Weekly Review 1

I have decided to do a weekly review of all the things that have happened in Sri Lanka so far, and I have decided to do it in English. This is basically going to be a summary of all the previous posts, but I’ll definitely add some new information, just for you English speaking folks :-) I hope you like it, and for pictures, just check out the previous posts, plus I added a list of all the published photo albums, at the end of my Blog under the archive ("Fotoalben").

My first week in Sri Lanka is over and it feels more like a month. I have seen and done so much that it’s hard to believe it happened in only one week. It’s a very strange feeling, but strange is the theme of these first days, anyway. I first set a foot on Sri Lankan ground last Wednesday (October 6^th), around 4am Sri Lankan time (UTC +5:30 hours). The flights (I had to transfer in Doha) were nice, although I enjoyed the first one more than the second one. Noisy people, puking kids and a touch screen that did not want to work can get really annoying during a 4 hour flight. But never the less, I made it to Colombo, the capital of Sri Lanka. After I made it through the security and immigration checks and after I found my luggage, I was picked up by Shavi and her parents. She is a friend of mine who participated in the exchange program last semester, only the other way around. They took me and my stuff to Munch, another friend of mine, who went to Germany with Shavi in the same exchange program. Because I did not have a permanent place to stay yet, Munch and her family took me in and let me stay at their house for the first couple of days. With them by my side, I got to eat traditional Sri Lankan food, met a lot of people, took my first bus ride in Colombo and got to see how cinnamon is produced. Sri Lankan food is quite good and really spicy. I like it. Taking the bus in Colombo is an adventure in itself. Imagine the movie “Speed” but with a bomb in every bus. It seems like none of the drivers is allowed to slow down. Crazy!

But I had a great time with Manishka’s family and they helped me a lot during my first days in Sri Lanka and with my first major task: Find an Apartment!

Three guys participate in this exchange program and we decided in Germany, that the best thing to do is get an apartment together. As I am the first one who arrived in Sri Lanka, I promised Steven and Peter, that I would take care of the apartment issue and that they have a place to move in, when they arrive. It is not as easy as one might think to find a nice place, fully furnished, with three bedrooms, and close to the university, for an affordable price in Colombo. I just got to see one place and it was a take it now or risk losing it kind of thing. I had one day to show the guys some pictures and to get their consent. We took it, and it think we made a good call. Although it was our only choice, I’m sure we would have taken this place even if we had more to choose from.

So now we got a room, or to be precise, I got a room. The other two guys will arrive in Sri Lanka on Friday, which leaves me with all the basic shopping and getting the things we need. But thanks to the help of Shavi and her parents we got everything we might need by now. They helped us out with all kinds of kitchen stuff (plates, glasses, pans, pots, etc.) and sheets and pillows for the rooms and they took me to a store for all the other stuff that a household might need.

To sum it up, my first days in Sri Lanka were quite good, thanks to the people who supported me. I owe them quite a lot and I hope they know that I’m thankful for all that they have done for me.

PS: I'm having a Riddle every week where someone can win something. To participate just post your answer as a comment under the "Riddle" Post. This week you have to guess how much money is in the last picture.