Thursday 22nd April

Leaving Sri Lanka: It’s always emotional when leaving home for a long period, but I was able to handle it without making it too dramatic. Many friends came to send-off, and even helped me in carrying my 40kilos + 10kilos.

Friday 23rd April

To Singapore: The flight to Singapore was so empty that I could sleep on 3 seats after eating the inflight dinner (the parata and chicken on Singapore Airlines is good… ).

12 Hours in Singapore: Landed in Singapore at around 7 in the morning and Praitheesh came to receive me at the airport. After messing up with the terminal, went to his place in train for breakfast. Then came to city again at around 11 and spent some time roaming around and searching for the Merlion.

The whatever coffee at BurgerKing was a mistake, but we later had fairly good lunch with another friend Bala. Spent some more time around the city and got back to his place at around 5 on bus via Little India. We took the airport bus at around 6 as I had to be at airport at 7.30. Had a light dinner at McDonald’s at airport as I had to keep some room for the flight dinner.

To Sydney: The flight to Sydney was on a Airbus A380, and I was on the main deck (which is the lower deck of the double-decker). The flight was full and the dinner was OK. It was a 7 hours long flight, but I couldn’t sleep much except for the 2 hours before breakfast. The in-flight breakfast was fairly good.

Saturday 24th April

Landed in Sydney: The flight reached Sydney at around 6 in the morning and I was received by my uncle and cousin at the airport. We went straight to his place and I feel asleep till afternoon. Went out for some shopping in the evening.

Sunday 25th April

Anzac Day: It was a long weekend and the shops were closed in the morning. So went out in the evening, to Homebush. It is known as an Asian suburb and famous for its spice shops and many Sri Lankan shops. The funny thing is they even sell the Sri Lankan soft drinks such as Cream Soda, Portello and Orange Barley here. I also bought a pre-paid SIM (Lebara Mobile Australia gives cheaper international call rates, almost same as the calling cards), so now I have a Australian mobile number.

Monday 26th April

Day out in Sydney: Went to UNSW and met Sanchayan, Went to Coogee Beach and spent nearly 3 hours and enjoyed photographing around, Went city and Opera House, Met Hesavan near Darling Harbour, Return by train.

Tuesday 27th April

Lazy Day: Got up late, Went to another suburb with many Tamil shops, Online check-in and additional baggage on Qantas, Went to airport early, Board at 8.45pm take off at 9pm from Terminal 3.

Queensland: Land in Brisbane Airport at 10.30pm, Pick up by Pathmanathan Uncle at around 10.45pm and reach his house in Samford by 11.30pm.

Wednesday 28th April

QUT: Slept a little longer, Went to QUT by 10.30am, The ID card machine was not working, Meet ISS counselor, Went to QUT Higher Research Degree office and filled up the enrollment forms, Went to Information Security Institute (ISI) and meet main supervisor and some other staff, Return by train to Ferny Grove and to Samford.

Thursday 29th April

Travel from Samford: Went to QUT on train via Strathpine to Central, Meet accommodation officer, Meeting with supervisors at ISI, Bought a Go Card ( It’s a travel card which can be used to travel seamlessly on bus, train and ferry services in Brisbane.), Got my QUT Student ID Card, Found a contact accommodation from the Accommodation Services web sire and arranged for seeing the room on Friday, Return by train to Strathpine and to Samford.

Friday 30th April

Accommodation in Brisbane: Went to Brisbane on train via Strathpine to Central, Saw two rooms in Petrie Terrace and St James Street and gave advance for the later, Got money from HSBC ATM from my Sri Lankan account (good thing is the ATM fee is much less and this seems better than bank transfers considering the fees), Meet some UoM seniors who are doing their PhD in Structures, Walk around the city in the afternoon, Return by train to Strathpine and to Samford.

