October 4, 2024 • 9 mins
"Sri Lanka has loomed large on my bucket-list for quite some time. Nicknamed the Pearl of the Indian Ocean, I’ve just ventured to the teardrop-shaped island nation for the first time and it smashed my expectations. Over the course of a week, I savoured Sri Lanka’s colourful cities, vibrant cuisine, ravishing landscapes, astonishing World Heritage treasures and glorious wildlife, which were all seamlessly stitched together by On the Go Tours and their Colombo, Caves and Kandy group tour."
Read Mike's full article here.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:07):
You're listening to the Saturday Morning with Jack team podcast
from News Talks at be Ah.
Speaker 2 (00:13):
Good news. It isn't just map World. Great news are
the Map and Chart shop in Hamilton as well. There's
a dedicated map shops. So New Zealand has at least
two dedicated map shops. I know Marke Yardley, our travel correspondent,
will have been to map World a few times over
the years.
Speaker 3 (00:27):
Good morning, definitely, Jack, Yes, good morning. You can beat
a good map.
Speaker 2 (00:32):
You just cannot beat a good map. I just I
love it. You know what I was thinking before? Maybe
I don't know, maybe should libraries have more maps? Should they?
Speaker 3 (00:42):
You know? A little to throw debate. That is the
debate you need to have, leading Q and eight mine.
Speaker 2 (00:50):
That is the debate that people need. Hey, we've been
talking about various remote islands this morning in the Indian Ocean,
both the kurgel And Islands and the and Diego Garcia,
but we are focusing on something that is a little
more populated, Colombo and gaul in Sri Lanka and Sri
Lanka's I mean as head as troubles of late, did
you find it to be a welcoming place?
Speaker 3 (01:12):
One hundred percent. Yeah, from go to Wa. All all
I calls I encountered were just so welcoming, warm outgoing,
quite curious. When I mentioned I was from New Zealand,
the reflectsive response check, even though the black Caps were
in town, was all blacks. Really, I know, and I
didn't know it would be. I know it. They're not
exactly a juggernaut of a rugby nation, are they not yet?
(01:34):
But yeah, that's true. Yeah it was all blacks. And
then the other thing they mentioned was anchor milk. I
love the anchor milk.
Speaker 2 (01:42):
Yeah, I mean you do, you do get there sometimes.
My one was always the anchor butter. You know, like
you go through you're traveling through the Caribbean and someone
will say, oh, New Zealand, I love anchor butter.
Speaker 3 (01:51):
Yeah. But I was actually really pleased to see that
tourism is bouncing back in Sri Lanka because, as you
will know, the previous government they were as corrupt as hell.
They bankrupted the nation. I've now got a new government
and they're on this sort of anti corruption drive at
the moment. But yeah, very very welcoming place for a tourist.
Speaker 2 (02:13):
So how did Colombo strike strike you? What were your impressions.
Speaker 3 (02:17):
Remarkably cleaner than India's big city. And I'm a bit
of an obsessive when it comes to street litter jack
and I was just so pleased, so surprisingly pleased to
see the Sri Lankan capital so clean, very green heart
hundreds of enormous banion and feaks trees which are just stunning,
(02:39):
And I just love that max of new world glam
and old world tradition. You know it just jockles for
your attention. In Colombo, soundtracks by Talk Talk, centered by
spicy food. What more could you want? Really? Yeah, they're
shining new confection. By the way, in Colombo is this
incredible structure called the Lotus Tower, and it's like a
(02:59):
torch and it's crowned with this big, bulbous flower shaped top.
It's high than the Sky Tower and at night or
over the city, you can see the light show from
the Lotus Tower. So they love that. And also so
many colonial buildings they've retained a huge stat of them
and they're all like stone sirens to the respective areas
(03:21):
eras of Portuguese, Dutch and British rule.
Speaker 2 (03:25):
Is the population mainly Buddhist?
