happy as I am - Harmony and thoughts with wine

Sometimes wine makes you get "brilliant" ideas, which you will regret next morning. I hope this is not one of them. ;-)

I am wondering respect. There are so many kinds of respect. People give respect for so many different reasons to other people. For looks of another, for wits, knowledge, experiences, skills. It is a good thing, that people respect each other, because that is one way to harmony. And it's not easy to live in harmony, between human beings.

I have a person in my circles, whom I did respect for the wits. She is clearly very intellect one, no doubt. Let's say, I give her 3 levels of respect for that. But when I heard that she has good values, that instantly added st least one level. When I heard more about it, I understood that she is even passionate about her values, it adds one more level to her pile.
I started to understand how much I appreciate people, who have deeper values, than just superficial things. Wits couldn't be categorized as superficial quality, but it's not that deep either. Superficial people can have wits, while deeper people can - and often do - too.

But is it good thing to be passionate about your values, or anything really? Well I think it is, maybe I feel like that,  because I think I am passionate myself. But isn't that a bit in contradiction with harmony? Harmony is something much more peaceful. Yes, but you also need change. Let's say that you are in hell (nice picture that we start this with), wouldn't you need an enormous amount of passion to try to change hellish thinks, you experience there? ;-) What I am really saying, is that we need passion to make changes. Sometimes change to better can be made in ordinary, common way of things, but often real and big changes really need passion to be executed. People can't "just make those things" - you need passion to make all that effort that is required to accomplish it.

Anyways, it's important to find your place in the world. Currently - in this moment - I am in such a harmony with the world  and this actual place where I am, in this specific location and much more further than my mind can dwell, so I just have to say, people should feel like this in their everyday life! I know it would make me happy to see my friends in harmony like this!
This harmony is something you can not buy! I did buy two glasses of wine, which you could call cheating! :-) but like we all know, alcohol is not giving you real harmony, it cheats your body to think a bit like that. But as I found the feeling, that I am in the right place of the world right now - and hence the feeling of harmony - before I did drink (and not drive) - I don't think this is really due to consumption. Though I know that reading the "way of tea" -book has quite an inspirational effect on me.

One certain way to know that you have found a piece of harmony, is that you are not bothered by small things. You are happy the way you are and the place where and when you are. If I would speak about Tao or "Li" - which I will not - I would say that is one really important thing and sentence, in any kind of seeking of truth,  better your self, to find your self or just getting enlightened by any wisdom. I haven't actually red that from anywhere, but maybe I should have.
Maybe universe wants me to be here also, as much I do as myself - and not just me! Do you how comforting and moving thought that is? It's not just that you want to be here and you have the feeling that you are in the right place, but that you also know that everything else wants you to be there. Worldly matters don't really upset you, when you have that feeling and knowledge.

sasri2016 – In Colombo

I stayed in The Ocean Colombo. It was okay hotel. Room was okay, not bad. Service was okay.

Colombo itself as a destination.

It's not that bad city. There are higher prices (see my comments below about the prices) and traffic is what it is. Moving wasn't that hard, if you use PickMe and get to travel hassle free (hassle free as no-negotiation for tuk-tuk price - getting bad english speaking drivers to drive you to hotel, that they don't know - is not hassle free ;) ).

There is a poshier part of Colombo (at the northern part of city, close to Pettah) and then southern part of the city (this is my limited vision, based only on two nights visit there – so more experienced travelers probably have a say to this – but this was all I needed for my visit). My hotel was in quite good position (crossroad of melbourne avenue and marine drive). Of course those poshier and more expensive hotels are in better suited location for many things, but I appreciated the close proximity of Majestic City (walking distance or short tuk-tuk drive in middle of the day).

I really loved the Sugar bistro at the poshier part, for having a happy hour (buy one, get one for free) and a totally awesome Kofta for dinner.

Mid-day in Sri Lanka is very hot (for me as Scandinavian). Temperature of 33 C is at the top of my “comfort” zone (well comfort is somewhere under 28 C, so maybe I call it “survival” zone). If you are going to walk around the city in mid-day, think twice. It's good way to see the city, but the amount of sweating when walking in that temperature is compared to tuk-tuk “airconditioning” - for me ordering tuk-tuk with PickMe was easy and cheap enough way to travel around the city.

