October news from Sri Lanka....

Hello again from Sri Lanka! As I will be leaving here in another 5 weeks (scarey thought...) thought it was about time to update you on what's been happening here. The past few weeks have passed by in a blur as it's been so busy but the main themes for this month are dogs and religion!! I know that many of you follow my blog on the dogstar website (www.dogstarfoundation.com) but for those of you that don't (and I know many of my friends are animal lovers) there are a few photos in this blog about dogs and cats.

I know that some of you commented on the photos I sent last time of the sunsets here in Sri Lanka so thought you may also like to see one of the photos I took on my trip to Anuradhapura which I don't think I uploaded (and if I did, then you'll have to see it twice!). It's one I'm particularly fond of.

As many of you may know, religion plays a very big part in Sri Lankan culture and society with the majority here being Buddhist. For me, that means not only being exposed to Buddhism on a routine day to day basis via my dog work with Temple monks, but also on special occasions with people close to me. October 11 saw the anniversary of the death of Carminie's husband (Carminie is the lovely lady I live with) and to mark this event annually a 'pirit' is held where monks come to the house and chant throughout the night. For the past 2 years I've been invited to attend, which I've been pleased to do. Below is the little structure which is put up to house the monks during their nightly vigil.

Having been here for so long over the past couple of years I feel very much part of the local community. Recently, along with other locals, I was approached to sponsor a musical event that our tuktuk drivers arranged for October 14. Carminie's son (another sponsor) was asked to open the event and all sponsors were asked to light candles to bless the event - there's a back view of me doing my bit!


Here's the group on stage. It was a great event - everyone here knows I have a penchant for dancing so with the other couple of volunteers who went along we were expected to get up and bop along to the music. Sadly, the heavens opened and the girls and I managed to dance our way through another half hour of so when soaked to the skin we made our way through the torrents of water cascading down the hill (shoe-less!) to our home here.

Still on a religious (and dog!) theme, I was asked to go along to a Temple close by a couple of weeks ago to see their dogs and liaise with the monk about the possibility of a small clinic there. Hopefully, we'll manage to sort something for January when I'm back in Sri Lanka after my December trip to the UK. I was taken by one of the locals to see the hilltop shrine with lovely paintings, one of which is shown below. It was a bit of a trek up a lot of steep steps but the paintings and the view certainly made it worthwhile.

Here's the Buddha figure in the same little shrine.

And here's the wonderful view from the top over the surrounding paddy fields and to the mountains beyond....

Those of you who have read my recent dog blogs will know about Oscar - my latest love! I found him exhausted in the road a couple of weeks ago and was able to keep him in my room for a couple of days before a local Temple kindly agreed to give him a home. As you can see below, Oscar was a pathetic little scrap and I wasn't sure he would survive.....

Below is the lovely Temple which is now Oscar's home and where I go to see him every couple of days. My colleague Sam from Dogstar is here at present and we've made sure he's had his rabies vaccination and other necessary skin/worm treatments. The monk at the Temple (in very unmonkly fashion......) has taken a bit of a shine to me so I'm currently getting text messages at 5.15a.m. telling me it's time to get up and work (am now putting the 'phone on silent by the way!).

Unfortunately for Oscar, one of the female dogs at his new home took a dislike to him (or rather his sharp puppy teeth....) and gave him a nasty bite which needed stitching. Poor little Oscar hasn't really had a great time of it so far... Here he is looking a little miserable after being stitched up but Sam and I visited every day afterwards to give him painkillers and dress his wound. It's cost us about 5 pounds so far to make him better....

And here's Oscar yesterday looking much fitter, much happier and more like a puppy should! I always seem to have a 'project' every time I come here and this time it's Oscar. The lovely monks at his new home are certainly making sure that he gets enough to eat (we provide regular donations of Pedigree dry food for them) and have numbers for the local vet and our Dogstar tuktuk driver should any medical help be needed if Sam and I are away from Randeniya.

Still on the dog theme, we saw another local female dog on Sunday. We thought initially she'd just had pups but the owners said no - but on Monday we went back and she'd just delivered a little of 5! As always, we've managed to find a home for the male but have to get people to take the females. Sod's Law that of the 5, only 1 was male.... Slowly, tho' people are starting to consider female pups because they know Dogstar will arrange vaccination and sterilisation at the appropriate time.

