rajapakse gets the most seats, he will attempt a coup.  Then we can all kiss the country good bye.

I have been up to my usual tricks.  Last month's spa experience was enhanced by the addition of an ultra fancy pedicure chair.  Built in foot bath, reclining back with remote control switch.  Of course, in the typical Sri Lankan style, it is jerry rigged.  The landlord wants the space restored to how it was when he rented it to the salon, so they could not install the plumbing for the chair.  So Sundari had a platform built for the chair with the plumbing running through the platform.  Consequently, you need a small ladder to get up into the chair.

Like a queen on her throne.  You'll have to excuse the state of my hair as after all, I am at the hairdresser.

The lovely woman who sometimes gives me a pedicure.

We had been having a lot of trouble getting someone to pick our ripe coconut and tambibli (king coconut).  Finally, my landlady found someone.  We had quite a crop.

My tambili with the rest in the background

Coconuts

Went off to the Earl's Regency Hotel with Ava on Tuesday for high tea.  We were the only ones and despite that it took almost 40 minutes for the stuff to come.  We told them we did not want chicken, but it came anyway.  After another two attempts, they finally got it right.  They even had scones which were quite good, but no cream, butter or jam which meant that they were totally dry.  We made a few suggestions for improvement before we left, but I am not holding my breath.  I brought the scones home and had them with my homemade lemon butter for breakfast the next day.  They were great that way.

Wednesday was Ken Kawasaki's birthday.  He wanted to do a danne (alms giving) at Vajirarama Temple where they teach on Wednesdays.  Veenitha stayed over on at my place on Tuesday night as we left at 0610 for the Kawasakis to go in tandem to the temple.  It is more a monastery than a temple.  In fact, the most beautiful monastery I have seen in Sri Lanka.  Beautifully maintained right down to the sand in the parking lot swept in the design of coconut fronds.

We set everything up in the pantry for the monks and novices who came with their bowls.  There were 18 all together.  Much less than usual as most of the novices had gone home during the rains retreat which they do not have to follow.  After food, we all assembled in the main hall for chanting.  This is a lovely room with a simple but beautiful Buddha statue as the focus.  The room is lined with upholstered chairs with no legs.  The monks sat on those chairs while we sat in the middle.  For a second or two, I actually felt the power of the chant.

This is the nicest danne experience I have had so far.  Much more traditional with the monks using their bowls instead of plates, sitting cross legged in the hall, quietly eating.  Plus, they all took very little food unlike some of these monks I have seen who eat gluttonous amounts.  One of the novices was so handsome, he looked like the idealized images you see of the young Buddha.  Here are some of Ken's pictures from the event:

Ken offering the food to the Buddha before the danne begins

The second in command monk changing before the danne.  The chairs are a new donation.  I reminded me a lot of the way chairs are lined up on either side of the altar in a catholic monastery.

Chanting before the danne.  From left to right/front to back:  Mike, Nimal (Kawasakis gardener), Weston and his new bride Theresa in Sri Lanka doing a Masters degree, Visakha, Veenitha (my maid), some ladies with their children who come every 12th of the month to give danne, me.

Giving danne

This is the novice who looks like the young Buddha.  He could be a film star.

The Chief Monk

Eating in silence

The spittoons are used to empty the bowls after they wash them with the jugs of water

Ken offering books as his birthday danne

Chanting while holding the pirith string

Theresa receiving her string

Afterwards, we went back to Kawasakis for breakfast and were home by 1000.  Lots of time to get on with the rest of the day.

Judith gave me some small agave plants.  In the absence of anyone coming to clean up the window box at the front of the house, I did it myself.  Donning my camo gum boots and wielding my mamate, I got out there and dug up the bed with Veenitha's help.  I don't really think she wanted to do it, but if Madame is out there digging like a labourer, she felt ashamed not to be helping.  The result is quite satisfactory.

I could have used those gum boots yesterday at art club.  I had been standing on the lawn at Deanne's to once again sand my coconut shell before painting.  I thought about leeches and kept checking.  After about an 2 hours of painting, I looked down at my foot for some reason.  I had been using crimson paint and upon looking down, I thought, "How odd.  I don't know how I spilled paint inside my shoe."  Wrongo rhino breath!  It was blood and plenty of it.  With Judith and Deanne's help, I cleaned up my foot and my shoe but the bleeding did not stop for another 4 hours after I got home.  They should synthesize the chemical used by leeches to prevent blood clotting to use on people with blood clot problems.

The sneaky little bugger had gotten between my little toe and my fourth toe,  I must have lost close to a cup of blood.  Of course, I had to get on the internet to see if anything can done to stop the bleeding.  There isn't, by the way.  But in searching for a solution, I found one post where some idiot said they had been bitten by their pet leech.  Who has a pet leech?

On returning home, I found the magpies in my front yard enjoying the pots of water we have taken to leaving out for them.  I discovered that they had taken to having baths in the cat's water bowl, so we have given them some bowls of their own.