Two down, nine to go

Our adventure here in Sri Lanka is continuing with another milestone now gone. On Tuesday of last week we passed the 2 month mark. It has gone so quickly that it is hard to imagine where the time has gone. I am glad we have lots of photos because it is becoming a bit of blur already and they will be an amazing record to look at in time to come.

This week has been a bit of a mixed bag with some highs some lows and some stuff I frankly still don’t believe.

Concerning animal encounters… Poor Emma is terrified of the frogs that seem to like her shoes. I’m sure you heard her screams in Australia whenever one hops out of them on a very regular basis. Her shoes now live in a bucket under her bed and we still check and recheck her shoes each time before she is game to put them on. The other animal encounter involves the shifting of boxes from the store room at school. When one box containing folded cloth was moved, it moved back. The offending item was taken outside and a very large snake uncoiled itself and made a valiant bid for freedom before being beaten comprehensively beaten to death with a rake in the school grounds by one of the Yr 11 boys! You may recall my last story concerning a snake and when I described it's colour to the staff and asked what kind it was they replied “ a good snake” and that was the best I could get? Well when I asked what this one was, the answers was a definite, “not good snake”! I left it at that.

Last Saturday we visited with a staff member at her home, Mrs Veerasingam. Her husband has been ill for 6 weeks or so. It recently became necessary for them both to leave fairly suddenly for London to investigate the cause of his illness. We had a very pleasant hour with them both the day before they left for Colombo then to London. It was interesting to see a different side to Jaffna society. They lived in a very comfortable home in an outer area of Jaffna city. Their house had to be rebuilt after the war as it was in a direct line between the airport held by the military and Jaffna city held by the LTTE Tigers and suffered from fairly major shelling between the two sides.

Mrs P and family

The next day was a Poya day (a public holiday in SriLanka that coincides with every full moon)  and we went to the home of the daughter of another of our staff, Mrs Pathman. Her 2 grandchildren lived there and the 4 girls had a great time playing and we had a beautiful meal and time in conversation about all sorts of topics (but mostly what life was like during the war) with the family. It gave us an amazing insight into what the general population suffered through during the conflict. Given that it lasted 30 years, there was a whole generation that grew up through it all.

This coming Monday is a formal opening of the new primary school in Jaffna. I had the privilege yesterday of meeting with Mr Wolfgang Gross, executive director of Humedica, the German based organisation that have been major supporters of Pastor Sam and the Angel International School and many of the Pastors other ventures. Wolfgang is an amazing man with a huge personal presence. He told me some of his story about how he became involved with aid in Sri Lanka and I hope Jacinta and I get an opportunity to speak with him more. Wolfgang related his first visit to Jaffna and meeting with Pastor Sam in 1991 when the war was at its height and access to Jaffna peninsula was heavily guarded by the military. It is not a story I feel can relate on this open medium, but it was truly terrifying and would make the premise of a really good movie.

Friday night saw our first visitors with the only other white student at A.I.S. and her parents, Jo and John.  They are working in a Jaffna orphanage and it was a pleasant evening talking about their experiences in Jaffna and where to find a really good book shop, and a shop that sells peanut butter! 

Hello Boys and Girls!!!!

And you thought the cows were a problem?

...and as we  bid a fond farewell to Micky and friend...

On Saturday one of the weirdest sites I have so far seen occurred. As part of the opening of the primary school, it was decided to take the large model dinosaur and Micky Mouse held in the Manipay school to the new school in Jaffna.  How to get them there, on the back of a tractor of course! Jaffna is 8 km away, they made it 67 metres to be exact before I desperately flagged down the driver to warn him of one of the many power cables crossing the laneway. He was very definite that I get up and untangle our huge green friend. I made it perfectly clear that there was NO WAY, I was going to climb up a dinosaur, made with a wire frame, to shift a power cable! Help came in the form of a support staff member from the school on a motorbike with a large wooden pole which he used to lift the cable out of the way. The looks on the faces of the locals as the tractor and cargo eased its way out onto the main road to Jaffna was priceless. By the way, the dinosaur and huge mouse did make it to Jaffna and I have no idea how and to be honest don’t want to know. It really could only happen here!

Manipay markets

Later that day Jacinta and I went for a short walk up to the Manipay markets for a fruit and vegies shop while the girls remained at school with teachers preparing for a performance for the official opening of the Jaffna campus. It was a wonderful time with just the two of us wandering through the market and it really was an assault on all the senses. We look forward to it being a weekly activity. The markets are where the locals shop.  There was a crowded area with seafood all over the floor. A carcass of some type of red meat hanging on a hook with bits chopped off it.  We stuck to the vegetables we could recognise that are much fresher and cheaper than the supermarket.

Until next week…

Take care.......

from the Gartys’