Sri Lanka HFH

My last Habitat for Humanity trip with KIS can be described in one word; Wet. Severe raining throughout the past couple of months has led to significant flooding in the northern and eastern regions of Sri Lanka. With many people displaced from their homes, crops ruined, elephants hanging from trees (see news story link below), and disease spreading, the trip itself nearly got cancelled.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-south-asia-12185011

Scheduled to fly into Colombo and spend the week building homes in Dambulla, we would luckily be circumventing the flood regions and thus we decided to proceed with the trip. This announcement literally brought cheering, hooting, and hollering from the 20 students (mostly seniors) signed up for the trip. These Habitat trips at KIS have gained a lot of notoriety over the years. It’s actually extremely unique that a single school goes on two International Habitat trips a year. And that school being a high school, it is very rare indeed. The program started with an ambitious teacher 7 years ago and has built up to a well established school club meeting weekly, fundraising constantly and taking about 30-40 students to volunteer internationally every year.

I must discuss our fundraising just a bit, because I find it to be relatively brilliant. Anyone that has been in fundraising for any nonprofit cause knows how difficult it can be to get any ‘bang for your buck’. Fundraisers notoriously flop, raising less money than a minimum wage worker would have earned for the time invested. And even if you have a huge population base to fundraise from (like I did back with UW Madison Habitat), coming up with sound ideas that will bring in money without a ridiculous amount of work is nearly impossible. That’s why I’m so proud of our KIS students who fundraising thousands of dollars yearly on a single, tiny high school campus. On of our brilliant fundraisers is “Habitat Helpers”. Any teacher or staff member can use Habitat student volunteers as hired help. They send our student leader an email for a requested day and time and are matched with a student willing to do their dirty work for them; cleaning classrooms, decorating bulletin boards, preparing lab materials, typing up documents, etc, etc, etc. The teachers love this as it saves them from hours of busy work. The donation money is nothing compared to what their time is worth and we have a steady supply of customers throughout the year adding to our pool of monetary donations.

I won’t discuss all our fundraising efforts, but I want to share just one more started this year by one of my motivated and created students: “Habitat Korean Lessons”. Obviously living full-time in another country necessitates the need for picking up some of the language. But learning Korean is an arduous task requiring a regular time commitment and likely regular lessons. And that’s just what our Habitat group now provides. Three days a week after school we have classes (of varying levels) available for anyone on campus to partake in. These lessons are completely student-planned and student-led. Not only are these lessons very popular, but they are actually quite an opportunity for building relationships between students and teachers. As the role reversal takes place, teachers and students learn to see each other in a different light and grow closer over their often one-on-one time together. And one of the best parts about it is how students build confidence as they design lessons and get up in front of a group of teachers to carry them out. Beyond anything we do in the classroom, I really think it’s experiences like this (along with the trips) that give students real-life practical skills and experiences. I am already dreading the end of the year when my time with KIS HFH will come to an end.

But I digress. Back to the Sri Lanka trip. So, we decided to go anyway, despite the rain. I had been communicating with Francis, the Habitat coordinator in the area and he assured me that the flooding had receded and we wouldn’t be working near it anyway. In fact Sri Lanka had received two straight weeks of blistering sun and he thought we had more to worry about with the heat at the worksite. So, last Saturday we loaded up 17 students (three parents pulled their students from the trip due to warnings about the flooding) and three chaperones: Jeong (chem teacher), Jenn (P.E. teacher) and myself.

To my great disappointment (and in contradiction to all the bragging I do about my students), the trip started out with a discipline problem. We were flying Singapore Airlines to Colombo, Sri Lanka with a layover in Singapore. If you’ve never flown Singapore Airlines, I highly recommend. It’s quite nice. With all the free movies, television shows, and drinks you can consume in one sitting. And there-in lies the problem. On the first leg of our flight one of our seniors too tempted by the beautiful drink menu, tried and succeeded in ordering an alcoholic drink (Singapore Sling, actually). By some miracle, Jenn happened to be paying attention and caught her. The remainder of our first day was filled with discussions on how to handle the situation and how to notify her family and school administration. Eventually we settled on restricting her to her own room away from friends and limiting her participation in some of our “fun activities”. Just a crappy way to start a vacation intended to be based on goodwill and altruism. Grrr. Clearly all teenagers make really stupid decisions at least some of the time.

