Thirappane

Anuradhapura, 8pm

The tuk-tuk drive was enjoyable. Slow but steady we made our way through the plains of Sri Lanka. A combination of junlge and rice fields was the main landscape around. And once again an elephant was sharing the road with colorful buses and tuk-tuks. Div and I had some interesting conversations about politics and about India, the place he's originally from. Despite living in London he is very fond of the place he was born: Bengalore.

I checked-in in a little hotel called Andorra, in the outskirts of this sparse settlement called Anuradhapura. I put on my trousers so my knees were covered to visit the temples and I met Div in the ticket office of the site. I considered getting a guide to explore the place but I was scared of ending up paying a lot to a person who wouldn't really know about it. So I changed my mind and thought it would be better to wander around with the help of Wikipedia. We even decided not to pay the $25 ticket fee and skip the five temples that it included, and to just visit the ones for free. Best idea, as the ones we were more interested in were close-by. This included the big white 'dagoba' and the holly Sri Maha Bodi. Sri Maha Bodi is the tree planted 2300 years ago out of the 'bo tree' were the Buddha got enlightened.Read more