I figured I'd drop some intel on my trip to Sri Lanka, because there isn't a ton of intel on Sri Lanka on the forum yet, and I'll have spent enough time to form some basic ideas about the place by the time this trip is complete. I point out that this is not a game trip, I'm with my parents and my LTR, and that's been the focus of the trip. I've not gamed at all, and did a few soft approaches that I knew I wouldn't pursue, just to get a better sense of the female population. However, after 51 countries, I can do a decent job extrapolating from what I've experienced, and I'm a bit of a student to human interaction. Take what you like from this non-report, and leave the rest, or consider it a RVF member's view of a travel destination, with a little bit of potential game intel thrown in.
(Because of my travel schedule and companions, I'm going to drop this thread in a few pieces, as I don't have a lot of uninterrupted time and because I want to get it down while its still fresh).
Sri Lanka is a moderately sized island off the southeast coast of India. Its population is 70 percent buddhist, with sizable Tamil and Muslim minorities. The people look largely similarly to the diverse populations of India, but I'd have to say that they're almost uniformly much more friendly and warm than I experienced traveling in India. Like in India, I've seen women ranging in skin tones from light tan to almost black, and with varying physiques to match.
Its a poor country by western standards, very undeveloped and un-urbanized compared to many other countries in Asia. If you fly over the country from the east to the main airport in Colombo (on the country's west coast), you'll see very few sizable buildings until you reach Colombo. However according to the world bank, the percentage of people living in poverty has dropped from almost 30 percent to below 7 percent over the last 20 years.
It's got a population of around 20 million people, and literacy and English ability is fairly good. Finding people speaking English is Colombo is a given but even in some of the smaller cities English was widely spoken (in fairness I spent a fair amount of time in more tourist oriented areas), and I encounter just a few people who couldn't speak English. That being said, accents can be quite heavy and communication for non-native English speakers might be more challenging.
Getting to the capital, Colombo (CMB hereafter), is quite a good deal. Its most likely you'll start your trip there, as the international airport for Sri Lanka is located there (or in Negombo, about 30 minutes outside CMB). The flag carrier is Sri Lankan airlines, which Ive flown a few times and is quite underrated in the service side. It almost always has very cheap business class (as do its local route competitors, such as Qatar and Etihad) fares available from both HKG/BKK/KL and from the middle east (Kuwait, Doha, Abu Dhabi and Dubai).
When I landed, I was given a sim-card (not sure if this was done in economy) and a preregistration card for a date/phone plan. After clearing immigration (you apply online before you go to SL, and I was approved in a few minutes online), which is a short process, and clear customs/baggage claim, you can drop off your card, pay around 10 USD for a week of data (2GB) for your mobile. As coverage is good, it came in quite useful, both for researching next stops, and for communicating with drivers should you be hiring cars as you move through the country.
Once your on the ground in SL, there are cars, buses and trains. Car travel is quite inexpensive and there are a lot of hirable cars around. Many can be booked through the various hotels and prices vary greatly. There are only a few highway tollroads throughout the country though, so car travel can be expected, if not via tollroad, to average 50-70 km/hr for stretches of populated areas.
Colombo is a fairly big city, though not large by Asian standards. Wealth-wise, the country and the city is comparable in feeling to the Philippines/Manila. When I stayed in CMB at the outset of my trip, I stayed in a hotel that is considered one of the best in CMB, the Cinnamon (local major hotel chain) Grand, which is located on Galle Face, which is the beach in CMB. There is a Shangri-la and a Hilton on Galle Face too, and many other non-chain hotels of 4+ quality. Galle Face is the fanciest area of CMB, and most tourists with any kind of money are staying in that area. I didn't see a single backpacker in the area at all, though I didn't really spend time on the beach. As a result, prices in the Galle Face area are substantially higher, and if you decide to book a car after staying in a Galle Face hotel before heading out of CMB like most travelers do to see the wilder areas of the country or to head to the beach, you're likely to get a much better deal by having your next hotel send a car for you to Galle Face rather than booking from the hotel from which your departing.
CMB has a lot of construction going on, and its my impression that after their civil war pretty much subsided (except for tiny patches up north) after so long, foreign money from the mid-east and China are flooding into the country. There's a strong presence of people from the mid-east in the tourist areas, and a decent number of east Asians. Gemstones (precious and semi-precious are big business here, attracting people from both the aforementioned areas). The whites I saw mostly seemed to be tourists. The country has a good reputation as a place to hire programmers, and I met a Sri Lankan American who outsources his computer consulting practice work for the health care industry in the USA to Sri Lankan programmers. They apparently are much easier to deal with and more forthright than Indian companies doing the same thing. All of this would tend to indicate decent climate for business opportunity, though to be sure, it seems that corruption and payoffs are somewhat common. Data speeds were quite good, 3G was strong throughout the capital and wifi was broadly available. In this sense, it reminded me of Cambodia, another poor country with relatively good digital infrastructure. (to be continued)
(Because of my travel schedule and companions, I'm going to drop this thread in a few pieces, as I don't have a lot of uninterrupted time and because I want to get it down while its still fresh).