We arrived at our hotel outside Dambulla at a ripe 4am on Sunday morning. And as luck would have it, we were met with... (you guessed it)... lots and lots of rain. We were still hopeful however and certainly weren’t going to allow a little rain to ruin the trip. We spent the afternoon in orientation learning about the families we would be working with and the type of work we would be doing. Monday morning we spilt up into three different groups and made our way to the worksites. My group was assigned the home of a couple with two children, one of which was only 10 months old. They were on their first Habitat loan and had already laid the foundation. Our first job was to carry bricks to the site so we could begin building the walls. We spent much of the morning doing this while other Sri Lankan workers mixed cement and started building the walls. I gotta say there is really nothing more satisfying in this kind of work than actually watch the walls go up. You could see the families excitement as they saw how quickly the work was proceeding. But, like every trip, working effectively with the local builders can be difficult. They look at our delicate, gloved hands and white skin and do a whole lot of judging on our abilities. It took most of the day, lots of miscommunication and pushy behavior before they really let the students get involved in the brick-laying and cementing. After they conceded, it was a rather wonderful experience. My students and myself working alongside the family and other Sri Lankan workers, speaking different languages but understanding and teaching each other all the same. All in all a spectacular first day.

End of Day 1

Days 2 and 3

Although not quite as good as India, the Sri Lankan food was still very good. Staples were rice and fried noodles with curries on the side. They curries are no where near as good and creative as Indian food. Much more simple, like ‘potato curry’ or ‘dhal curry’. There was always some sort of ‘deviled’ onion, coconut, vegetable mix too. Very spicy, meant to just mix a little with your rice. Jenn and I fell in love with the Mango Chutney. Yum!! It’s basically mango jam with spices and it goes with everything. Bread, rice, chips, potatoes, you name it. Got myself a jar to take home. Mmmmmm. The tea is also fabulous (Ceylon Tea, named for Sri Lanka’s old name). I probably had 3 glasses daily and also got some to take home. Prior to the British occupation, Sri Lanka used to produce a lot of coffee. Can’t say I’m disappointed with the change.

The buffet style food service is killer though. You want to try everything at breakfast, lunch and dinner. I don’t think I was actually hungry all week. And then when you’re at the worksite, the homeowners alway want to feed you more. Part of Sri Lankan hospitality is to offer plentiful food and tea. They would let us work a couple of hours maximum and then need to feed us again. These ‘tea times’ could be considered outright meals, serving rice, curries, spices, biscuits, cookies, bananas, other homemade goodies along side our tea. It seemed rude not to eat something, but we were all so full! In a country where they have so little, they seem to give and give and give.

A typical 'tea time'. Assortment of rice, spicy side dish, sugary rice cake and fruit.

The other two worksites involved plastering and hole-digging (the septic tank) and I got to experience those the proceeding days. But by the third day, the rain became overwhelming. The consistent drizzle morphed into an outright downpour all day. The students weren’t disheartened at all and bravely pleaded to work through the rain, but unfortunately it became impossible. The septic hole we were digging (now about 5 feet deep) completely filled with water and the surrounding mud became a landslide. We had to cover our partially completed brick walls at the other site with plastic tarp to avoid making the cement too runny and ruining the work we had done. And even the third site (where plastering was taking place indoors) was nearing completion and hardly needed any more work. By Wednesday afternoon we hung our heads in defeat and headed back to our hotel. There was nothing we could do but wait it out and hope that it would clear up for Thursday.

Cement mixing for the walls and digging a hole for the septic tank. (hard work!)


Flooding and the hole were were digging now filled!

Pool at the bungalows in a rare moment of no rain.

The students had no problem entertaining themselves at the hotel. They spent the day splashing around in the pool and playing cards while I read the afternoon away on my huge, secluded porch. But by Thursday morning, some of the wind was taken from our sails. It was STILL raining. A lot. And it had been all night. The news playing during breakfast described bad flooding happening again in north and east and high risks for our area as well. In fact the weather program predicted a consistent onslaught of rain to carry on through MAY! It was hard to believe there was that much rain to be had. I had already seen more rain at once than I had ever seen in my life below. The Sri Lankans we were working with were so disheartened. Nothing like this has happened in Sri Lanka before. And after all the political unrest the country has seen with the Tamil Tigers and the devastations of the Tsunami in 2004, it is beyond tragic. The flooding is running people from their homes, running crops, turning away tourism and sending the country into even deeper poverty.

The flooding depressed me, but I guess didn’t really surprise me. Those doubters out there of climate change really need to take a look around. In this same season, Korea is experiencing record low temperatures and high snowfall. My midwest home had a crazy blizzard that sent kids home from school for days. And if you watch the news you’ll see flooding in Pakistan, Brazil, Sri Lanka. Earthquakes in Haiti. Birds dropping dead out of the sky in Arkansas, Louisiana, Europe. Fish floating ashore in Arkansas, Maryland, New Zealand. (check out these links: http://forums.gamersfirst.com/index.php?showtopic=113890). 2010 seems to be the year of natural disasters.