The One Week Diary – From Samford, Queensland is a post from: Nimal's Weblog

A short message from Bhagi on Facebook was the start. He suggested a photography trip during the last weekend of November. First plan was a one day trip to Bundala and Yala, and as my new DSLR was sleeping in my closet for sometime, I instantly said “I’m in”. But due to some reason, it didn’t work out as planned. I called up Bhagi on Friday and we decided to go to some place along the Southern Coastline of Sri Lanka, but we didn’t finalize on a place that day and as usual I went to sleep around 3am on Saturday.

My got up on Saturday with the wake-up call from Bhagi around 10.30, and he asked, “Shall we go to Unawatuna or Hikkaduwa, we can take some good sunset shots there?”; “When?”; “Today, around 11.30…”. I was not sure about this instant trip plan, but thought at-least I could spend a Saturday without sleeping all day. When it was 12.30 we were on a C0lombo – Kataragama (yeah, its no more Katirkamam) bus, from Wellawatte to Unawatuna. According to Chamin, whom I talked in the mean time, it would be a 3 hour journey on road.

Unfortunately we had to stand for 3 hours with our backpacks, and when we reached Unawatuna little later than 3 in the evening. We had no plans whatsoever, and didn’t know where we could find lunch. So I called Chamin and he asked us to meet him near Wella Devalaya. It was a 10 minutes walk towards the beach and we waited there till 4, and clicked few shots of the beach in the meantime.

One important fact I noticed is that Unawatuna is a pretty expensive place for locals, specially with food. We couldn’t find a good place around for lunch, so we went to a small restaurant in Magalle with Chamin. And when we came back to the beach around 5, we almost missed the sunset…

We spent another 2 hours there, until its too dark, and took some photos around the beach. Bhaghi managed to take few good shots of the sunset, and I experiments with manual modes. We had to comeback that night as there was a assignment for Bhagi.

Though it was an unplanned trip, and we didn’t do much there, it was a good chance to learn few things. One, even unplanned trips, plan to some extent. Two, I know too less about my camera. Three, learn and practice night photography. May be I should plan for another trip down south soon…!

Bhagi’s Photos from Unawatuna // My Photos from Unawatuna

An afternoon trip to Unawatuna is a post from: Nimal's Weblog

Saie is a great friend I have met, thought I knew him before that was brief he helped me a lot in this tour to India. I just wanted him to find me a place to stay, but he invited me to stay with him, and also other guys with him, Arun and Prai were cool. The last think Saie said to me before the taxi leaving there is ‘If there is some one else coming, just tell them to contact me’. Really nice friend..!

I was flying back to Colombo after on Air India Express(IX671) from Chennai Airport(MAA) to Katunayake Airport(CMB). The flight was at 7am and I thought I should be there three hours early. The taxi left from Saie’s house at around 3.15am and after a quick drive arrived at the airport at 3.15am. It was due to my miscalculation of the distance I went there another 45mins early. Also they started check-in only after 4.45am and I had to wait at the lobby for 1 1/2 hours, and I thought of sleeping there, but I didn’t because I had doubts of this place regarding thieves and cheaters. Anyway nothing happened wrong and the check in call came at 4.45am and i checked in as the first person.

Things don’t happen that faster always, and I had to wait till 5.45am for security checks and another 1 hour till boarding at 6.45am. While waiting for boarding I had a coffee and a sandwich. Thought the boarding call came at around 6.45am, things were again happening slow and late and the passengers were coming in till 7.15am and finally the plane took-off at 7.25am, 25minutes late.

I got my seat changed to allow a family sit together. The snacks were same as in the flight to Chennai, and we landed at Colombo Airport at 8.45am. I finished all the immigration formalities soon and came to the belt earlier to get my bags. Then only I realized of the bad side of checking in first. My bags came only in the last lot. So had to wait a bit more time there and came to the customs where I was not checked along with may others at that time.

Appa had come to the airport to pick me up and reached home in van at around 11.30am. So my story of my Indian tour ends with this. May be this is the only series I have written so long on my blog. May be only few are reading these, but it is just for me, as a dairy, just to look back someday. I would love to visit India again on a more planned tour someday in future and I might write that as well on this blog. So thanks for all you reading this all long blog entries….

