Arrival in Maskeliya

Today was my first day volunteering as a teacher at the Tea Leaf Vision professional development centre in Maskeliya, a small town located in the central province of Sri Lanka, renowned for its tea estates. I arrived by train from Colombo on Friday, after a breathtaking ascent past paddy fields and coconut trees, school children waving in their white uniforms, tea pickers and seemingly abandoned stations where colonial-looking train carriages have been left behind. A group was singing along to the beat of a drum, two toddlers dancing, creating a pleasant and relaxed atmosphere for my long journey. Whenever the train stopped, men climbed in and walked through the carriage offering roasted peanuts, citrus fruit and hot tea. At lunchtime, everybody took out their rice, dhal and vegetable curries wrapped in newspaper and shared it between themselves, eating with their hands as is custom.

Two other British volunteers are living with me in the school manager’s flat on the edge of town, which is quite reassuring at times, and otherwise very friendly. Beth and James live in Bristol and have been here for two months already. They cook curry almost every night, go on long walks at the weekend, practise yoga, have plans to travel to New Zealand after Sri Lanka and have become quite popular at school as well as in Maskeliya. Whenever we go into town to do some shopping, James especially gets summoned into shops where he has made friends and answers over and over again questions about his age, where he is from, if he is married, how he is feeling and so on. Everywhere we go people are intrigued and curious, wave at us, sometimes follow us, or ask us to take selfies with them. The town itself is always buzzing with activity and incredibly diverse considering its size. Walking down the main street you pass by a Buddhist temple, a Christian church and a mosque. There is a brand new yoga centre, which I am quite keen to go to, and shops selling exotic fruit, spices, homemade samosas and bhajis in every nook and cranny. We have been on two walks along the tea plantations with incredible views of Mousakelle lake and Adam’s peak, a striking 2243 metres high mountain and one of Sri Lanka’s most celebrated places of pilgrimage.

The sun sets at 6 pm. and rises around 5:30 am. so my sleeping schedule has shifted and rendered it quite natural to wake up early for school. We pottered around this morning before heading down the muddy track where we joined some teachers and students who greeted us with great enthusiasm. There was a short meeting in the staff room and then, as usual on Mondays, all the teachers went outside and held assembly, which was focused on the importance of attendance, motivation for the exams coming up in November and on introducing me.

I attended two Business classes, one about writing business letters and resigning a job, another about formal dress and what to wear for a job interview. The teacher of the latter lesson had me participate and explain what would be considered professional in Europe. I also joined in in a Success and Ethics class in which the students discussed ignorance, cliques and prejudice as obstacles to understand and respect the Other. The teacher cleverly used me as an example of this, which encouraged the students that had been too shy to address me to come and speak to me. In Emotional Health class, the discussion around negative self-talk, depression, and its symptoms, although it appeared to put some students ill at ease, was one I wish we had had at some point in my schooling.

The highlight for me, though, was participating in a game of “duck duck goose” with James and a group of students this afternoon, which broke the ice and was a welcome break from standing or sitting still all day.

Tim is coming up to Maskeliya tomorrow, it'll be nice to have a familiar face amongst so many new ones!

Sascha xx