We boarded Sri Lankan Airlines @5 pm (local Q8's time) and reached Bandaranaike International Airport around 5 am (Sri Lanka's time). Sri Lanka was 3 hours behind Msian time. We immediately bought Dialog prepaid card from the airport booth and called our tour guide. Since our hotel check in time was around 2pm, we had lots of time to waste before heading to Galle hence we en-route to Colombo, around 1/2 hour from airport for sight seeing.

:: @ Our apartment lobby ::

:: Our ride for 5 days. We were fetched using the gold color Nissan but since it was manual, our guide got it changed to automatic white Nissan belonged to his brother, also a tour guide under the same travel company. This is because we're going to uphill country in the later part of our trip, hence auto car would me more convenient for the driver ::

Firstly, we requested for our guide to stop somewhere so we could have a breakfast. I was imagining our 1st breakfast to be in some famous local paratha shop located in some corner of Colombo City. Unexpectedly, the guide stopped his car at Coffee Bean. Aiiyyaaa there goes my roti canai dream kah kah kah. Takpe lah, esok masih ade kot. Anyway, being in Sri Lanka, it would be only natural to order their infamous Ceylon Tea.

:: Mine! Kekecewaan tak dapat makan paratha terubat sudah. I felt better already ::

:: The girls with their chocolate shake. Alis over betul! Siap bershawl bagai eh.. Feeling2 kat London ker makcik? ::

Anyway, as per my previous post, I did mentioned about doing some research on my own and came out with my own personalized place-to-go-stuffs-to-do-and-things-to-buy list. Sure enough my list was everything but short and a short glance at it made my husband shake his head of disapproval. Will it stop me? Never heh heh heh.

:: Sneak peak on FIRST PAGE of my list. Alis had to made little sacrifice by giving me few pages of her Hello Kitty notebook. As u can see, the smaller the paper is, the better so I could just slip it on my jeans pocket or something ::

Once we're done with our breakfast, we made our way into Colombo City. Before coming, my husband had a chat with his Sri Lankan office mate and also one of cab driver whom we were quite close with about Colombo. You know, it will always better to get an insider tips so we would know what to expect. Both of them came up with same story which is Colombo is dirty. Don't go Colombo. You know what, I can't help but believing lah kan since the things came from a local people who was born and bred there. Based on the info fed to us, we decided not to stay in Colombo but just transit for few hours before proceeding to Galle, about 4 hours from Colombo.

Did I regret it? Yes you bet. It was nothing like what I had in mind. Infact, it was very very very clean. It was cleaner than KL or Fahaheel in comparison. They even have environment police on duty. I wish I could take their picture but the car was moving pretty fast so all I got was this blurry picture.

The fact that Colombo just recently had war of course worried me to my core. However, they're so many soldiers in every corner of the city, so many check points we had to by pass, probably every 50 meters makes me felt safe and secured.

Colombo to me, was not as modern as KL, or Kuwait City but there's something about the originality that amazed me. Another thing that caught my attention was the people. I've been reading soooo many reviews about Sri Lanka online and almost all reviews said about this very same thing. Sri Lanka people's hospitality! They always smile, very polite, waves to us and always very helpful. I certainly felt welcoming. Every time our driver stops by the roadside to ask about something, by-passers always more than willing to help and they looked very sincere too. You'll definitely can sense if somebody helping you out for something in return but in here, they just wonderfully sincere.

There's one incident happened in the middle of our trip where our driver made a stop at one workshop in the middle of nowhere to service the car as we're going to travel quite a distant after that. It's so happened that at that moment, me and Erin had this urge to go to toilet but apparently there's no public toilet anywhere near. He doesn't allowed us to use the workshop toilet, worried that the toilet might be dirty. Anyway, our desperate needs was overheard by the workshop owner so he offered us to use his home toilet, around 100 metres from the workshop. I wasn't really comfortable with the idea of having to borrow stranger's toilet but I was desperate I'll do it in a bush if I have too.

He asked his mother( I guess la, she's old lady by the way) who happened to sell coconut juice by the opposite side of the road to take us home. She was having a customer at that time so I signaled her that I can wait. To my surprise, she asked her customer to wait and she running towards me barefoot and lead us the way. Once we reached, she showed us the toilet and guarded the door for us. She even waited for us to finish and sent us back to the workshop safely before returning to her coconut stall, although I repeatedly said that we can find our way back on our own. Truth be told, their home was very minimally equipped with an old 3 seater rattan sofa, a table and that's about it. They don't even own TV, but their toilet was very clean.

I am touched and most importantly, I felt ashamed. My home was far more luxurious than hers but I don't think I'll ever let strangers out of nowhere come inside and take a pee in my toilet. Her home was indeed small but it goes without saying that her heart was bigger than Titanic.

Now, let me share few photos of Colombo City and let 'em all tell you the story..

:: Sri Lanka main religion is Buddhism, hence there's so many Buddhist temples like this around the city and around the nation ::

:: Of course, there's a mosque too since Islam was considered among the major religion in Sri Lanka besides Buddha. They even have Sri Lanka Malay that speaks bahasa melayu. Of course their bahasa are a bit vary from ours but I can say it's about 65 % similarity ::

:: Old train or was it called locomotive? ::

:: Local girl with traditional attire ::

:: Government building... errr I think ::

:: Colombo Fort ::

I don't have much picture in ODEL since I was busy in and out the fitting room. ODEL was one of the top factory outlet in Colombo and they're widely known for high quality cotton clothing line. However, they also have houseware, tea, stationaries, toys, cafe and souvenirs section too, all under one roof.

That's pretty much about my first half day at Colombo. After done at ODEL, we proceed our journey headed South. To the coastal side of Colombo.

Before closing, I'll share with you one photo, a teaser of our sanctuary for the next 2 days Insya Allah.

Ehhhh ehhh kata satu, ni pesal tiga lak?

I am in good mood plus bersedekah itu amalan mulia :)