Memories… Forever…

India… Day16… Fly back… is a post from: Nimal's Weblog

Today I participated in the second Leo Club project, during my visit to India, second to the project done in Bangalore. I’m glad that I got the opportunity to join hands with our twin club, Leo Club of Sri Lakshmi Ammal Engineering College and I hope this is a rare to occur in our Leo Clubs to do join projects with foreign Leo Clubs.

So I decided to go to with Vimal, and I confirmed it with Hemalatha, VP of the host club, and we were to picked up by their principal near a hospital in Thambaram. So we got up early (at around 7.30am is early ) and went to the Thiruvanmiyur Bus Stand. From there we took a bus to Thambaram. The bus route was through Old Mahavalipuram Road(OMR), where a lot of IT companies and IT parks are there and coming up.

We reached Thambaram at around 9.00am and we were picked up by there principal with in 10 minutes. In the mean time we got the chance to see some Indian Air Force planes practising over the skies. We reach the children’s home after a 30 minutes drive in the principals car. Leos of SLA. Engg. College arrived in a few minutes and we got our selves introduced. There were around 12 Leos from there Leo Club, headed by their vice president Hemalatha, and their Leo advisor Mr. Puhazhraj was present.

After that for about an hour or so we had a get-together like thing with children, where Leos and the children did various entertainment items. Leo Hemalatha performed a dance, while another Leo did a superb(?) mimicry performance. I also got a chance to sing, and they wanted me to sing a Sri Lankan song, and I sang a few lines from our ‘Rothu mela poran oru kedi…’. Also many children did dances and singing. Following this their Leo Advisor, who is a lecture at their college, taught the children some subject matters, even other Leos joined him in clearing some of the doubts the children had in their subjects.

Then the children were given gifts which were brought by the Leos. After that we exchanged mementos between Leos of Leo Club of SLA. Engg. College and myself. Also I took a couple of photos with all the Leos present. We left the place at around 1.30pm.

We came back to Thambaram with the Principal and we were asked to join him for lunch, but as I had to go for shopping in the evening we thanked him and got down near Thambaram train station. Vimal and I decided to try going on train, as I had to go to Bank of Ceylon, which is near Egmore and Central. But we didn’t know which station we had to get down. So we got a ticket to Chennai Beach, which I think is the last stop on that line.

When we came down to the platform, train had just started to move, and we managed to get in. It was not like the Sri Lankan trains, bit more wider in space aswellas it operated in electricity (I think). We passed so many stations, but both of are not sure about where to get down. I knew if we get down at Egmore we could go but we missed to get down at Egmore, and we got down at the next Poonga Station, which indeed is near to central on that line.

As it was already around 2.30pm, we had our lunch in front of Central Station Hotel Buhari. Vimal is a vegetarian, but I had some chicken for me. As we were so hungry we had enough for the time. Then we came out and walked for a bit and got a auto-rickshaw, to Bank of Ceylon, where I had to meet Linda Acca. I wanted to buy some dresses for my sisters, so I thought she could help me out in selecting. When we went there she was just finishing her work and with in five minutes she was ready to go.

We got another auto-rickshaw from there to Purasaivaakkam, which is an area in Chennai famous for the garment shops in the area. First we went to Madar Sha and bought shalvar for Rosy and Mythily and sareee for Lukshy Acca. Vimal and Linda acca helped me in selecting some of these and then we went to Ranjanas and bought another Shalvar there. Finally we went to a jewells shop and bought some of the stuff my sister waned me to buy. But it didn’t stop there, and for a suprise I got some sweets for me from Adayar Anandabavan, from Linda Acca.

Then we got a 23C from there and came back to Besent Nagar, and came Saie’s place. There I met Prem going home, so it happened to be the last meeting. I had to go to Mr.Rajendra’s house and Vimal had to catch his bus back to Bangalore. So Vimal got ready with his bag and we came out and took a 5E and got down at Vadapalani, and walked some towards Koyampet and got a share-auto to Koyampet.

