Pelican Crossing - Colombo 2010

Away from the traffic is a road that is less heavily used, and forms a complete loop around Beira lake, it is difficult to walk anywhere in Colombo without being accompanied by a self-appointed tour guide who appears out of nowhere the moment you step on to the street, and offers you his life story as well as pointing out things that you can already see. The waterfront to the lake is practically non-existent, looking every part like a once elegant Victorian promenade long forgotten and neglected, where vegetation has taken over in places. The surface of the water along the former promenade is made up of floating plastic bags and debris derived from packaging. Kittens play in a shady corner, whilst pelicans cruise up and down on the surface of the lake, as the sun begins to set forming a dramatic profile of the skyline as the towers along the Galle Road are silhouetted against the evening sky.  In the centre of the lake, Seema Malaka, the Lake temple designed by Geoffrey Bawa, Sri Lanka’s best known architect, and founder of the movement known as tropical modernism. Here the modern temple designed in the 1970s takes on a timeless quality in its serene setting.

I am told that following independence in 1948, much of the British contributions to the city and indeed country have not been maintained.  Here the formerly gentrified areas surrounding the lake bear the signs of long term neglect; trees grow out of the walls of the white rendered buildings resembling the hotels that make up the sea front at Brighton, long abandoned by the gentry. A walk across the busier of the roads, a once grand tree lined boulevard, to Gangaramaya Temple, built in the 1800s, completely surrounded by trees, the air filled with the heady scent of lotus flowers and burning incense, it is easy to forget that you are in the centre of Colombo,  the sound of the tuk tuks and car horns, fades into the background, a sense of calm permeates as the senses, as they are completely occupied taking in the sight of all the intricate carvings in a deep dark wood, my tour guide tells me I can take photos, but it feels disrespectful to do so inside the temple. Outside, numerous Buddha statues, all bearing an orange sash seated in meditation, each next to their own dagoba as though in a class. Overhead, hundreds of flags flutter in the evening breeze, whilst in the courtyard a baby elephant chomps on some palm fronds for her evening meal.

Back out into the deluge of tuk tuks, car horns, dust and fumes, the sun has disappeared below the horizon, leaving a fading orange glow as twilight approaches. Walking once again along the fragments of the broken promenade, a suspension bridge leading to another island in the lake is fenced off, saying that the authorities have absolutely no intention of allowing anyone to get to the island shown as Childrens' Park on Google Earth, or ride in one of the swan boats moored there. The ever present pelican follows, looking very much like a creature from an ancient age of the Earth. The route along the north part of the waterfront is blocked off, so the walking route deviates across a car park to one of the office blocks and through a small gate into the street that belongs to another world. Gone are the signs of Victoria’s Empire, the street is barely wide enough to drive a tuk tuk down, which of course is precisely is what drives down there moving slowly through a stream of local people walking barefoot along this incredibly busy street, in a densely packed quarter of the city known as Slave Island, maybe not all the signs of Victoria have gone.  Curious, friendly faces peer out of shops and houses, evening meals are being prepared giving the air a very appetizing aroma of a myriad of different varieties of curry. The walk inevitable finds once again the road and the traffic, a level crossing with gates that look like they have not changed since 1948, announces the presence of Slave Island Railway Station, an active station looking very much like the ones that did not survive Beeching in the UK. 

The route joins the Galle road and return to Victorian Splendor, the Galle Face Hotel looking every part as though it has been transplanted from Brighton, the green, the promenade evoke memories of growing up by the seaside in the UK. Here the semi-permanent beach cabins of Paignton are replaced by tricycle rickshaws, ‘Walls’ Ice cream, takes its place among a myriad of local snacks, egg hoppers, devilled cashew nuts, sodas available from temporary stands formed by the tricycles. It is a very busy place, the air alive with the sound of the excited exchanges of Sinhalese conversation. The pier, a concrete platform that extends no more than thirty metres into the Indian Ocean, but people still walk out to the end to get a closer view of the sea, begging the question was this once a longer pier that has been destroyed? Or is it one that was intended to be longer and abandoned for some reason?