EARTHQUAKES: The January earthquake killed well more than 220,000 people in Haiti. In February, an earthquake that was more than 500 times stronger than the one that struck Haiti hit an area of Chile that was less populated. Deadly quakes also struck Chile, Turkey, China and Indonesia in one of the most active seismic years in decades.

FREAK WEATHER: In the summer, one weather system caused oppressive heat in Russia. That single heat-and-storm system killed almost 17,000 people, more people than all the worldwide airplane crashes in the past 15 years combined. Super Typhoon Megi with winds of more than 200 mph devastated the Philippines and parts of China. In a 24-hour period in October, Indonesia got the trifecta of terra terror: a deadly magnitude 7.7 earthquake, a tsunami that killed more than 500 people, and a volcano that caused more than 390,000 people to flee. A volcano in Iceland paralyzed air traffic for days in Europe. A nearly 2-pound hailstone that was 8 inches in diameter fell in South Dakota in July to set a U.S. record.

FLOODING: In summer, flooding in Pakistan that inundated 62,000 square miles, about the size of Wisconsin. Flooding alone this year killed more than 6,300 people in 59 nations through September In the United States, 30 people died in the Nashville, Tenn., region in flooding. Inundated countries include China, Italy, India, Colombia and Chad.

The one degree raise in global temperature has caused a shift. Whether you attribute it to human action or not, it is happening there’s no doubt about that. Nobody can really predict how climate will change, how fast it will change or for how long, but you can’t deny it’s happening. I guess we have two options: 1) Do Nothing, assume climate change has nothing to do with human action and that we can’t make a difference; or 2) Do Something just in case we can make a difference. Seems pretty obvious to me.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/40739667/ns/us_news-2010_year_in_review/

But back to the story. So it rains hard all day Wednesday and Thursday and our workweek is basically ended. We got to see the families on the Thursday, celebrate what we were able to accomplish and say goodbye. The best part about these trips is these relationships we develop. Intimidated to even interact on the first day, it always ends with hugs and often even tears.

With two of the kids from the second work site.


At the 'hole-digging' site with the family behind us.

My yoga suffered significantly this week. I really have a hard time going a day without it now, so I packed my travel mat and intended to find a good place to practice. I was delighted when I arrived to find my own personal porch overlooking the lake and the jungle definitely large enough to lay out a yoga mat! How peaceful would it be to wake up in the morning and practice yoga on my porch with the sounds of nature all around? Well, as it turns out, not too much. My first attempt on day one turned out to be a disaster. I got up at 5am in time to practice before breakfast. It was dark, but the porch light proved plenty of light. I stood at the front of the mat and started my ujjayi breathing. Just as I was feeling very euphoric thinking about how cool it was to be doing yoga in the jungle of Sri Lanka, I felt something wiz past my head. I opened my eyes but didn’t see anything. Probably just a bird, I thought. I closed my eyes again and resumed breathing. Zoom! Another one! This time I was slightly more panicked searched the morning landscape thoroughly. I began noticing flying objects all around the porch, nearby trees, and lake. I thought that seemed odd behavior for birds at this time of the morning. I kept watching as another approached my porch light. That’s when I realized what it was; BATS!! Okay, yes I do love the outdoors, but there is something about bats that really creeps me out. Mammals with wings just doesn’t seem normal, I don’t care what nature has to say about it. The creepy bone structure, eerily similar to a human hand, bent at odd angles to create wings. Eck! So, what did I do? Scream of course and run back into my hotel room.

So no yoga day 1. I did brace the heat and bugs to practice later during the week, but my ‘zen’ moments were significantly decreased after that!

Ta Da! Look what I can do :)

Friday was Sri Lankan Independence Day (Feburary 4th, 1948, from Great Britain. Actually same year as South Korea’s actual independence day from Japanese occupation [the celebrated one is also a little off for political reasons]). No work this day either! And most of the businesses were closed. We were able to see the Dambulla Cave Temple. We climbed up the side of a foot hill and tucked away beneath the overhang of the mountain was four both natural and man-made caves carved underneath. Starting about 300-400 years ago these caves were given to the monks of the Buddhist Temple. Over the years they have ceremoniously decorated and adorned this caves with paintings, carvings and statues. It was quite a site to behold. The caves were much wider than they were tall and many of the large statues of Buddah were lain sideways with the head on a stone pillows. These statues were absolutely huge. (see pics below)

Climbing up to the cave temple

Example of what the caves were like inside.