Speaker 3 (03:27):
Yeah apparently, but quite sizeable populations of Catholics, Hindu and Muslims.
And I mean starting with the Buddhist architecture. There was
this magnificent temple in Colombo called gangarung A Maya, and
my goodness, it's like Buddhist to Baroq. It is just
bling bling and you just go there and you watch
(03:50):
these lovely devotees take their colorful lotuses, put them in
front of the body. Then they light the oil lamps
and their jostex. It's all very zen. I actually went
to Saint Joseph's Church, the Catholic church as well. You
may recall that was the scene of that horrendous East
of Sunday terrorist bombing about five years ago. Just the
(04:10):
most amazing church. And then just down the road in
the Peta shopping district, Jamie or Alpha Mosque. My godness,
I thought I'd send some amazing masks. This thing is
a show stopper. Vivid candy striped minarets, the most ornate
Arabesque interiors. It is just a jaw dropper. Definitely add that.
Speaker 2 (04:33):
To the chick nice is there good street food?
Speaker 3 (04:36):
Really good? Yet Down on the Colombo beachfront green around twilight,
they fire up the food carts, and I fell in
love with a classic dish called Kotu ruti or kotu
roti sorry, which is your chopped roty with curried chickens,
scrambled eggs, chili and onions, so delicious. I acquainted myself
(05:01):
Jack with iso waddy Iso waddy, which are dal fritters
topped with spicy prawns. And the locals just live on
those things and chowered down on string hoppers. These are
those rice flowed steam noodles and they serve them with
gravy and pole sambol, which is a combination of freshly
(05:22):
grated coconut, Llott's chili and lime juice. And I mean
they have the hoppers all around the day. It's likely
every day breakfast. But that that that sandbolt, the freshly
grated coconut. Man, that's good.
Speaker 2 (05:36):
Yeah yeah, okay, I'm one over. That's so, am I right?
And I'm putting you on the spot here, am I right?
Because they've changed the status of the capital, right is
the capitals now Sri jayawardena quart or something I think
is that?
Speaker 3 (05:50):
Yeah? Yeah, yeah, yes, it's like an administrative capital.
Speaker 2 (05:55):
Yeah right, it's kind of adjacent to Colombo. Now right, yeah, correct,
so down the coast to Gaul. Did you catch it?
Speaker 3 (06:02):
I did. I was lucky in town to be in town, well,
I thought of it's like you're given the dollar.
Speaker 2 (06:08):
I was looking for you on TV. I didn't see it,
but you must have fought. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (06:12):
So funny you mentioned that, because yes, I was one
of those sad tex who went who went Dutch. Oh,
I was standing on the ramparts of the fort, you know,
free and fabulous. But it is such an amazing spectacle.
And of course that's the ground that Shane Warn helps
resurrect after the Boxing Days tsunami. And these actually little
(06:37):
notices you can still see how high the water rose
and ball thirty meters in height around the Croocket grounds are.
Speaker 2 (06:45):
Staggering three zero yes, what yes, seriously thirty meters.
Speaker 3 (06:51):
Isn't that amable?
Speaker 2 (06:52):
It seems Yeah, that's astonishing, okay, wow.
Speaker 3 (06:55):
Yeah yeah so but yeah, it's such a gorgeous crookeet Graund. Yeah.
Thirty thousand Trilancons died and that tsunami.
Speaker 2 (07:02):
That's so sad. Yeah, I mean, and and like you
said that the ground that has been resurrected in the
years following is I mean one of the one of
the most picturesque cricket grounds in the world. Is the
fortified Old town as good in the flesh as it
looks on Telly.
Speaker 3 (07:17):
Great question because I thought, oh, you know what TV's like,
But it is such a jewel jacket. Really is amazing.
And it takes a good two hours to circumnavigate the
walls of the fort town. And that town is just
jammed packed with white washed buildings and terracotta reef tops.
