Sarah & Stu’s Arugam Bay adventures

Point Breaks and Machine guns Fosamax price in pakistan

Ia??m not going to lie to you, ita??s been a surreal 48 hours. We left Unawatuna and Shangri la, our tropical garden paradise with slightly heavy hearts and, Ia??ll be honest, a bit of a hangover.A? The night before we left Sarah left me in the company of two NGO types and a bottle of Arrack (coconut scotch) and a bottle of vodka. A lot of storytelling later I rolled into bed and snored my way through the four hours left til dawn and the seven hour trip to Arugam Bay. We were packed on our way by Nanda, a very sweet guy who lost his wife in the tsunami and struggles to earn enough money to pay his chef Charmin each day. He got up at 0430 and made us papaya salad with chilli and cucumber for our journey. Herea??s a photo of this lovely man in his restaurant cum grocery store (something akin to the Falafel King for just what oddities he sells for those of you who are familiar).

That was the straightforward bit. Seven hours of taxi ride with boards etc later, we arrived in the dusty beach village of Arugam Bay. Now wea??ve never been here, but had decided that we were going to spend 5 months, based on the fact that therea??s great surf. Strolling around the backstreets, therea??s a mosque, the elders have beards and crocheted white hats and didna??t look all that impressed to see us, in spite of our smiles that on the other side of the island had, literally taken us miles. Then we checked into a place imaginatively called Beach Hut. Run by Ranga, we were made to feel pretty comfortable and for A?3.50 a night we got a tree house, complete with wagon wheel trailer outside, separate bathroom with no light, but lovely cold shower, and a buffalo skull by the front door, no extra charge.

a??Wea??ll get jobs.a?? I said, trying to find some way that we could possibly fill 5 months in this hippy backwater of a place ravaged by the tsunami 6 years ago. Wea??ve not really been making a secret of the fact that wea??re looking for voluntary work with an NGO, charity, or otherwise. It does make people look at you differently if they think youa??re not there just to get drunk and chat to other NGa??oha??

Our straw mattress and cement bag pillow did little for my sleep, and I was beginning to feel like the buffalo by morning. Particularly after being woken at 0400 by a couple of cuckoos who were sharing our tree house.A? Having said that, it was a stunning location with the pounding sea on one side and Indian sitar music on the other. A swift breakfast of fresh papaya, pineapple, coconut, curd and honey brought everything back into focus just in time for us to walk into a very informal interview and find ourselves a job.

From Wild Wild West to paradise number 2. What a difference a day makes. We were allowing ourselves 3 weeks holiday before we started looking for something to keep us occupied, but therea??s only so much of the day can be filled with surfing, harmonica and practicing the head waggle. So now if you need us youa??ll find us, most likely for the next few months or so, residing at the Tsunami Hotel on the beach, where I guess wea??re running it. Spookily named and built 5 years before the tsunami, it was completely destroyed in 2004 and is only now really getting back on its feet. The deal is, we get to live here, eat here, surf just out the front door and so on, while we give the place a little help to attract more custom, direct the music policy, design the new menu and help teach the local chef to make guacamole and poached eggs, while the owner is away in Hong Kong. So basically we get to meet a load of great new people, cook, learn Tamil, direct a small team of workers to do some diy, make the place look amazing and a brilliant place for people to come stay. A?To celebrate our good fortune we watched the sun going down at at sea on our boards waiting for our turn riding a breathtaking point break, while on the beach four soldiers with machine guns cheerily looked on. You should have seen the smiles on our faces.

Ia??m not going to lie to you, ita??s been a surreal 48 hours. We left Unawatuna and Shangri la, our tropical garden paradise with slightly heavy hearts and, Ia??ll be honest, a bit of a hangover.A? The night before we left Sarah left me in the company of two NGO types and a bottle of Arrack (coconut scotch) and a bottle of vodka. A lot of storytelling later I rolled into bed and snored my way through the four hours left til dawn and the seven hour trip to Arugam Bay. We were packed on our way by Nanda, a very sweet guy who lost his wife in the tsunami and struggles to earn enough money to pay his chef Charmin each day. He got up at 0430 and made us papaya salad with chilli and cucumber for our journey. Herea??s a photo of this lovely man in his restaurant cum grocery store (something akin to the Falafel King for just what oddities he sells for those of you who are familiar).

That was the straightforward bit. Seven hours of taxi ride with boards etc later, we arrived in the dusty beach village of Arugam Bay. Now wea??ve never been here, but had decided that we were going to spend 5 months, based on the fact that therea??s great surf. Strolling around the backstreets, therea??s a mosque, the elders have beards and crocheted white hats and didna??t look all that impressed to see us, in spite of our smiles that on the other side of the island had, literally taken us miles. Then we checked into a place imaginatively called Beach Hut. Run by Ranga, we were made to feel pretty comfortable and for A?3.50 a night we got a tree house, complete with wagon wheel trailer outside, separate bathroom with no light, but lovely cold shower, and a buffalo skull by the front door, no extra charge.

a??Wea??ll get jobs.a?? I said, trying to find some way that we could possibly fill 5 months in this hippy backwater of a place ravaged by the tsunami 6 years ago. Wea??ve not really been making a secret of the fact that wea??re looking for voluntary work with an NGO, charity, or otherwise. It does make people look at you differently if they think youa??re not there just to get drunk and chat to other NGa??oha??

Our straw mattress and cement bag pillow did little for my sleep, and I was beginning to feel like the buffalo by morning. Particularly after being woken at 0400 by a couple of cuckoos who were sharing our tree house.A? Having said that, it was a stunning location with the pounding sea on one side and Indian sitar music on the other. A swift breakfast of fresh papaya, pineapple, coconut, curd and honey brought everything back into focus just in time for us to walk into a very informal interview and find ourselves a job.

From Wild Wild West to paradise number 2. What a difference a day makes. We were allowing ourselves 3 weeks holiday before we started looking for something to keep us occupied, but therea??s only so much of the day can be filled with surfing, harmonica and practicing the head waggle. So now if you need us youa??ll find us, most likely for the next few months or so, residing at the Tsunami Hotel on the beach, where I guess wea??re running it. Spookily named and built 5 years before the tsunami, it was completely destroyed in 2004 and is only now really getting back on its feet. The deal is, we get to live here, eat here, surf just out the front door and so on, while we give the place a little help to attract more custom, direct the music policy, design the new menu and help teach the local chef to make guacamole and poached eggs, while the owner is away in Hong Kong. So basically we get to meet a load of great new people, cook, learn Tamil, direct a small team of workers to do some diy, make the place look amazing and a brilliant place for people to come stay. A?To celebrate our good fortune we watched the sun going down at at sea on our boards waiting for our turn riding a breathtaking point break, while on the beach four soldiers with machine guns cheerily looked on. You should have seen the smiles on our faces.

http://www.surfandcurry.com/2010/04/point-breaks-and-machine-guns/