After the caves we started to make our way back toward Colombo for our departing flight that evening. On the way we stop at the Elephant Orphanage. If you read my post about our ‘safari’ in India you’ll know I’m not much for caged animals. As impressive as it may be to see these amazing creatures up close (and surely we have a lot to learn from them), it’s all too depressing. The freedom and life seems to be just sucked out of them. Their life is perpetually and simply a display for human enjoyment and the instincts and amazing adaptations that keep them alive and thriving in the wild are unseen. Unfortunately this elephant orphanage was no exception. From the description it had seemed to be a program that rehabilitated elephants and returned them to the wild. But when we arrived to a field of literally hundreds of elephants wandering around in their own feces, this couldn’t possibly be true. I kid you not, it was very reminiscent of a pasture of grazing cows surrounded by a fence (except a lot more dung!). A handful of the elephants were forced to stay at the forefront of the viewing area so people could observe up close and take pictures. There was no fence between the elephants on display and the people observing. I’ll be honest, it was quite exhilarating to be that near such a large creature and I did myself partake in the picture-taking. And we found out they do in fact save some very debilitated elephants. One in the pictures below you will notice only has only three feet. One was blown off by a land mine. Another, depressingly on display was a blind elephant that obviously would never survive in the wild. By the end of the afternoon, we had all come to sort of a point of depression. Unique as though it was, it’s hard to take a lot of joy away from that experience.

Missing a foot due to a land mine.

Getting a little closer than comfort! (nervous laugh)


Ingenious environmental effort :)

Before making our final trek to the airport we stop in Negombo for a quick stroll on the beach and dinner (little did we know, it wouldn’t be so quick!). Again because it was Independence Day, not much was open. Francis was able to find us a place to have dinner at one of the beach hotels. The manager literally came running out and begged the 20 of us to dine at his restaurant. Thoroughly persuaded, and used to the hospitality that Sri Lanka has to offer, we took him up on his offer. Baaaaaad choice. We were on a time schedule and there was literally only one waiter (and it would appear, cook as well) to feed the 50-100 people dining there. Our waiter kept promising speedy service, but never actually gave it. He left us sit there for 20 minutes before our order was taken, another 25 minutes to even get us water, and about 2.5 hours before we finally got our food! Actually, we never even got all our food and it was cold and just really gross. Now I’m in Sri Lanka and not Seoul or Milwaukee, so I am being very understanding. But when we told him we need our bill and one of the students still needed the burger they ordered, he was gone again for 15-20 minutes. Plus, they were certainly charging us western prices. We were all SOOOO frustrated (and of course hungry and drained from a tough week). Definitely not in a state of mind to answer rude and horrible service. So Jeong decided we are NOT going to pay this guy full price. At least not the required 10% service charge. Jenn and I supported him, so Jeong goes up to the guy and tells him the situation, our disappointments and what we are willing to pay. The waiter flipped out. He said he was absolutely going to charge us full price for everything. He was busy, that’s the way it is. Jeong came back and told us this and we were fuming. Me being me, I decided I could go up there and logically and professionally handle the situation (lol). I smiled nice, explained that our Habitat coordinator would love to bring groups back here if they provided honest, good service and that we couldn’t possibly pay for food we didn’t get and service that didn’t happened. Lets just say it didn’t go as well as planned. He said he didn’t need to be fair because we were never going back to that restaurant again anyway. And he didn’t like my change in attitude so now he’s not going to lower the price. At this point, Jeong and Jenn are flanking me and the students are all looking on. Jeong pops in, lays money down on the counter, says ‘this is what we are going to pay and that’s that’. The manager started yelling, picked up his phone and threatened to call the cops! This went on for quite some time and we had made a big scene. Eventually we didn’t feel like getting arrested and had to catch a flight so we paid the stupid guy the money. In the end he did give us free water. Wow, is all I have to say. I would suggest avoiding the “White Rose Resort” in Negombo at all costs. This trip certainly started and ended with a bang.

But truth be told, all the rain and setbacks did not stop me from falling in LOVE with Sri Lanka. It is truly like a jungle paradise. Birds chirping, monkeys swinging and interesting wildlife and terrain to explore everywhere you look. Driving through the countryside you seen rice fields, pineapple trees and mountain peeks jutting up in the distance. And then of course there is the people. It seems everywhere you look people are just hanging out in their doorways, on their porches, in restaurants and shops just waiting to throw you a smile and even strike up a conversation. There is nothing strange, frightening or intimidating about the country and it put me completely at ease. After India’s congestion, smells, and sounds this Habitat trip brought me a great deal of peace.

Extra Random Pictures:

Left: mosquito net. learned quickly to use one of these!

Monk catching me snapping his photo (left) and what's my fascination with doors? I always seem to come back with quite a few pictures of them.

Monkeys at temple, high up! And identical outfits at the girl's home.

Girl's home at the nunnery.

Communicating with the families by drawing (left) and house warming ceremony by boiling coconut milk (right)

Jenn and I at the temple (right). Had to where the skirts or we wouldn't be allowed in!

See more pics from the trip at: http://api.flickr.com/services/feeds/photoset.gne?set=72157625876431137&nsid=53689178@N04&lang=en-us