11th Nov. Galle

(Mantra for the day):
Always have a cheery 'hello' for the street sweepers. They have a hard enough life already. Anyway, it's often they who offer a smile first and a 'good morning sir'. The place would be a right old mess without them.
I could hear the overnight rain relenting, so I nipped out for something like breakfast. Blimey, the temperature is rising so it was clever of me to take my brolly with me for a change - for showers or the baking sun.
Today I had planned to walk to Galle's old fortified part of town - it's on the list of 'must-sees' in Galle, and definitely worth it. Whilst checking the bus routes in the bus station I was accosted by a young man who wanted a chat. He turned out to be a student about start his PhD in business studies (Not more of that, surely?) at Leicester University. It was a middle interesting conversation but I soon gleaned he was a bit of a bore, so I left before it became painful.
Galle Fort is excellent though. The perimeter sea walls have bastions every so often, named after Greek gods such as Triton and Neptune. Much of the architecture has been left from the Colonial era: Portuguese, Dutch and British. (How many of these ex-Colonial trading cities have I visited in recent years? Think Malacca.) I even found an okay street cafe filled with locals just around the corner from some army lot doing some square bashing on a patch of lawn. Chicken soup a vegetable roti and black tea, seeing as you asked.
An old chap struck up a brief conversation while I was waiting to be served. He said he came from Hungary, but I was sure he sounded Australian. `maybe I've been away too long already?
Today's score card:
Steps walked - gazillions
Water drank - a couple of litres at least
Cheery hellos - 15
No thank yous - 8 to 10Read more