Unawatuna Change Of Fortuna

Friday, March 06, 2015
Unawatuna, Sri Lanka
Fun fact: Back in the day, the Arab traders' word for Sri Lanka was "Serendib," meaning exotic surprises. This morphed into our word "serendipity."

Fun fact #2: The one creature responsible for the most human deaths over time, by a very large margin, is the mosquito . This fact feels quite relevant tonight because I am quite chewed.

So yesterday morning, we had breakfast on our host's terrace in Tangalla, watching the tide come in. We then packed up and walked to Tangalle's bus station, and boarded a VERY brightly decorated bus to Unawatuna on the west coast. The bus was decked out in a "Rio: The Movie" motif, covering all the seats and walls (it was reminscent of a child's birthday party...I found myself wanting cake).

The two-hour ride up the coast was almost fun. We rolled on by lots of cute beach towns, and the air smelled like the ocean. At noon we arrived in Unawatuna, our home for the next several days. Unawatuna is the most popular beach town in Sri Lanka- it's got bars (that close at 10pm on a weekend night) and tons of guesthouses and a gorgeous white horseshoe beach. We hadn't reserved any accommodation, so with backpacks on and sweat pouring (it's about 95F here with humidity. ..it's a beachy jungle), we searched out the perfect beach hideaway. We ended up at a tiny 3-room guesthouse, in a large, airy room with a fan and a little terrace overlooking the jungle. We noted that there were no other guests in the other rooms, so I haggled the owner's 4000/night asking price (about $29 USD) down to 3000 (about $22 USD) (side note: I love to haggle. It is a blood sport I engage in with gusto. However, since we've not bought anything on this trip, I have been sadly starved of this hobby until this moment).

After we settled in to our guesthouse, we explored the small village. We're about a 5-minute walk to the beach, and Sri Lanka's beach culture is so laid back that you just walk through one of the many open-air restaurants on your way to the beach, and plunk yourself down on a beach chair. There's no one charging for renting a chair or access to the beach- it's a refreshing change from the tout-heavy beaches we've visited.

We spent a few hours playing in the water, and then headed back when the afternoon downpour hit (note: next time, remember the laundry hanging on the terrace) . Later in the evening, after the clouds rolled away and the moon came out, we discovered the most fantastic restaurant. It was a little fisherman's shack on the beach, with 4 or 5 candlelit tables in the sand. There was fresh fish and curry on the menu, and with the full moon and the ocean and the incredible food it was an amazing experience. It occurred to me that candlelit dinners on the beach are experiences that normally cost hundreds of dollars, but here in Sri Lanka, it's just some fisherman using some spare space on the beach. The tables in the sand and the candlelight aren't "romantic," so much as a cheaper option than owning a restaurant. And with the entrees and salad and beer, the bill was about $16 USD. I could learn to really like it here.

Today, however, was not so swell. There comes a time in all of our vacations when everything goes to sh*t (or as my new British colleagues say, "the situation went all pants." Holy crap I love a good British turn of phrase). And today was the day! So here's what happened: We noted that our stash of cash was down to 1000 rupees (about $7 USD). This was enough for brunch, but not enough for dinner or to pay for the laundry we'd sent out yesterday. So we decided to head to the beach for a few hours in the morning, then at lunchtime, head to lunch en route to an ATM. But here's the kicker that our assh*le Lonely Planet guidebook neglected to mention: THERE ARE NO F**KING ATMS IN UNAWATUNA. So we walked and walked in the heat, and finally asked a shopowner. He helpfully pointed down the busy highway to a local bank on the outskirts of town. So we walked. At the ATM, my card was denied. So we asked a tuk-tuk driver where ANOTHER ATM might be...and his answer was in the next town over, about a 15-minute ride. So we hailed a public bus to the next ATM, only to run into some other travelers who were having the same experience as we were. And guess what, that ATM was busted too. So we hailed another bus to the next town, and tried not one, not two, but seven ATMs. All no luck, and by this time we'd wasted three precious beach holiday hours. But the reality was that we needed to find a hotel for tomorrow night and dinner tonight, and now we were faced with spending a lot of money to stay and dine at places that would accept credit cards, not just cash. (we call these types of places "white people places") Since we'd not had much to drink all day, we spotted a grocery store that accepted credit cards, and bought water and sunblock (we'd just run out this morning), and falooda ice creams to make ourselves feel better (side note: Falooda is the bomb. It's like Egypt's karkade- hibiscus tea flavored. There is nothing as refreshing on a boiling hot day).

We took the bus back to Unawatuna (note that we'd just wasted 100 precious rupees on this pointless bus ride), and resigned ourselves to being screwed. Back at our guesthouse, I explained to the nice owner that we had barely enough money to pay our laundry ransom, and while we'd like to stay another night, we were broke. To his credit, he offered to lend us money, but his offer of a phone was most useful. A 20-minute phone call to our bank informed us that they'd shut down our card for fraud. I nicely asked them to turn it back on before I came through the phone and stabbed them with a dull spoon. It was turned back on, and another walk all the way back to the ATM on the outskirts of town proved successful. That is, if you can count 4 1/2 wasted hours in the baking sun on a frustrating mission "success."

So we decided to make it up to ourselves and stay an extra night here in Unawatuna. Tomorrow we plan to do nothing but read and play on the beach.

Oh, and Matt's new camera broke. Awesome.

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