Vimal went to the bus stand, and I got an auto-rickshaw to Anna Nagar, and got down near Chinthamani junction, as the auto driver didn’t know the exact address which I had. So got another auto from there and went to Mr. Rajendra’s house. He gave me some parcels to be given in Sri Lanka. I came back to Anna Nagar junction with Mr. Rajendra, and got a 47D to Thiruvanmiyur and then came to the room in an auto from the bus stand.

As it was already late and I had to get things ready, I couldn’t have dinner. So I packed my bags and get a bath, and Saie called a taxi, and asked him to come at 3.30am. So all my activities in Chennai came to an end as I went to sleep…

India… Day15… Leo in Chennai… Shopping… is a post from: Nimal's Weblog

Vimal and myself arrived at the Koyemped bus stand at 7am. We searched for the bus going to Besent Nagar or Thiruvanmiyur, but couldn’t find it till 7.30. As we felt bit tired went to a hotel near by and had a coffee. Then we came back got the bus to Triplicane from there. From Triplicane we got a 23C and went to Besent Nagar. Vimal got some money from the Citi Bank ATM, and we went Saie’s room.

Saie is the only guy at the room who knew Vimal, so introduced him to others. In the mean time Leo Prakash of Leo Club of Nightingale called and informed that the project planned for today was cancelled due to unavoidable reasons. Then I contacted Leo Kannan of Leo Club of Valluvarkottam, and he too was busy with some office work and couldn’t meet him either.

Arun and Prai said they are going to Trichy for some family matters of Arun. So that was the last meeting before leaving India, as they will be back only on Monday. After they went, I slept till 3pm. I went for lunch with Saie and Vimal to Murugan Idly Kadai and had masala dosai and sarkarai pongal. We coming back to room and browsed for awhile and slept. Leo Hema called regarding the tomorrow’s project. We discussed about it and their principal also talked about that.

At around 9pm went to dinner at Tharavad Restaurant, which is a kerala food place. Saie, Vimal, Prem, Anbu and some other guys were there. After dinner we went to the Fruit Shop in Besent Nagar. It is a special place for fruit juices and milkshakes. I had a pineapple juice. After coming back to the room, Anbu and Prem went to some friends house, and that was the last time I saw Anbu as he goes home tomorrow.

India… Day14… Back to Chennai is a post from: Nimal's Weblog

• Reached Thanjavur at around 7.30 with Vimal and we a room to keep our bags and my laptop and we got bath there
• Had breakfast at a road side ‘patti kadai’, and it was one of the best in my life I would say, very nice Thanjavur ittaly
• Went to Periya Kovil at around 8.15am (About and Photos)
• Stayed there till 10am, had some sweet ‘pirasatham’
• Came back to room and transferred photos taken at kovil to laptop, go gain some space to take more photos
• Went to Saraboji Palace (Photos and About), and stayed there till 1pm
• Went to Tamil University, and Vimal bought a book
• Had lunch and came back to room transfer files
• Went to Darasuram in bus, which was a journey of 1 hour
• Went to Darasuram Temple (About and Photos) and stayed there till 4.30pm
• Got a bus from Darasuram to Kumbakonam,and from there got another bus to Gangai Konda Cholapuram, which took anther 1 hour
• Reached Gangai Konda Cholapuram temple at around 6.30 (About and Photos)
• It was already very dark, and unfourtunately camera batteries were weak, there was no place to find new batteries, so took only a few photos, and stayed there till 7.30pm
• Came back to Thajavur by bus through Kumbakonam, and it these buses they play DVD movies
• Reached the room by 9.30pm, and we had to catch the night bus to Chennai, so packed our bags hurrily and went to have dinner
• After dinner came to bus stand and got the 10.15pm bus to Chennai, and it was a Tamil Nadu UD bus

I have just posted by diary log, just copy and paste… Thought this is the one big day for me in India this time, and I have a lot of nice memories about Thanjavur, I’m feeling lazy to write those in detail. So if I happen to find some time, I’ll try to complete this.

