Canada Eh!

Well, I’m back in Canada for another stint at client site. Said good bye to good old SL last Thursday, the 29^th, and will not be seeing her for some months.

Thanks to the time difference, you get to land in North America on the same day as you left Sri Lanka. So, I left early morning of the 29^th SL time and landed in Toronto in the evening of the 29^th. The flight was long and tiring. Spent 20 hours in total, including a 3 hour transit at Abu Dhabi.  This time around flew on Etihad Airlines, and the service was quite good.

I’m a bit upset about the timing of the trip because I missed Hon. Pusswedilla’s third campaign. I was so looking forward to this for a long time. Oh well, maybe he’ll have a 4^th campaign.

The weather is quite cold, hovering between 10-16 C, and it’s still the beginning of fall. Even the trees are still green. I have a feeling I’m in for a very cold winter. The last winter that I was here was pretty hard, but both the previous one and the preceding one were mild. Jack Frost isn’t a fan of mine. To add to the cold, it’s raining too.

My internal clock is whacked out. No matter what time I go to bed and night, I wake up around 2 in the morning. Last night I actually went to bed around 2am, but woke up around 4. Sometimes I fall back into sleep around 6am again and wake up around 9. Unfortunately the result is a heavy drowsiness around 3 in the afternoon. You are knocked out for another 3-4 hours. Hopefully this sorts itself out soon. I have to get back to work tomorrow.

Went to downtown last night, and the place was crowded. There was a city wide, all night art show in town, so the streets were jam packed. It’s called Nuit Blanche, where various contemporary art projects are installed in public building and spaces throughout the downtown area, and it’s a night event. It went from sunset to sunrise the next day.  

Well, here’s to Jack Frost not freezing me!

Cheers!

Going Home to the Paradise Isle

After six, cold, yet exciting fun-filled months, my stint in Canada is coming to an end, and I’m going back to our little Paradise isle we call home. My sentiments in one word: Woohoo 

Man, can’t believe that 6 months have already gone by. It seems like yesterday that I landed in Canada, all wide eyed in wonder of all the exiting sites. It was a very busy time at work, so didn’t really notice the months go by. It truly has been a wonderful couple of months, albeit the freezing weather, but then again, that is what Winter is. I can at least say that I braved winter storms and played in the snow. Unfortunately the timing is such that I won’t be here to experience the hot and wild summer days. That’s when all the action happens. Winter on the other hand is pretty boring and depressing. Oh well, maybe next time eh? Met a lot of wonderful people, learnt new things, saw new things and places and managed to have some fun on the way as well. A great experience overall. Also managed to meet up with an uncle of mine, who I haven’t met in a long time, so that was good as well.

Canada is a great place, with a lot of diversity in people and culture, since it has been welcoming immigrants with open arms for a long time. A jumble of different ethnicities living together without any problems. There is a vast difference between SL and Canada, when it comes to the level of development, but I still believe that if our lot put their minds to it, we can also achieve great heights.

I’ve been counting the days for the past couple of weeks. 16th is D-Day, and after several hours stuck in a metal tube with wings, I will be touching some good ole SL soil on the 18th. Not looking forward to being stuck in a plane for 18 hours though. Got a transit in Dubai for about 8 hours, but luckily they gave a hotel room for a bit of rest.

Sources inform me that it’s like living inside an oven in SL these days. Just my luck, from freezing in an ice box, to roasting like a rotisserie chicken. Hopefully the heat can help me lose some weight gained during this time. Not a big fan of exercising, but will have to do something once back home.

The first thing I want to do is to take my bike out and let it rip. It is one thing I really missed. The wind blowing in your face, speeding along the open roads while the rest of the world zooms right past you. That is a wonderful feeling. The feeling of freedom and nothing can beat it.

Also my taste buds are yearning for some good old yummy home cooking. I’m getting a bit tired of this daily cooking business. You get tired of take-out after awhile, and the thought of cooking a meal after a busy day at the office is not also a thrilling thought. Makes you appreciate your mother dearest more and more. I don’t want anything fancy, some rice with some creamy polos curry, a Mukunuwenna mellum and a hot hot fish curry, my all time favorites. Ok, enough. I’m torturing myself with all this talk about food. Just a few more days boy, be strong. Just a few more days and I’ll be hanging out with the gang, polishing off a bottle of OR with hot plate of devilled prawns or Cuttle fish at Mount beach, watching the sun go down on the warm waters of the Indian Ocean. Aahhh, good times are ahead, yeah baby…

Truly there is no place like home, and my greatest wish is that we can move beyond out petty squabbles and develop SL what she should really be, hopefully during my lifetime. I have zero faith in politicians, only in the common man.

Adios Canada, it was truly a wonderful experience. Hopefully I will be able to visit your shores once again.

Cheers to all you peeps, I will be back once I get settled home.




The golden beaches. It’s a pic I took sometime back near Seenigama.