Pettah market is kind of the worst market scenes I have been. It has bad sides of Thailand markets, with hassle and it probably has a lot of robbers around tourists (heard, not seen). I ended up buying one piece of shorts, but they were not that cheap, after the bargaining. Starting prices were crazy (my 300 LKR – theirs 2400 LKR), but I wasn't as comfortable bargaining harder at the late night (almost closing time) in Pettah, as I am in Thailand, so ended up paying almost double of my target price. Well, less than 7 euros for brand shorts, that even fit my big size, wasn't that bad deal (though haven't tried them on yet :).

Majestic City is a shopping mall, with a lot of watches, jewellery and clothing shops. It also has food court at the bottom floor and a grocery store “Gargill's Food city”. I ended up buying two shirts and a couple of teas from a tea shop there. Otherwise I used food court for fresh juice (from desk called “Roots” and couple times lunch food from other desks).

Note! If you own a DinersClub -credit card, you should be aware that the only locations where DinersClub -credit card works in Sri Lanka, are in Colombo. There are 5 ATMs, that you can use to withdrawn money from DC credit and one of them is inside Majestic City (only one I found). Those are Commercial Bank's ATMs.

Massage.

I always try to get a massage in the beginning of the trip and at the end at least. On this trip, my plan is to get one massage per week. So I called the reservation of the hotel, where I could get a massage. They transferred the call to the third floor and a guy with very poor english answered. I though they transferred the call to kitchen or something. So I called again and this time he explained that there is a massage on the third floor of this hotel. So I went there and the price for one hour Thai massage was quite high (my opinion, again), 4500 LKR (about 31 €).

Massage room was simple and a bit shady by lighting, but the lady who did the massage was very authentic and as I recognize and remember the moves that belong to Thai massage, she did about all the common moves of normal (non-dirty) Thai massage. It took about 50 minutes, so not true 1 hour, but comes with the territory.

Prices in Colombo: It's a capital (though not the official one) of Sri Lanka, so you should expect higher prices, than most of the other places.

Tuk-tuk drivers are asking way too high prices from foreigners, for a budget traveler. That's why PickMe service comes so handy. You just need an internet connection and that app installed to your mobile device (you can probably do it also on a computer, but app is very handy). With this app, you say where from you are going to be picked up, what kind of a car you want (default is tuk-tuk, there is also a mini car and normal car options). Then you specify if you pay by cash and app gives a rough estimate about the price of the trip. Prices always come by meter and you can actually check the progress of your travell in app's map, while you are in the vehicle. After the trip, it also asks you to give driver stars and a comment (it's not necessary). Sound quite like Uber, doesn't it? And I did love it all the way. Would want to have this in Finland too and especially with the same prices. ;) Travelling from melbourne avenue to Fort Railway Station (Pettah), costed about 460 LKR with a normal car. Driver was very helpful and guided me how to get to the train and correct platform, for my train trip to Mirissa... which is the next episode.

Couple notes about The Ocean Colombo -hotel:

• Breakfast price is steep, about 1300 LKR
• Travel agent was blaming me later, that I didn't reserve a car from them, to get to Mirissa or something like this. People had written this kind of stuff in TripAdvisor, so it was to be expected; if you don't like pushy salesmen, then you will not like this guy (well he is not that pushy, but blaming for not ordering is bad enough)
• Laundry service was normal priced (IMHO) and worked well, except they lost my sock and then blamed that it wasn't ever in the laundry bag (which I of course had checked before giving the laundry bag); but I would use that again
• I never got to get to the roof top bar, but it might have been really nice; later I did regret that I couldn't make it there to take some photos and to enjoy later evening breeze there.

sasri2016 - Travelling into Sri Lanka from Helsinki (well actually from Lieto)

Trip did begun 18 hours ago (30.3.2016 22:50 in Finland). Time in Finland is now 16:53 (31.3.2016) when I started writing this in Airberlin plane. I have no idea what time it is here, where we are flying now. This second flight – from Berlin to Abu Dhabi – will take about an hour still before the landing, so ten hours of this flight and 3 hours at Berlin (weird terminal B) and 5 hours of travelling and waiting in Finland has been completed so far.

