15. "Do a Colombo. Do a Colombo"

After a full 14 weeks in the Maldives, it was time for me to leave. We packed one final day wandering Male', doing the essential tourist activities; marvelling at giant tuna in the fish market, sipping kurumba through straws that smelt vaguely of petroleum, and spending far too much money on ornamental shells. A hawker also convinced us into buying some 'Maldivian chocolate'. After much contemplative chewing we decided that this weird concoction was a mixture of cinnamon, sugar, dry rice, and chilli. It wasn't bad, but it looked like a dog chew and definitely was not chocolate.

That night we flew to Colombo, on a plane so ludicrously underbooked that it was actually spooky. The gate for its onward flight to Nanking was equally empty. Presumably China Eastern Airways is state-subsidised, because I can't see how 7 passengers paying 50 quid each is enough to cover the fuel, crew and fees for a 196-seat commercial jetliner. (The empty plane did not stop one poor girl diligently scanning the rows for her assigned seat). It was a good flight, through a stunning lightning storm, and with an easygoing cabin attendant who gave both of us a family-size bottle of Pepsi gratis and looked the other way when we started playing hide and seek.

Entering Sri Lanka is not a pleasant experience. The signs of Civil War are still fresh, and heavily-armed soldiers patrol every inch of the capital city. There are military checkpoints and mounted semi-automatics throughout Colombo, but the airport was a key target of the LTTE Tamil Tigers, and it was breached in 2005, so the neurosis and tension is noticeably higher here. Equally concerning is the unmissable sign at immigration proclaiming: POSSESSION OF ILLEGAL DRUGS CARRIES THE DEATH PENALTY. It's difficult to avoid paranoia seeing this. You start thinking, "what if I picked something up accidentally", "what if my luggage was tampered with?". Obviously you really know it's fine, but that fleeting creeping doubt is scary when the consequences of a mistake or misunderstanding are so horrific.

After spending the night in a little guesthouse near the airport we boarded a 'luxury' bus to shoot the 90 minutes drive into Colombo. It was still battered, packed like a tin of sardines, but there was apparently some A/C, and thus cost 50p instead of 30p. It was a fascinating journey, with the roadside packed full of small businesses, market traders, cows, shacks, and hilarious advertising hoardings. Most of these are the same: a grinning cricket player with a bat nonchalantly slung over one shoulder, holding the product to camera in his other hand. Sri Lankan marketing execs are either the laziest or cleverest in the world. I saw the exact same cricketing pose advertising: a) Milo chocolate milkshake; b) Mobitel internet; c) Coca-Cola; d) Kot-Mee instant noodles; e) some miscellaneous shower gel. Sri Lankan Tourism also get in on the cricketing/advertising panacea with one of the most astounding non-sequiters I have ever seen. "BE BOWLED OVER BY SRI LANKA'S WILDLIFE" demands the roadside billboard, complemented by a quite unremarkable image of an elephant having a nice stand in a field. Not holding a bat, guarding a wicket, or throwing a novelty cricket ball in the air. Just standing there. Sri Lanka Tourism do not get puns.

This was not my roadside hoarding however. Not even close. That honour goes to a rare non-cricketing billboard for Fedex, with some abstract silhouette of humans, lots of Sinhalese writing, and the perfect tagline: "NO TWO PEOPLE ARE THE SAME. WHY SHOULD THEIR FREIGHT SOLUTIONS?"
This is just so laughably ridiculous, clearly blue-skied by some snotty little graduate (me in six months), probably responding to a remit of "repackaging and individualising the customer/servicer interface", whilst ignoring the clear fact that freight solutions are the one sphere that really demand uniformity. It's just a glorified postal system. I felt like yelling at Future-Me: "Because everyone's freight requirements are the same. Get it from A to B. Safely. Efficiently. They don't want a personalised service. They want structure, order, systemisation, the most certain method of concluding their recent freight-based dilemma without further stress or trauma. They are not buying choice cuts of meat for a barbecue."
Marketing execs are clearly the biggest bullshitters in the world. I want to be one.

What a pleasant interlude! The bus dropped us somewhere in the bustling market hub of central Colombo, near Fort Railway Station. Laden with sweat and big backpacks, we were attractive target for tuk-tuk drivers, who clearly sensed a fee commensurate with desperate Westerners. For some reason we started bartering, before realising we had no real destination in mind, so strode with purpose up various back alleys and staircases into a succession of dirty guesthouses. After a few hours we found a room in a particularly disgusting street, where a grubby but habitable double room cost us 1500 rupees (7 quid) per night. The bed sagged to the floor, the toilet seat was left in the shower, and the cistern had to be manually filled with a hosepipe before flushing. I now know the internal mechanism of a toilet by heart. On the sink was an empty foil packet from the hitherto unknown but presumably reputable CUPID♂ brand. Clearly the previous occupant had medical issues. But at least the guesthouse boy swept the floor, and got us new sheets. It was a dive, but fine for a few hours each night.


That afternoon we tramped around Colombo, and jumped in a tuk-tuk to the posh Galle Face Hotel for a stunning view of the sun setting over the Indian Ocean. Even at this exclusive place (waiters in tuxedos) we could procure pints for just 80p, so I enjoyed my first affordable beer in 3 months and reclined into a sofa, Kindle in hand. Posh hotel, cold beer, awesome location. Bliss. And even better when they got the bill wrong. We paid, and cheesed it.