We arrived to Colombo about noon and my excursion was in the evening. Jennifer and I wanted to find some fabric and went out to take the shuttle to town but ran into some friends and a guest speaker and decided to take a taxi together. The guest speaker was dropped off at the hotel/mall and we directed the taxi driver to the fabric store Jennifer found on google.
We didn’t find the fabric store but the taxi driver took us to a large market and said “just go down that alley and the store is right there”. We didn’t want to get out as we were worried we’d get lost and besides we did not have the necessary currency to make any purchases. We directed the taxi driver to take us back to the ship- he drove thru the market- it was fascinating. Cars and people were moving right next to each other and vendors had many, many items for sale. And we did see lots of vendors selling fabric!
They are celebrating the full moon festival today- it happens every full moon- so many of the stores were closed for the holiday. Sri Lanka has many many holidays as they celebrate the Christian holidays, the Hindu holidays, the Muslim holidays….
After we got back, we celebrated by having tea. We all wore our elephant clothing we got at the last port. I tried to find the same dress as the others but in a different color but couldn’t find one.
My evening excursion included a dance show and we got to drive by the large lotus blossom cell tower that has different colored lights. And I got to try delicious Arrack- a local drink. Arrack is an alcohol made from coconut that has been fermented. It didn’t taste like coconut but tasted similar to a margarita.