When I saw the flight map from this plane's nice touch screen (that are in front of all seats – points to Airberlin for that), I understood how much wrong direction the first flight to Berlin did go. Actually the flight from Helsinki to Phuket takes like 10 hours to Hadabad in India and now we not nearly as far as that would be and I have been longer time in air.

Feelings for the start of the trip? Well now they are quite good. I haven't eaten too much, but still okay (well I should have eaten bigger lunch than what they offer in these flights and I am already late in dinner), but I estimated that I have slept like 6 hours on this flight. Well, I didn't sleep at all last night, so tiredness will catch you in some point and this was a good flight to have it. Everybody knows, that flights are not good places to sleep, but longer flights are better than airport floors or busses (tried those both when I went to Helsinki airport). I was in a quite bad shape when first flight started to land, body didn't like the non-sleeping theme and carrying the heavy luggage at Finland and my belly also started to get messy. Those got fixed at Berlin airport, even though the breakfast was totally overpriced in that cafe (eg. quite small class of juice was 3,50 €).

I am glad that I had heard from my collague, that Berlin airport is strange. Otherwise I would have seriously suspected my own navigation. You need to go with bus from plane to terminal where plane has landed (yes, that's normal), but then you need to exit the building and transfer to terminal B, which is a different building and you just walk out of the terminal C. Distance is not that long, but it's strange that there is no indoors walkway between those terminals. Then I also needed to go to passport control and another security check-in at Terminal B. After I got to those gates (B20 and B21), I didn't see any toilets in that small waiting area. Someone really didn't think this through! But well, I still got to say, that I appreciated the one hour free WiFi connection at airport. And for once, the WiFi's main page was useful, it had the same listing as boarding screens show on wall. So it was possible to check those boarding times and flight statuses from your browser, while connected to that free network. Good idea! Hope this would be taken to use in all airports.

So next there will be landing to Abu Dhabi's airport (heard that it would be world's biggest?). Then there's going to be change to next flight, from Abu Dhabi to Colombo, Sri Lanka. It should take about two hours to change to connecting flight and I have planned to run to some burger or other food stop for quick meal. If everything goes by the book, I should be landing to Colombo's airport (which is closer to Negombo beach than Colombo) something like 03:35. Then it takes about an hour to get to The Ocean Colombo -hotel from airport. When I arrive to hotel, I have travelled about 28 hours - I'll likely be quite done in that point.

Racing Extinction - why we humans really have not made any steps to avoid destruction of our and all the life on this planet?

Being on a trip, is nice by so many ways. One of them is that mind starts to flow and walk. Freedom, restfulness, being out of hamster wheel... it all relieves your mind and allows it to wonder into places, it wouldn't go during the daily routines.

These thoughts came to me, when I was reading "The Way of Tea" - a book that hasn't yet spoken about tea - but a lot about tao and taoism.
Thoughts where my mind dwelled, were about the nature - and to say it pluntly - about the TV documentary called "Racing Extinction". Raising questions, like "How could such a thoughts of perceiving the world with nature and for man's place in the world, can be written by the people from that same country, that today cause such a havoc to this planet and ecosystem, what we are part of?". This doesn't mean, that I would blame China alone for the problems to our planet and to the nature that we are living in. Those problems are caused by humans as a race - not by population of one country. Saying just one more thing about this subject - before moving to actual subject - If we would compare eating habits of Americans and Chinese population, I bet Americans would eat a lot more meat per person, than chinese. And why this is relevant, because actually metabolism of cattle produces a lot of methane in to the air. So cattle is actually part of our ecological catastrophe, that we have created in modern days of human existence.

So to the actual subject: why we humans really have not made any steps to avoid destruction of our and all the life on this planet?