India… Day13… Thanjavur… is a post from: Nimal's Weblog

Ofcourse, today I got many new directions to my life, I got to know where to go and where not to…

<!–The Day… Another Day… Mc.Donalds at M.G.Road…–>

I came to Kicha’s room after lunch with Vimal, but we had already made the decision that I’m leaving Bangalore today. Vimal told we can go to Thanjavur on the way to Chennai, I also needed to see some places in this tour which didn’t happen yet. Kicha was not happy with my sudden decision, but I had to go. I asked Kicha to call Hithesh and Shibthosh to tell them I’m leaving and they came to Kicha’s room. It was a few days I knew them, but Shibthosh is a great guy. He is in his final year and will go from here this year and he is going to get married soon. They wished me good luck and I wished them the same. They left after a while.

At around 4.30pm I went to Vimal’s room from Kicha’s room. Franklin, the Tamil guy from Selam, was there with Vimal. Again he is another good friend of Vimal. Vimal was ready and we came to Hebbal bus halt and got a bus to Majestic bus stand from there. At Majestic bus stand we booked tickets for bus to Thanjavur. It was a Tamil Nadu SETC Ultra Deluxe bus. The bus was at 8pm, but it was late and came around 9.30pm.

Saying Good bye to Bangalore… I had expected & unexpected happening…
I hope I’ll be back here someday sooner or later…

India… Day12… Goodbye Bangalore… is a post from: Nimal's Weblog

Ok, ok… As I slept too late, I got up too late. Kicha had to go to college, and he gave some more pictures to draw and went to college. He came back with Vimal at around 11.30am. We went to lunch at Andra Mess, but it was full. Kicha went to another place, while I stayed with Vimal there for some time and had our lunch there. After lunch Vimal went to college and I went to Kicha’s room and slept.

At around 4.30pm I got up, and Kicha was there. We tought of going somewhere out and i thought of going to Sivaram’s place and meeting the guys there. So we called them and and came out of the house. When we came down it started to rain, so we got an auto-rickshaw and went to Bhoopasandra. Sivaram was not at his room and another two Tamil guys were there. He came after some time and took us around Brindavan College and showed all the places. It is a small building but seems beautiful.

Then we came back to Sivaram’s house and browsed Internet for a while. Shukri came after some time and I went with him to a travel agent there to book a Bangalore city tour, but Vimal called me and told about ‘some other program’ and we came back without booking. I met Azeem and Suman, two guys who studied at Royal, and who are now studying there. I went to Azeems room and he bought me milk and talked with him for awhile.

After that we went to Shukri’s room. He is living in a small room at a top floor and he had a small kitchen, TV, fish tank and all in it. We stayed there for sometime and came down for dinner at a nearby hotel. After dinner came triples on Shukri’s bike to Hebbal Flyover. From there walked to Kicha’s room.

I had some important matters to discuss with Vimal, so went to Kicha’s room and too my laptop and come back to Vimal’s room. Vimal lives in a similar place like Shukri, in a top floor of a house. But for him the place is bit bigger and it is separated into three as hall/study area, bedroom and kitchen. Again today we talked ‘a lot’ and we slept ‘very late’.

India… Day11… Bhoopasandra… is a post from: Nimal's Weblog

So you are back to my blog to ‘waste’ you time by reading what I wrote to ‘waste’ my time. I’m saying this because I did nothing useful today, other than sleeping and eating.

Though I had plans of going on the Bangalore city tour today with Kicha, I got up late after sleeping ‘late’ yesterday. When I got up at Vimal’s room, it was 9.30am and Vimal had to go to college to pay exam fees. So I came with him to Kishan’s room and Kicha told that he too has to go to college to submit some practical records. So we canceled the Bangalore tour plan and diced to go on that on another day ‘if possible’.

Kicha went to college around 10.30am and I took a bath and slept till Vimal and Kicha came back. Though they had a lecture at 11am, it was canceled and they came back. We were at the room for about an hour and then went to lunch at Andra Mess, near Acharya Institute. I had ‘chapati‘, while Vimal and Kicha had rice. Again we came back to Kicha’s room, while Vimal went to college to pay the fees and came back after a while as there was much crowd. By evening Vimal went back to college and Kicha and I thought of going to R.T.Nagar.

