Mahinda’s Little World

I’ve been back a whole six days now, and still not unpacked fully. Getting closer, mind!

Anyway, it was a fun two weeks - much more so than I expected, anyway. A quick summary of the trip goes something like this:

• Day 0 - work; leave Blighty
• Day 1 - stag/hen night; bridesmaid #1
• Day 2 - health spa thing; out clubbing (Clancy’s); bridesmaid #2
• Day 3 - with parents; not doing a lot
• Day 4 - BIG wedding
• Day 5 - electrical work on dad’s flat
• Day 6 - bride’s mother’s birthday party
• Day 7 - more work on the flat; BIG spider
• Day 8 - nothing much
• Day 9 - BIG homecoming (big post-honeymoon party thing)
• Day 10 - little sis arrives
• Day 11 - party at the Jayawardene residence; up all night
• Day 12 - staying with friends (wedding party); not a lot
• Day 13 - shopping, out clubbing again (H2O); more about bridesmaid #1
• Day 14 - more work on flat; BIG snake; party at our place
• Day 15 - long drive towards beachy resorty areas; muchos rain; drive back; little sis moans a lot
• Day 16 - last-minute shopping; legal stuff; fly home
• Day 17 - get back to Blighty; sleep a bit; meet up with Alison; play tennis with Bethan; completely fail to unpack

I think that’s about it.

Stag/Hen Night

I did my usual trick of being up for nigh on 24 hours (see recently completed write-up of Tallinn Day 1):

• Thu 9am (BST) - wake up
• Thu 9pm - on plane
• Fri 5pm (SLT) - off plane
• Fri 7pm - get to "21" (house where mum + half of wedding party are staying)
• Fri 9pm - festivities commence
• Sat 6am (1.30am BST) - eventually get some sleep

Given that I had no more than the odd half-hour snooze at Doha (transfer point in Qatar) and on the plane (I just can’t sleep on aeroplanes), it’s no surprise that I was absolutely knackered at the end of it all - pretty much 40 straight hours on the go!

The festivities were at Uncle Atley’s (sp?) flat - we "surprised" Shaluki (the bride) and had some dinner, then the blokes headed off to Chaminda’s place. There, well, we just talked about cricket and stuff while drinking. Eventually we decided enough was enough, ditched Uncle Dudley (father of the bride) and the other older folk, and scarpered back to join the hens. Admittedly, this was respectably late.

It became something of a house party, really. Eventually, the parents (well, mothers) fell asleep, leaving us "kids" chatting away in the kitchen.

Wedding

The wedding itself was a huge affair, in basically one of the most prestigious venues on the island - the Mount Lavinia Hotel, which is an old colonial affair complete with comedy porters. About 300 people there, and it was definitely one for show rather than for the happy couple. What with labour being cheap, there was a team of about eight black-clad photographers and assistants, which made it all very paparazzi. It looked pretty cool initially, but proved bloody annoying as they were just so damn intrusive - the complete opposite of the (excellent) photographer at Ian and Nancy’s wedding.

Of course, Mahela (Jayawardene - SL cricket captain, and close family friend on the bride’s side) turned up with wifey - this would be the equivalent of Michael Owen or Stephen Gerrard turning up to an English wedding, so there was much excitement.

There were an awful lot of people who were clearly only there for show, and the meal. At one point, Maria (bridesmaid #1) came over to sit with us, and one of the guys sharing our table* had met her in London. "So, are you anything official for the wedding?" he asked. Maria looked surprised, glanced down at her special ornate sari, and replied "Erm, yes - I’m a bridesmaid!" I mean, how can you miss that?!

* The seating plans had gone all to pot, so it ended up a bit mix-and-match.

As Paul, the groom, didn’t have any family or friends over (parents dead, living in London and originally from Mauritius - even his best man was the bride’s brother), some of us got roped into being part of "the groom’s party". So I got a front-row view of the ceremony, which was all a bit strange. A Buddhist ceremony, which was a curious match of subcontinental and, well, English, probably due to the colonial influence. Anyway, I may officially be Paul’s brother now

Homecoming

The traditional wedding was a pretty formal affair - while there were certainly elements of a reception, it wasn’t quite as let-your-hair-down as you might expect. Actually, that may just be because my parents were around.

Anyway, the big party is the homecoming, which is to greet the bride and groom when they return from their honeymoon. Uncle Dudley threw a HUGE party at his place (21 Rev S Mahinda Mawatha - basically "21 Mahinda Street") for many many people, featuring scaffolding, a live band, security guards, and even a police presence!

The homecoming was, well, warm. Us "kids" spent much of the evening in one of the bedrooms, mainly because it had a nice fan to keep us (relatively) cool. I had a vodka-and-lemonade poured over me by Iro (bridesmaid #2)…fortunately she didn’t have much left in her glass.

BIG Spider

In our flat one evening, I went into the bathroom…to find a big hairy beast of a spider happily munching on a cockroach. It was a fairly large cockroach, yet the spider was big enough, fierce enough and hairy enough to (a) chase it, (b) catch it, and then (c) kill it. Well, almost kill it - it was still struggling a bit.

With its legs stretched out, the spider would probably have been saucer-sized. I could see its individual eyes from over six feet away. It didn’t seem too bothered by my presence.

Now, I’m not good with spiders, and I reckoned a flipflop just wasn’t enough ammunition…so I went and fetched mum. Manly, huh?

Mum just grabbed a bit of newspaper, picked up both spider and ‘roach in her fist, and chucked them out the back door. The benefits of growing up in semi-rural Malaysia, I suppose - she’s also rather good at killing chickens, although I’ve never seen that particular trick in action.