Endlessly exotic. Is the sort of sensation you get as
(07:38):
you wander around. What blew me away about those fort
walls is how they were built the Dutch when they
took over from the Portuguese. They mined the reef just
offshore for the rock. So are you walking down the
remparts you can see the shells still in the rock
from the reef and for the view of us. There's
(08:00):
this place on the ramparts called flag Rock, and the
biggest buy from the street venders. There is something I'd
never come across before. A slice of fresh papya with
a sprinkling of chili powder.
Speaker 2 (08:13):
Oh okay, because they do the mango with chili. You know,
that's the mango how to papya and chili go.
Speaker 3 (08:21):
Yeah well yeah, I mean I always think mango is sweeter,
but the fresh papyre with the chili was really good. Yeah,
it was like the perfect balance. Yeah yeah, no, very
very good.
Speaker 2 (08:31):
Ya'd but be happy to give that a crack. What
about the beaches?
Speaker 3 (08:34):
Yeah, well I can now well believe why some people
had to go, not for the crickets but for the beaches,
because they are just so stupendously insta perfection of ely
brilliant jungle beach, really good. The one I would recommend though,
is Unawatuna Beach because it's banana shaped, you know, it's
just that perfect present and it's all soft blonde sands
(08:57):
and crystal clear waters that always pulls the crowd. It
will just chum your pants off.
Speaker 2 (09:01):
Yeah nice, it sounds wonderful. Thank you, Mike. So we'll
put all of Mike's tips for visiting in Colombo and
Gaul and Sri Lanka up on the news talks Heb website.
We put everything up there, everything from our show. So
if you've got any questions about the TV shows that
we're recommending, our film picks for the week music, All
that good stuff all goes on the website News TALKSHEDB
dot co dot NZ, Forward slash Jack Jack. Good morning.
(09:24):
I've been to Diego, Garcia twice, says David on my
way to and from Somalia in nineteen ninety three while peacekeeping.
I mean, there's another fascinating part of the world, David,
Great Island, absolutely loved it, bloody hot. No one told
us what they actually did there. There are huge satellite dishes.
Love your show. Thank you, David ninety two ninety two.
If you want to send us a message
Speaker 1 (09:45):
For more from Saturday Morning with Jack Tame, listen live
to News Talks dB from nine am Saturday, or follow
the podcast on iHeartRadio
You're listening to the Saturday Morning with Jack team podcast
from News Talks at be Ah.
Speaker 2 (00:13):
Good news. It isn't just map World. Great news are
the Map and Chart shop in Hamilton as well. There's
a dedicated map shops. So New Zealand has at least
two dedicated map shops. I know Marke Yardley, our travel correspondent,
will have been to map World a few times over
the years.
Speaker 3 (00:27):
Good morning, definitely, Jack, Yes, good morning. You can beat
a good map.
Speaker 2 (00:32):
You just cannot beat a good map. I just I
love it. You know what I was thinking before? Maybe
I don't know, maybe should libraries have more maps? Should they?
Speaker 3 (00:42):
You know? A little to throw debate. That is the
debate you need to have, leading Q and eight mine.
Speaker 2 (00:50):
That is the debate that people need. Hey, we've been
talking about various remote islands this morning in the Indian Ocean,
both the kurgel And Islands and the and Diego Garcia,
but we are focusing on something that is a little
more populated, Colombo and gaul in Sri Lanka and Sri
Lanka's I mean as head as troubles of late, did
you find it to be a welcoming place?
Speaker 3 (01:12):
One hundred percent. Yeah, from go to Wa. All all
I calls I encountered were just so welcoming, warm outgoing,
quite curious. When I mentioned I was from New Zealand,
the reflectsive response check, even though the black Caps were
in town, was all blacks. Really, I know, and I
didn't know it would be. I know it. They're not
exactly a juggernaut of a rugby nation, are they not yet?
(01:34):
But yeah, that's true. Yeah it was all blacks. And
then the other thing they mentioned was anchor milk. I
love the anchor milk.