Sri Lanka is a moderately sized island off the southeast coast of India. Its population is 70 percent buddhist, with sizable Tamil and Muslim minorities. The people look largely similarly to the diverse populations of India, but I'd have to say that they're almost uniformly much more friendly and warm than I experienced traveling in India. Like in India, I've seen women ranging in skin tones from light tan to almost black, and with varying physiques to match.
Its a poor country by western standards, very undeveloped and un-urbanized compared to many other countries in Asia. If you fly over the country from the east to the main airport in Colombo (on the country's west coast), you'll see very few sizable buildings until you reach Colombo. However according to the world bank, the percentage of people living in poverty has dropped from almost 30 percent to below 7 percent over the last 20 years.
It's got a population of around 20 million people, and literacy and English ability is fairly good. Finding people speaking English is Colombo is a given but even in some of the smaller cities English was widely spoken (in fairness I spent a fair amount of time in more tourist oriented areas), and I encounter just a few people who couldn't speak English. That being said, accents can be quite heavy and communication for non-native English speakers might be more challenging.
Getting to the capital, Colombo (CMB hereafter), is quite a good deal. Its most likely you'll start your trip there, as the international airport for Sri Lanka is located there (or in Negombo, about 30 minutes outside CMB). The flag carrier is Sri Lankan airlines, which Ive flown a few times and is quite underrated in the service side. It almost always has very cheap business class (as do its local route competitors, such as Qatar and Etihad) fares available from both HKG/BKK/KL and from the middle east (Kuwait, Doha, Abu Dhabi and Dubai).
When I landed, I was given a sim-card (not sure if this was done in economy) and a preregistration card for a date/phone plan. After clearing immigration (you apply online before you go to SL, and I was approved in a few minutes online), which is a short process, and clear customs/baggage claim, you can drop off your card, pay around 10 USD for a week of data (2GB) for your mobile. As coverage is good, it came in quite useful, both for researching next stops, and for communicating with drivers should you be hiring cars as you move through the country.
Once your on the ground in SL, there are cars, buses and trains. Car travel is quite inexpensive and there are a lot of hirable cars around. Many can be booked through the various hotels and prices vary greatly. There are only a few highway tollroads throughout the country though, so car travel can be expected, if not via tollroad, to average 50-70 km/hr for stretches of populated areas.
Colombo is a fairly big city, though not large by Asian standards. Wealth-wise, the country and the city is comparable in feeling to the Philippines/Manila. When I stayed in CMB at the outset of my trip, I stayed in a hotel that is considered one of the best in CMB, the Cinnamon (local major hotel chain) Grand, which is located on Galle Face, which is the beach in CMB. There is a Shangri-la and a Hilton on Galle Face too, and many other non-chain hotels of 4+ quality. Galle Face is the fanciest area of CMB, and most tourists with any kind of money are staying in that area. I didn't see a single backpacker in the area at all, though I didn't really spend time on the beach. As a result, prices in the Galle Face area are substantially higher, and if you decide to book a car after staying in a Galle Face hotel before heading out of CMB like most travelers do to see the wilder areas of the country or to head to the beach, you're likely to get a much better deal by having your next hotel send a car for you to Galle Face rather than booking from the hotel from which your departing.
CMB has a lot of construction going on, and its my impression that after their civil war pretty much subsided (except for tiny patches up north) after so long, foreign money from the mid-east and China are flooding into the country. There's a strong presence of people from the mid-east in the tourist areas, and a decent number of east Asians. Gemstones (precious and semi-precious are big business here, attracting people from both the aforementioned areas). The whites I saw mostly seemed to be tourists. The country has a good reputation as a place to hire programmers, and I met a Sri Lankan American who outsources his computer consulting practice work for the health care industry in the USA to Sri Lankan programmers. They apparently are much easier to deal with and more forthright than Indian companies doing the same thing. All of this would tend to indicate decent climate for business opportunity, though to be sure, it seems that corruption and payoffs are somewhat common. Data speeds were quite good, 3G was strong throughout the capital and wifi was broadly available. In this sense, it reminded me of Cambodia, another poor country with relatively good digital infrastructure. (to be continued)
I've referral links for most credit cards, PM me for them & thanks if you use them
Strip away judeo-christian ethics ingraining sex is dirty/bad & the idea we're taking advantage of these girls disintegrates. Once you've lost that ethical quandary (which it isn't outside religion) then they've no reason to play the victim, you've no reason to feel the rogue. The interaction is to their benefit.
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