Though Kicha took me through some shot-cut roads, it took about 25minutes walking to reach R.T.Nagar. I got ‘some calls’ on the way and the roads were like in Sri Lanka. At R.T.Nagar Kishan took me to a cake shop and we ate ‘cakes’. (Because you get ‘cakes’ at ‘cake shops’.) After that we went to a net cafe there and created a ‘hi5 profile‘ for Kicha.

When we came out of cafe it was already 7pm, and we thought of going for dinner from there. We went Kavitha Mess but it was closed due to Malayalam New Year, so we went to Andra Mess and had the same ‘chapati’ for dinner.

After coming home to we watch the Sri Lanka vs. Aurtralia cricket match. Vimal came at around 9pm and we were talking till 11pm. After Vimal went back, I drew some pictures for Kicha’s practical record book and slept.

So today is a day of nothing and I hope this don’t happen tomorrow…

India… Day10… Sleeping… is a post from: Nimal's Weblog

Today we thought of cooking lunch at room and Kishan had already talked to Shibthosh, who cooks very well. Also Atchuthan had told last night that he’ll come to Kishan’s room today to meet me. Around 8.00am Atchu called and told that he is in Hebbal bus halt and wanted Kishan to come there to pick him. But as Kicha had to go to buy stuff for lunch, I went to Hebbal to bring Atchu.

Talking about Atchu, he is the only Sri Lankan guy whom I met in India, who has not lost weight, but gained. It took around 20mins to walk from Hebbal to Kishan’s room. At Kicha’s room we were talking and Vimal also came there after a while. Kicha bought some biscuits and ‘Thums Up‘, which is a bit stronger cola drink. We talked a lot, from life in Bangalore, food, entertainment, Sri Lankan politics and much more about our friends and batchmates.

Shibthosh and Hithesh came to Kicha’s room at around 10.30am and started cooking lunch. They planed to cook rice and chicken curry and also a dahl curry for Vimal, who is a vegetation. I helped in cutting onions and cleaning. Shibthosh is a great cook, I’ll say he does that with style and difference. Also he did everything very fast and finished cooking at around 12noon. We all had lunch with the two guys at Kicha’s room. The food was superb, and everyone ate more that what what they will eat normally. Atchu at the top as usually .

After lunch Shibthosh went back to his room. We spent the rest of the evening talking at Kicha’s room. We also watched some movies, but didn’t watch anything fully. We thought of going out but all of were lazy and decided to stay back at room. Atchu called Sivaram and told him to come to the room with Shukri to meet me, and he said he shall come around 5.30pm. So in the mean time I had a bath and washed cloths. Kicha went out for some place and came back around 6.00pm.

Sivaram and Shukri were not there till 6.00pm, so we thought of going to M.G.Road, and called Sivaram to confirm, but he said they will be coming for sure, and they came in Shukri’s bike at around 7.00pm. We had a good time talking about everything and anything. Shukri is still the same silent person, but only it comes about Kicha he starts talking a lot. Sivaram is called the politician of Bangalore representing Sri Lankan Tamils. The left the place around 7.45pm and I told them I’ll be visiting them before I leave from Bangalore.

After Shukri and Sivaram went, I thought of going to Vimal’s room and staying the night there. Atchu told that he also need to be at college tomorrow morning so he can’t stay here. Kicha said he had to go to dinner, so we all went to out together. I took mu laptop so, we first went to Vimal’s room and kept the laptop there and came back to a vegetarian hotel there for dinner. I had ‘onion dosa‘ and Vimal had ‘set dosa’. We also had some snack after dinner, but I didn’t remember that name. After having dinner we came back to Vimal’s room and I typed these on my laptop, while he did some college work. After that we had a long chat about our ‘life’ and slept very(!) late.

Though today is only eating and talking, it is good meeting friend after a long time…

India… Day9… Old Friends… is a post from: Nimal's Weblog