amazing animals

I’ve been moving stones. Being outside in Sri Lanka and moving around a bit, I don’t think you can avoid coming across a few animals. That and the mind tends to wander to previous encounters.
I’ll tell what I mean but, please don’t read, if you still get bored, or see in another way. It would be just like entertainment if we were compelled to read everything.
Under a rock I came across the poisonous slug. It’s not really a slug but, I remember my wife telling me that it’s more dangerous than a snake. This one was about, 1 ½ inches long, flatter than a slug and a bit slimy. Previously I had seen this kind of animal and did an experiment to find if it was some kind of jumping slug. Prodding, with a long enough stick. It seemed to be too fond of the rock to attack me.
One of Eva Padma (from s.o.f.a)’s dogs had an amazing jumping ability and has she has so many dogs, was one of the few with a name. She called it after a German high jumper and thought everyone would ‘get it’ straight away. I can’t remember what the name is though.
Other animals close by; I have built a squirrel table about half way up a tree and every morning and evening put a cup full of rice for the most common squirrel. He normally wakes up now before me and so now my wife wakes me at an unearthly hour to ‘feed your squirrel’, which I do with a very long stick. Just now a bird that looks just like a wren came to the other side of the wire and then in the evening I normally throw any left over ‘food’ wrapped in a bundle for the pig mali (wild boar).
Anyway, not being afraid and as the poisonous slug didn’t give me any nasty looks, I flicked him over the same fence and carried on working.
There’s a girl we know at the Peradenia vet school that they call ‘butterfly’. Her and ‘Pulley’ graduated last year but have to do an internship. They are friends of ours and whenever they can, visit. Pulley is now working with the project to sterilize stay dogs left after the Tsunami. He’s in his twenties, will probably never be that wealthy (living in Sri Lanka) but doing ok. His background is from what we would think of as ‘extremely poor’. The School he attended had very few books and by getting a place at University, not only did he make a great achievement, through his hard work but, is an example to everyone. We give them a meal when they visit because life really is hard. They would both be extremely embarrassed if we tried to help them. They are both characters worth bearing in mind
One of the things that prompted this thought is.- When I wrote about the tourist asking about my bread before; I didn’t mention that I had to sit down after that. There was a young boy also sitting, it was by the lake in Kandy. I was there for some time. Then he said, ‘ten rupees?’ I scolded him.
Here they ‘advise’ all the while, always have, and strangely it has a paradoxical effect. While in the west, advice is considered pompous, and so it should! But, people condescend into their own society. So I won’t. But, oh visitors, do be aware.
If you treat people well, any change may be for the better. If not, make a note.
Other strange animals. There are many strange and wonderful animals. It’s a bit like the trains where ‘life comes to you’. The national parks are amazing but really its everyone’s back garden.
The strangest animal I heard about, but didn’t see, was something which came into the garden of our previous place. This is how it was described; about 4 feet in length and 1 foot broad, and was something between a snake and a worm. More like a huge maggot than anything else. From the only one of us that had seen one before he said that normally they are found deep in dense jungle.
There are lots of fallacies about animal life. We grow up thinking praying mantises are dangerous whereas they are actually very placid and gentle. The biggest spiders are scarred of geckoes. I think a little bit of nervous respect helps the excitement, when seeing these things. We sometimes get very bright green mantis in the house, they have been sitting on the computer as I write before now. One day I was relaxing in a chair and a large mantis walked up my leg and had a good look at me when he reached my knee.
Of house animals there are; ‘Merry-oh’s’, that all come at a particular time of the year and fill every room in the evening. (Tamils eat them). The noise like a space ship landing is caused by a solitary grass hopper around 4-5 inches in length. Fruit bats will happily fly around, until they again find an open door. Indian Palm cats are in most ‘wooden’ roofs in Sri Lanka. There are about 10 different types of ‘mice’ from small long nosed, to huge cat sized. Squirrels also make there homes in rafters, as do many birds, lizards and geckoes. We have had several small owls enter the house and then a 3ft monitor was at home on the slab, for a while.(poor Michael). I have found that nearly everything is harmless, apart from ‘ticks’ (for dogs).
I just had to stop then. In-between this and moving the stones;. The squirrel is calling for food again and 6 men arrived in a three wheeler.
By the way. ‘Barsooooniers’; There’s a worker in Kandy who specializes in carrying heavy loads on his back and of course you must know that ‘metal’ is made one piece at a time, with a hammer to specific sizes.
The environment seems well suited to amazing animals, along with other amazing things, which seem to work better with age.
So I became a little concerned when 100 rail carriages are donated by China. Perhaps it was less than unfortunate that it took 11 months to get them to fit the tracks and couple to the engines. Now they are up and running, although it’s very difficult to enter them from the Sri Lankan platforms. There are obviously one or two unfortunate advancements, like that horrible water jet in the middle of Kandy Lake but, I can’t imagine it being maintained with the same loving care as the trains.
I’ve heard that a German man has built a hotel completely out of mud; we are going to give it a look. And then there are enough fine characters running guest houses to see that ‘tourists’ don’t get out of hand. I won’t mention any names but a good friend ran a place near the lake, until a couple of years ago. Two of his memorable instigations were. Getting a young male guest to call on a neighbour because, ‘they have four very beautiful daughters’ and, Getting foot massages from his guests.
The people also have developed and generally work fine at any age.
I’ve finished moving stones for today. Didn’t find anymore amazing animals though yesterday there was a giant centipede. The black ones they call ‘fountain pens’. I’ve never picked one up before but now realize how harmless they are so will be ready for ‘sunandfunseeker’. Just took a couple of the inside dogs around the top of the hill and as usual (although they are fee to go anytime) all 5 of the outside dogs came along, all bringing there own character. Timmy running ahead, Lizzy being clever and Mindy wildly running in and out of the grass at full speed , have to hurry back before the boars reach the top. Incidentally, I’ve found an unlimited supply of Citronella plants. It’s a kind of tall grass. Now, I have a rough idea of extracting the oil but, does anyone know the fine details? Citronella oil being a mosquito repellant. (the first time I tried didn’t get oil, just citronella water)
From the tourist side, I am beginning to appreciate some of the fine people that come over here but, I can’t really mention them because at some time or another it’s mostly you lot. And thinking of the Lady that has visited the same guest house in Kandy for the past 26 years. Perhaps, unlike me, she has the sense to keep quiet about it all.
Sorry for warbling, it’s a kind of passive anarchy in response to the volume of t.v.
I can’t remember the last ‘saying’ on the Lanka pharmacy wall but, to end, I like- ‘the best people were born yesterday’.
Best wishes
Chris