Sam and I visited another local lady on Tuesday this week to check on her dogs post surgery - and to have to lovely rice and curry lunch she prepared for us. She also wanted us to meet her mother in another village to see her pets, who were extremely well cared for. These included a lovely female cat who has a litter of kittens about a month old - mum and one of these is shown below.

And here's our friend Violet with her 2 dogs. Despite telling her to the contrary, she's convinced Sam and I are vets and we're both known as 'lady doctor!'.

Violet's house is in a little rural village through the paddy fields. Here are some of the local men working planting the rice (looks back-breaking work to me, especially in the heat).

And this is the patch from where the individual plants are taken.

Sadly for Sam and I the monk from our local temple (Randeniya) passed away earlier this week. Wangeesa Thero had been instrumental in the setting up of Dogstar when he asked Sam for help in 2006 so we've always had a special bond with him. This of course was a very important event locally and many people here had never been to the funeral of a monk before. Below are all the signs up at our local temple where Wangeesa Thero's funeral was held.

To save any disruption from our temple dogs (who yip excitedly when Sam and I visit), we went via the Dogstar tuktuk and parked outside so we could follow what was happening.

Here's another generel shot of the Temple on the day of the funeral, last Wedneday.

It is customary for monks to be cremated at their temple on a funeral pyre. Here below - in the monsoon rain which came over during the afternoon - is the covered pyre onto which Wangeesa's body was carried.

This is Wangeesa's coffin being carried by locals just prior to the cremation. As is customary here, the body had been placed in the Temple for locals to visit. Sam and I went to say our final goodbye the day before the funeral which was a very sad time for both of us.

The coffin was carried around the covered pyre 3 times before being placed inside. During this part of the ceremony, other monks (in their lovely orange or red robes) accompanied the coffin.

Here's the final part of the ceremony, the actual cremation. Sam and I both felt this was an appropriate time to leave having said our goodbyes to a man we both admired and respected.

That brings you right up to date with happenings here. Mostly, it's been a very positive and upbeat month (but damn busy......) marred only by the loss of Wangeesa. We still have 14 dogs being cared for by the novice monks at his Temple and we are sure the new head monk there will also - in true Buddhist fashion - provide sanctuary there.

After a busy few weeks, and knowing that Oscar is now well settled in his new home, Sam and I are off to Colombo tomorrow for some retail therapy and to catch up with friends there.

I do hope you've enjoyed reading this and that for those of you living outside Asia it will give you a flavour of the countryside we're working in and on the part religion plays in life here.

I'll try and send a final update before I come back to the UK on 5 December!

Love to all

Mo

xxx

My September update from lovely Sri Lanka!

Hi again from Sri Lanka - thought I'd send you my September update. I wish I could say it was very hot and sunny here but that's far from the case right now - we're in the monsoon season so have had lots of rain this week (one hot day - when I was working!) and yesterday we lost both power and water supply for several hours. No matter, when that's the case we just head for the bar! I thought I'd include a couple of photos of Sri Lanka sunsets so you can see just how beautiful it can be here in the late afternoon.

It seems that the arrival of teenage years aren't celebrated as such here, but there's always a celebration when a girl becomes a "big girl" (whatever that is!!). At least it's another excuse for a party and the lucky girl gets a whole new wardrobe of clothes and plenty of presents. Below is my friends' daughter, Warani, at her "big girl" party.


I'm still teaching here but find it much more rewarding to work one-to-one with a few children rather than have large classes. That way, there's no distraction from kids that would rather play cricket or rounders than learn English! Here's my lovely little student, Muranga. He absolutely adores the Maisy Mouse learning toy I got from England and I'm hoping I can find another for his Christmas present when I come back in December.

Recently we had a visit from a lovely guy from America who came to teach our elephants to paint! (see www.elephantart.com). He and a group of volunteers and I were scheduled to attend a meeting of the Sri Lankan Conservation Society so left MEF early in the morning for the 5 hour drive south. Sadly, when we arrived we found out that we'd gone to completely the wrong National Park with no hope of going to the correct location in the time available. Our contingency plan was to visit another National Park nearby, called Uda Walawe. Pictured below are some of the wild elephants we saw on the day. It's just so rewarding to see these lovely giants in their natural surroundings.

This one is not on zoom - he really was that close (and actually came and touched our safari jeep)!

Here's one of our elephants going through her paces with the paint and easel.

......and another picture with another colour scheme. Since these were taken, both our elephants have practised almost daily and are developing their very own style. Paintings will be sold via the elephantart website to raise funds for MEF.

