Ni Dieu Ni Maitre

That’s my political commentary for the day. That, and when the notable Fascist Benito Mussolini was asked by a reporter what the philosophical underpinnings of fascism were, he replied, “We don’t think, we act!”

This stupa is in the downtown area of Colombo, Sri Lanka, right next door to my very small and inexpensive hotel. Landing at the airport, I wisely located a shuttle bus for Colombo, avoiding a $35 taxi fare. Like the other 4 westerners aboard, once we had arrived in the city, I just got off where there were tuk-tuks, showed the address of my hotel to a driver who located it on his phone and GPSed us right there. Jet lagged, I stayed in Colombo for several days.

This is a huge, clean and relatively modern city, basically of little interest. A small and accessible urban neighborhood provided food, necessities and the occasional beer. Surprisingly, it also supported quite a few Western tourists in the upscale hotels there. Unlike India, walking there featured a timed walk light across a busy avenue, and a crosswalk at the next street, totally accepted by the motorists at the smaller crossing.

I had decided to go to Trincomalee, a port city on the east coast and to the nearby beaches of Uppeveli and Nilaveli on the overnight train. Still not really over the jetlag, a sleepless 9 hour night on a train was a bit much. Arriving at pre-dawn, a ‘helpful’ tuk-tuk driver took me to a beach hotel in Uppeveli, where I was overcharged quite a bit for a room for 2 nights. But sleep… beautiful, restful sleep.

Not really sure what this prominent Colombo tower is, but it lights up at night and changes colors. Anyhow, the hotel thing was solved the next day, walking around the fairly compact precincts of the beach and settling with the manager of the new spot for an extended stay at a good price.

Storm moving over a deserted end of the beach. The first week here there was rain on and off, but not problematic at all.

Goya… sleeping.