Speaker 2 (01:42):
Yeah, I mean you do, you do get there sometimes.
My one was always the anchor butter. You know, like
you go through you're traveling through the Caribbean and someone
will say, oh, New Zealand, I love anchor butter.
Speaker 3 (01:51):
Yeah. But I was actually really pleased to see that
tourism is bouncing back in Sri Lanka because, as you
will know, the previous government they were as corrupt as hell.
They bankrupted the nation. I've now got a new government
and they're on this sort of anti corruption drive at
the moment. But yeah, very very welcoming place for a tourist.
Speaker 2 (02:13):
So how did Colombo strike strike you? What were your impressions.
Speaker 3 (02:17):
Remarkably cleaner than India's big city. And I'm a bit
of an obsessive when it comes to street litter jack
and I was just so pleased, so surprisingly pleased to
see the Sri Lankan capital so clean, very green heart
hundreds of enormous banion and feaks trees which are just stunning,
(02:39):
And I just love that max of new world glam
and old world tradition. You know it just jockles for
your attention. In Colombo, soundtracks by Talk Talk, centered by
spicy food. What more could you want? Really? Yeah, they're
shining new confection. By the way, in Colombo is this
incredible structure called the Lotus Tower, and it's like a
(02:59):
torch and it's crowned with this big, bulbous flower shaped top.
It's high than the Sky Tower and at night or
over the city, you can see the light show from
the Lotus Tower. So they love that. And also so
many colonial buildings they've retained a huge stat of them
and they're all like stone sirens to the respective areas
(03:21):
eras of Portuguese, Dutch and British rule.
Speaker 2 (03:25):
Is the population mainly Buddhist?
Speaker 3 (03:27):
Yeah apparently, but quite sizeable populations of Catholics, Hindu and Muslims.
And I mean starting with the Buddhist architecture. There was
this magnificent temple in Colombo called gangarung A Maya, and
my goodness, it's like Buddhist to Baroq. It is just
bling bling and you just go there and you watch
(03:50):
these lovely devotees take their colorful lotuses, put them in
front of the body. Then they light the oil lamps
and their jostex. It's all very zen. I actually went
to Saint Joseph's Church, the Catholic church as well. You
may recall that was the scene of that horrendous East
of Sunday terrorist bombing about five years ago. Just the
(04:10):
most amazing church. And then just down the road in
the Peta shopping district, Jamie or Alpha Mosque. My godness,
I thought I'd send some amazing masks. This thing is
a show stopper. Vivid candy striped minarets, the most ornate
Arabesque interiors. It is just a jaw dropper. Definitely add that.
Speaker 2 (04:33):
To the chick nice is there good street food?
Speaker 3 (04:36):
Really good? Yet Down on the Colombo beachfront green around twilight,
they fire up the food carts, and I fell in
love with a classic dish called Kotu ruti or kotu
roti sorry, which is your chopped roty with curried chickens,
scrambled eggs, chili and onions, so delicious. I acquainted myself
(05:01):
Jack with iso waddy Iso waddy, which are dal fritters
topped with spicy prawns. And the locals just live on
those things and chowered down on string hoppers. These are
those rice flowed steam noodles and they serve them with
gravy and pole sambol, which is a combination of freshly
(05:22):
grated coconut, Llott's chili and lime juice. And I mean
they have the hoppers all around the day. It's likely
every day breakfast. But that that that sandbolt, the freshly
grated coconut. Man, that's good.
Speaker 2 (05:36):
Yeah yeah, okay, I'm one over. That's so, am I right?
And I'm putting you on the spot here, am I right?
Because they've changed the status of the capital, right is
the capitals now Sri jayawardena quart or something I think
is that?
Speaker 3 (05:50):
Yeah? Yeah, yeah, yes, it's like an administrative capital.
Speaker 2 (05:55):
Yeah right, it's kind of adjacent to Colombo. Now right, yeah, correct,
so down the coast to Gaul. Did you catch it?
