RovingMind: Of Deadly Snakes And Exotic Spices

Regarding the snake thing...for whatever reason prior to this trip, I didn't get the memo. Usually I study up on a country for months before visiting. I pore through guidebooks and travel blogs, learning what to do, what not to do, etc.

Somehow this time I missed that Sri lanka has the highest percentage of poisonous snake bites per capita in the world. The "deadly five" there account for most of them -- Indian cobras, Hump-nosed vipers, Russell's vipers...

To draw from an old saying, nothing to focus the mind like a green pit viper coiled up alongside a trail. Nothing like knowing that if it nails you, you may have hours, not days but hours to get the antidote into you.

Green pit viper. Known locally as "pala palongo."

While not even one of the deadly five, these are to be reckoned with. One publication describes it thusly: Venom can be quite potent and occasionally prove fatal. Immediate treatment and medical assistance are recommended to minimize organ damage and preserve life.

The good news is that the government encourages that school children be drilled on how to identify the different species, and how to avoid them. Hospitals and EMTs (emergency medical techs) are trained, stocked with antidotes and ready for victims. You just have to get there in time.

Be that as it may, I was fascinated with the snake shown above, and observed it for a good hour.

Schoolgirls in Galle. The white uniforms are typical of here.

Exotic spices.

Our guide with a pepper plant...S.L. is one of the top producers.

As all good historians know, Christopher Columbus did not set out to discover the New World. What he really was after is shown above -- the spices of India and its environs, which include Sri Lanka. He just happened to bump into the Americas en route.

Back then the meals of Europe were so bland that eating was a drudgery as much as anything. But not so here.

Call this a culinary warning -- this food is not for the timid eater. It comes right at ya. The fiery curries using different meats, the caramelized onions and chilies, the soups that make your eyes weep, and on and on. Powerful flavors that startle the senses, widen the eyes of jet-lagged travelers lulled by the thick humidity only a few degrees off the equator.

Unless you're one who revels in such things, you may wish to go in easy. I practically had to take a course on how to eat there without injuring myself. As much as in any country I've been, the food was an adventure unto itself.

Noodle soup with mutton (I think) and vegees.

Starting at top, clockwise -- lamb curry, chicken curry, fish curry, string poppers... mint tea.

Breakfast of Champions in S.L. -- fish "pocket" with Milo.

The fish pocket or bun, made of delicious bread and containing tangy green fish paste (30 Rupees or 25 cents U.S.) was one of my favorites. This may sound a little iffy, but I became fond of them from the first bite. They jolted me awake as well as tasted good.

(As an added benefit, at times I'd yearn for a Coca-Cola, my old nemesis, only to lose the urge by downing a fish pocket. Evidently the spices pepped me up in much the same way.)

I'd wash them down with Milo, a chocolate malt drink, served either cold as shown above or hot in a mug. The problem is that humans aren't the only ones taken with such a combo, and it resulted in one of the scarier episodes of my three weeks in S.L. In fact, even more so than the snakes, it was like something out of a cheezy horror flic...

Attack Of The Junk-Food Monkeys!

Junk-food monkeys -- with my junk food.

One afternoon I was laying in bed with a big-bladed fan whirring overhead, reading the election news on my tablet. I often did this type of thing to escape the mid-day heat.

The hair on the back of my head stood up as something hunched and hairy troddled on into the room! I had left the door open to my balcony, never dreaming that anything would bother two stories up. But a monkey, scabbed and shedding patches of hair, bee lined up to a bureau a few yards away and seized a bag containing two fish pockets and a Milo!

Another monkey, obviously a male, was hopping about with excitement in the doorway. Both retreated out onto the porch and proceeded to woof my stash! (see pic above) Even guzzled the Milo!

Soon other monkeys zeroed in -- swinging in using branches, shimmying on phone lines -- until six or eight were perched on the railing. Not only were they ugly, they were showing their teeth, making guttural noises.

I slammed and bolted the door. Long hairy arms poked in through windows, grabbed at my shirtsleeve, groped inside for anything that they could. I whacked at them with my flip-flops, slammed shutters onto them, yelled like a madman...

Eventually the manager realized my plight and tossed half a dozen "monkey busters" (cherry bombs) and drove them off. Never underestimate the power of spices upon man or beast, seems to be the lesson here.

Or the allure of Coca-Cola. As this pic shows, we humans aren't the only ones taken with the stuff...