9:15 am - Coffee (Pineapple juice) with Pradeep**
10:00 am - See off Aunty Kumu & Uncle Lucky
12:00 pm - Pre-lunch Drinks at Aunty Rohini's
1:00 pm - Lunch at Gallery Café hosted by Aunty Rohini
3:00 pm - Coffee (Lime soda?) with Vidhi*** & Aunty Rajes
4:00 pm - Tea (perhaps actual tea, maybe another juice) with Buddhika****
7:00 pm - Dinner hosted by Aunty Mano
Post dinner drinks?
I need to cancel my plans to go to the Colombo Zoo after lunch. There just isn't any time! Somewhere in there I have to get in the hotel pool with my new scuba mask and snorkel so I'm ready for diving tomorrow and start reading my PADI book for the exam I'll be taking on Thursday.
*A note about the terms "aunty" and "uncle". South Asians call all their elders "aunty" or "uncle". None of these aunties are blood relations, though a few of them are practically family. Most of them went to Ladies' College with my mom. They all grew up together here in Colombo.
**Pradeep is Aunty Padma's son. He's a really sweet guy and always takes good care of me when I'm here. Four years ago when I was here last, he was engaged. Now, he's married, their daughter will be two on Thursday, and their son is due in about six weeks!
***Vidhi is Aunty Rajes's (real) nephew. I just met him last week at Aunty Padma's dinner. We were the only two people under 40 and they made us talk to each other. Not that we wouldn't have ended up talking to each other, but Aunty Rajes didn't leave anything to chance. She asked me to come over, sat me down next to him and told me to "tell him about all the interesting things I'm doing because he's doing interesting things, too". Fortunately, he is actually doing interesting things and we've had a good time hanging out. He also has a lot of interesting friends and family that I've met over the past week. It has been nice to have someone to make my own plans with.
****Buddhika is a documentary filmmaker that I met at Heathrow checking in for our flight to Colombo. He was carrying a big camera case which naturally caught my eye. He bought me a Costa coffee at the airport terminal, his favorite coffee in the world, and we had a good chat. He's here for a month shooting a documentary on the aftermath of the war. My cousin is also doing a documentary in Sri Lanka, so it was great to talk to him about his experience. He went to Jaffna when I was in Trincomalee. I would've liked to go with him. There has been a lot of talk about Sri Lankan politics and the current and future state of this country since I've been here starting with that Costa coffee chat. I'm not too into politics in general, mainly because I don't keep up on it, but it's been interesting to hear all the different perspectives.
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