Week Without Walls: Day 1 - The arrival

The amazing view of the beach in batticaloa
(Source: http://oscwww.blogspot.com)

On the 27th of January, we left Colombo from the main train station at Fort (Colombo 1) to Batticaloa. To be honest, I was both excited and a little scared because that was the first time that I have ever traveled in an overnight train in Sri lanka. However after a few minutes upon leaving the station, my worries were completely gone and I was able to have fun with my friends despite the train having a few technical difficulties half way through (the engine broke down and we had to wait for a new one). After 11 hours on the train and another 4 hours on the bus ride to Arugam bay, we finally reached the hotel where we would be staying at; 'Stardust beach hotel and restaurant'. This was truly an amazing and very peaceful hotel, and I think everyone  including me was pleased with the service there as well.

A 'Cabana', a small hut-like room accommodated
with 4 beds (I stayed in this type of room)
(source: http://oscwww.blogspot.com)

Since it had been a long journey, we were given the chance to just chill out and play some sports for about an hour before we headed out to the Komari school and to ride our bikes. We played some softball, Frisbee and Rugby. It was a good way to warm up for our 25 km bike ride. I also took the time to prep for the journey, including packing a full water bottle and getting my gloves ready.

Students and there teacher who greeted us when we
visited their classroom
(source: http://oscwww.blogspot.com)

After lunch, we went by bus to the Komari School; where we would be teaching the ninth graders Science, Sports and how to repair bikes the following day and the day after. This was our chance to engage with an issue of global importance, since most of the kids in this school are very under privileged, and just being able to interact with them and exposing them to our lifestyle, enables them to broaden their perspective of this world. I was in the Science group and so while we were there, we setup all the equipment we were going to need for the days to come as well as plan who is going to do what during the teaching hours, We already planned what we were going to teach them when we were still in our school so this part of the process did not take too long (Sid and I were going to teach the kids Chemistry). This was definitely an opportunity for me to start taking part in an active service role for an audience that I'm not familiar with, the kids could not speak much English or Sinhala so it really was hard trying to explain to them the concepts of what we were doing. After all the prep work, some of the seniors in the school gave us a tour around their school campus. They did not have many teaching material in their class rooms or in the IT and science labs and yet, despite the lack of equipment, the students were happy and keen on learning with whatever they do have. This made me feel both sad and proud for these kids.

We said good bye to the kids until the next day and we headed back to hotel. While there, we played some more sports and chilled out for another couple of hours, then, Peter-our bikes guide- came to the hotel with all our bikes and helmets. We were all very excited to finally go on the bikes; we got our things ready, warmed up a little and we headed on out of the hotel to Kumana national park.

Stopping for a quick rest
(source: http://oscwww.blogspot.com)

It was a challenging journey, no doubt; we went through some very rough terrain at times, then over lose sandy trails which really threw us of with our momentum and also over some large puddles here and there. I am fairly good at riding a bike so I did not have any casualties, however a few people in the group wasn't so lucky, fortunately they only got a few minor cuts and bruises when they fell but nothing too severe. Despite the injuries, we all rode on as a single unit helping each other where ever we could. I decided to go ahead of some of the weaker riders and give them a heads up in case there is a difficult obstacle coming up or so. We went through some beautiful areas with amazing scenery, it was a really good ride and we had lots of fun. I felt that was able to successfully apply the skills that I already knew, as well as learn some more on my own as well.