This is a group of current/recent volunteers with David the painting trainer, at one of my little social gatherings.

The only really sad news this month was the death of a wonderful little old lady (and I mean little - I'm not tall and she was at least a foot shorter than me) of 91 who was a good friend even tho' her English was limited and my Sinhala little better (but am working on it...). She'd been in hospital a month or so ago where I went to see her but had seemed to be doing fine at home. I saw her several times and we had a few laughs together. Sadly, on 17 September I had a call to say she'd passed away peacefully overnight. I went to the funeral (happily my first in Sri Lanka) which was a nice occasion and I then went to the cemetery to see the burial (although I was the only woman in attendance). I was asked to light one of the candles on her grave which was a lovely honour for me. This is how burials are marked here.....

On a happier note, Dogstar work is keeping me VERY busy at present. Last Sunday we had a clinic here at MEF which I organised and the day went off very well with around 75 dogs/cats attending, 26 of whom were sterilised. Here's one of our younger clients with his little dog. Luckily the rain stayed off and the whole day was a great success (but very hard work!).

Here's one of our patients in surgery (you can read more about the clinic on my latest Dogstar blog at www.dogstarfoundation.com volunteer blogs).

The clinic was timed to (almost!) co-incide with World Rabies Day and Dogstar's 3rd birthday which fell on 28 September. Since the clinic, I've taken animals to the vet on 3 days this week (another dog from our temple for sterilisation) and have visited at least one other animal every day for minor treatment or wound dressing.

Below are a few of the dogs at our local temple for whom I'm trying to find homes.

Below is one of the areas I've been to on my 'house calls' this week. Pretty wonderful isn't it? (Well it was until a deadly snake passed about 6 inches from my foot!).

Finally, here's a video I meant to include with my last blog. It was taken on my weekend away to Anuradhapura - I hope it plays as it's the first video I've uploaded, but it's a wonderful sight of monkeys playing in the water pool at one of the temples.

Well, that's it for now. Thanks to all who keep my updated with news from the UK which I love to receive. Will be in touch again soon.

Love Mo

xxxx

Mo's Sri Lankan Adventures - update!

Hi everyone! Here's an update on my adventures since coming back to Sri Lanka on 23 July. I arrived in Colombo after a 12 hour flight only to go to a masked ball in the city centre (I did take the opportunity to shower/dress up en route!). Carminie and I joined the "ladies who lunch" set for a dinner and dance - which was intriguing as the only male dancer was the dance teacher from the Womens' International Club where the function was held - and boy was he in demand!! We arrived back to Randeniya at about midnight when I found Sam my Dogstar colleague waiting to meet me with all the news. Two hours (and several whiskies!) later, my body decided to give up the fight to stay awake - the end of 2 very long days.

Then started an extremely busy and hectic schedule at MEF as numerous volunteers came and went. At one point in mid August there were 13 volunteers here - never before have I known more than 6 at once time; maybe the end of the war here has mean people are more willing to travel to Sri Lanka. What a lovely bunch the volunteers have been - the age range was from 18-67 and we had students, teachers, psychologists and even an ex tea planter!

One of the volunteers here when I arrived was a lovely newly-qualified vet called Peter who came out via Dogstar. I think it was a baptism of fire for him as operating conditions, drugs used etc are very different to the UK. However, he did a brilliant job treating many skin problems/wounds, vaccinating several dozen dogs and operating at a sterilisation clinic. We really missed him when he left....... We spent August 4th at Arandara, where one of our restaurant staff lives, operating on 2 male dogs and walking round the village (much of it uphill through rubber plantations) vaccinating against rabies.

Here's a view of Arandara - what a lovely location for house calls!!

And here's Peter operating on one of the village dogs.

The previous weekend I'd gone with another volunteer to the wonderful Kandy Esala Perahera where we joined the vet team from the University of Peradeniya who checked all the elephants due to walk in the procession (about 90) to ensure they were fit prior to the perahera. The team were then on hand with tranquillizer guns in case any of the elephants decided to leave early! Luckily for us, being with the vet team meant we had a fantastic position within the police compound from which to watch the procession.

I think this is probably the best tusker I've ever seen in Sri Lanka!

Here's Rani, one of the MEF elephants, dressed and on parade.


