Day 13 - Packed in Like a tin of Sardines..

Oh what a day..
Early start up at 5am to catch the 6am train into Colombo with all the commuters! Our first sri lanka train experience.. We had to jump on the train while it was still moving which was fun, luckily we got a seat and enjoyed be beautiful views on the 2.5hr journey.

When we arrived we got a tuk tuk to the visa office and filled in our application, surprisingly it was quite a pain free process and it was all done within an hour or so. Catherine then had to go and sort her India visa so we went to a hotel to use their pool. We took a tuk tuk to'Mount Lavinia' hotel and I think we were taken for a bit of a ride by the driver, it was on a meter and he clearly was driving round in circles taking advantage, first dishonest Sri Lankan we have met, seems to be a city thing! When we finally arrived at the hotel we had some lunch In a cafe first then paid to use the facilities, it was a gorgeous hotel location with amazing views of Colombo and the coastline. Spent the day lazing by the pool then had a cocktail as the sun was setting.

The biggest ordeal of the day was yet to come...the journey home in rush hour. We had to get a train then change at the first stop onto the express train to galle, sounds simple.... Not so much. The train was absolutely packed, by this I mean men were actually stood on the steps outside of the train hanging on and we had to push our way on. We managed to all squeeze on and got to the next stop, we then had a few minutes to find the platform where the next train went from, this guy offered to show us where to go which involved jumping down and walking across the tracks, this went against every rule we were taught as children.. Felt a bit wrong but appeared to be normal in Sri Lanka. We then had to run down the platform to try and get I to a 2nd class carriage this Involved jumping over a dog, benches, people it was a bit surreal and once again we were squashed like sardines into a carriage. The train was full of Sri Lankans mostly men and just us 4 white girls, I was a little uncomfortable it was all a bit to close for comfort with some people!! It was packed like this for over half a hr then some people got off which made it about more comfortable. To make the journey even weirder a man got on with a box of 6inch knifes that he was selling And loads of people bought them, I was very uncomfortable surrounded by people holding knives

All in all it was a shattering journey and the first time
We felt a little unsafe and vulnerable. I guess that's the difference in going into the capital city, the people were very different to down in galle. I have never been so happy as to get back to our room for a shower and early night!!