Speaker 3 (06:02):
I did. I was lucky in town to be in town, well,
I thought of it's like you're given the dollar.
Speaker 2 (06:08):
I was looking for you on TV. I didn't see it,
but you must have fought. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (06:12):
So funny you mentioned that, because yes, I was one
of those sad tex who went who went Dutch. Oh,
I was standing on the ramparts of the fort, you know,
free and fabulous. But it is such an amazing spectacle.
And of course that's the ground that Shane Warn helps
resurrect after the Boxing Days tsunami. And these actually little
(06:37):
notices you can still see how high the water rose
and ball thirty meters in height around the Croocket grounds are.
Speaker 2 (06:45):
Staggering three zero yes, what yes, seriously thirty meters.
Speaker 3 (06:51):
Isn't that amable?
Speaker 2 (06:52):
It seems Yeah, that's astonishing, okay, wow.
Speaker 3 (06:55):
Yeah yeah so but yeah, it's such a gorgeous crookeet Graund. Yeah.
Thirty thousand Trilancons died and that tsunami.
Speaker 2 (07:02):
That's so sad. Yeah, I mean, and and like you
said that the ground that has been resurrected in the
years following is I mean one of the one of
the most picturesque cricket grounds in the world. Is the
fortified Old town as good in the flesh as it
looks on Telly.
Speaker 3 (07:17):
Great question because I thought, oh, you know what TV's like,
But it is such a jewel jacket. Really is amazing.
And it takes a good two hours to circumnavigate the
walls of the fort town. And that town is just
jammed packed with white washed buildings and terracotta reef tops.
Endlessly exotic. Is the sort of sensation you get as
(07:38):
you wander around. What blew me away about those fort
walls is how they were built the Dutch when they
took over from the Portuguese. They mined the reef just
offshore for the rock. So are you walking down the
remparts you can see the shells still in the rock
from the reef and for the view of us. There's
(08:00):
this place on the ramparts called flag Rock, and the
biggest buy from the street venders. There is something I'd
never come across before. A slice of fresh papya with
a sprinkling of chili powder.
Speaker 2 (08:13):
Oh okay, because they do the mango with chili. You know,
that's the mango how to papya and chili go.
Speaker 3 (08:21):
Yeah well yeah, I mean I always think mango is sweeter,
but the fresh papyre with the chili was really good. Yeah,
it was like the perfect balance. Yeah yeah, no, very
very good.
Speaker 2 (08:31):
Ya'd but be happy to give that a crack. What
about the beaches?
Speaker 3 (08:34):
Yeah, well I can now well believe why some people
had to go, not for the crickets but for the beaches,
because they are just so stupendously insta perfection of ely
brilliant jungle beach, really good. The one I would recommend though,
is Unawatuna Beach because it's banana shaped, you know, it's
just that perfect present and it's all soft blonde sands
(08:57):
and crystal clear waters that always pulls the crowd. It
will just chum your pants off.
Speaker 2 (09:01):
Yeah nice, it sounds wonderful. Thank you, Mike. So we'll
put all of Mike's tips for visiting in Colombo and
Gaul and Sri Lanka up on the news talks Heb website.
We put everything up there, everything from our show. So
if you've got any questions about the TV shows that
we're recommending, our film picks for the week music, All
that good stuff all goes on the website News TALKSHEDB
dot co dot NZ, Forward slash Jack Jack. Good morning.
(09:24):
I've been to Diego, Garcia twice, says David on my
way to and from Somalia in nineteen ninety three while peacekeeping.
I mean, there's another fascinating part of the world, David,
Great Island, absolutely loved it, bloody hot. No one told
us what they actually did there. There are huge satellite dishes.
Love your show. Thank you, David ninety two ninety two.
If you want to send us a message
Speaker 1 (09:45):
For more from Saturday Morning with Jack Tame, listen live
to News Talks dB from nine am Saturday, or follow
the podcast on iHeartRadio
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