By now I'm sure you know that being at MEF means being involved in community projects and not just elephant care. These projects include teaching English to local children and working on the MEF eco-farm. The farm is now trialling methods of producing high quality compost from our elephant dung (much of which is currently used for making pachyderm paper in the factory adjoining MEF). The garden manager, Mr. Karu, arranged for us all to go on an organic compost making course at a research unit near Colombo. Overall it was a fun day out but parts of it - such as the 45 minute slide show in Sinhala - were rather like watching paint dry! Suffice to say, it won't be included as a regular field trip for volunteers.....

Here are our volunteers (and Mr. Karu) before terminal boredom set in!


Something much more rewarding was repainting a local orphanage. All the volunteers chipped in to buy paint, brushes, wall posters and hire a van and most made 2 journeys to the temple to do the work. Sadly I was involved in dog work on both occasions, but I'm aiming to start a weekly English class for the 10 boys from 4-15 years old who live there. Will update you in due course.

One of my friends in Colombo is a sari designer and she asked 5 of her friends to model at a fashion show on 14 August. I'd blithely said OK think there would be about 20 people watching - only to arrive at a large theatre seating over 250 people and to find out 2 of the models were ex Miss Sri Lankas! We did our run-throughs on stage to make sure we were all in time with the music, could change outfits quickly (we all wore 3) and to get back on stage in time for the group finale. It was a little nerve wracking as the auditorium was full but as the only non Sri Lankan in the whole place I think I got a few claps for my nerve if nothing else. Below are a couple of shots of me ready to hit the stage - still waiting to be sent the 'official' on-stage shots.

Part of MEF's raison d'etre is to provide sanctuary for old/sick elephants for volunteers to work with hands-on, and one of our regular field trips is to Habarana and Minneria national park (about 3 hours north of MEF) to learn more about the human-elephant conflict which sadly occurs when elephant grazing lands are swallowed up as the human population expands. On 17 August we set off about 6am and went firstly to the village of Habarana which borders jungle, and where MEF have been involved in a project to provide early warning of elephant attacks on crops via a system of warning bells. There are also around 25 tree-houses which are manned nightly in rotation to keep watch for marauding elephants. The problem really was highlighted for us when we met a villager whose tree house had been attacked by a large male elephant the previous night. The only way the man survived the attack was to move up to the highest platform out of reach of the elephant which foraged his crops and rammed his tree-house for over an hour.

Here's the damage caused....

From Habarana we went to Minneria and hired a jeep to take a safari to see wild elephants. Sadly, the heavy rains the day before meant we didn't see the usual 200 or so ellies but we did see several family groups including the one below which had several youngsters.

This last weekend I went away with a local family - 15 Sri Lankans, including 4 children to the northern ancient cities of Anuradhapura and Polonnaruwa. One of the tuktuk drivers had invited me and I took along our one remaining volunteer. We left here at 4.30am last Friday for the 5 hour drive north by van. The family had prepared all meals en route, so Friday we spent going round the lovely temple complex in Anuradhapura ending up at the biggest temple, where a Buddhist ceremony was being held.

Here's the family group at our overnight stop - where 17 of us shared 4 rooms! I can't sleep under a mosquito net so decamped to the sofa in the sitting room only to have 3 of the men in the party roll out sleeping mats on the floor in the same room. That in itself wouldn't have been too bad, were it not for the fact they woke at 4.45am the next morning, put on all the lights and started chatting animatedly. To say I was not best pleased is a slight under-statement! Anyway, apart from that Nicola and I were treated as honoured guests and are now the subject of several Sri Lankan home videos! We eventually got back here at 1.30am on Sunday after 2 nights of only 4 hours sleep each so I spent most of yesterday chilling out downloading photos and preparing this blog!

Below are some more photos of our weekend away...

Buddha statue

water lilies at a Buddhist temple...

lotus flowers on a Buddhist shrine....

Dagoba (temple) at Anuradhapura

ruined temple at Polonnaruwa

Finally (well, almost) for those of you who have ever wondered what living conditions are like here, below is a shot of my living accommodation - a little basic, but it's home while I'm here.

AND FINALLY....here's a recent photo of the dogs at the local temple. Despite the socialising and volunteer co-ordination that takes up much of my time (co-ordinating that is, not socialising), Dogstar work is still my main priority and what I enjoy most. So ending on that note provides me with an ideal chance to say do have a look at my blog on http://www.dogstarfoundation.com/ (volunteer blogs) where you can find out more of what's been happening with the dogs/cats since my return and see photos of our patients.

Bye for now. I'll aim to update the blog regularly so please check it out every couple of weeks!

Love to all

Mo x