My answers:
1. It needs to go to the root level (simplicity of execution and communication, how these things affect all of us), it simply isn't enought, that there are couple hippies or hipsters wanting to drink tea and eat organic/veggie food- because that simply won't save the day
2. Reducing consumption is against well-being and power of the highest class (whole system would need to be changed)

One of big discoveries to me in this TV document "Racing Extinction" was, that 50% of phytoplankton has been killed during the last 50 years. Why is this so important, we can't even see them in our normal lives? Because phytoplankton PRODUCE 50% OF OXYGEN IN OUR PLANET!
Lets consider this from another point of view - phytoplankton has existed for a long, long time and been responsible for producing oxygen to our planet, so how would we cope if this planet wouldn't have enough oxygen anymore? Shouldn't we all start to figure out, where we are going? If the same rate would continue, aren't we like killing another 50% of phytoplankton from our oceans in next 50 years. It probably won't happen exactly like that - but you get my point. If we have now destroyed 25% of planet's oxygen producers, just in last 50 years (which isn't even a twinkle of an eye in the billion years history of our planet), isn't it showing that we have to have somekind of loss of oxygen in next 50 years?
How long time is 50 years? It's not the medium of human life expectancy, but we could say, that it's very probable that most of us reading this will live longer than that (if nothing unexpected happens).
So next generation of humans - meaning our children - could have less than halve of the same amount of oxygen, to live in this planet, than our parents did. So are we avoiding to take any action regarding this, because we don't care about our kids or their generations? I don't think so, I think that people are not really aware how bad the situation actually already is and that we would need to take actions now.
Another important realization was to understand, that cattle actually produces so much of our green house effect, while cars actually do as much as I thought.

[Under construction] - Sorry I am too tired to finish this rambling to the (bitter) end, but I hope some day I can find time and energy to finish this off.



How the destruction of life on earth could be avoided?
- All problems need to be addressed, not just one (methane and pollution in the air is not enough, saving the oceans is not enough, but fixing them all, would make a difference)
- Moving straight from oil to electricity isn't going to solve everything. It helps some part of the problem, but not all. Consumption of everything is in the source of these problems.


Are we beyond the point of salvaging the situation? I do really think so. But being correct in this, is not relevant, instead it is relevant that we as a human race try to make changes now, when we have even a glimbse of hope, that these things can be saved.

Funny, while writing this post, stumbled to an article about, through totally different subject (aging effects shown in metabolism of elderly) posted by a friend in Facebook: http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v531/n7596/full/nature17145.html

Kiila - Manskulla

Paikkana varsin hauska. Tilaa on, pöydät on ihan hyvät ja sijainti Manskulla kolmen sepän patsaan kohdilla.
Katsoin menun ennenkuin astuin sisään. Siellä näytti olevan aika kivalta kuulostava kana-pesto caesar salaatti.
Kömmin sisään ja paikka oli aika tyhjänä näin 1640 arkipäivänä. Tarjoilija  (johon naisvieraat varmasti ihastuvat) ohjasi todella hyvään pöytään, vaikka olinkin yksin. Pisteet siitä.
Katsoin ruokalistaa ja mikä pettymys, se olikin jokin supistettu versio ovella olevasta... hyvä etten ottanut jalkoja alle, mutta annoin mahdollisuuden ja kysyin tarjoilijalta listasta. Kyllä, homma oli näin. Mutta tämä tarjoilija keräsi pisteet ja kysyi että mitä olisin halunnut. Kerroin ja hän järjesti sen keittiöstä! Poeng - Poeng pisteet hänelle!

Nyt odottelen rauhassa ruokaa ja katselen liikennettä Manskulla - tai siis kunhan olen saanut tämän naputettua. ;-)

Juna lähtis kuudelta, joten tovottavasti ruoka tulee aika pian.

Salaatti on tosi hyvän makuinen! Pesto on hyvää ja kastiketta on riittävästi, muttei kuitenkaan liikaa. Krutongit on kyllä liian isoja ja kovia.

Ai että tää kanakin on hyvää - juuri loistavasti valmistettu - ei liian kuivaa muttei liikaa toisessakaan päässä.

Annos oli myös varsin riittoisa. Vaikka lounas  oli töitten takia jäänyt väliin ja kello oli jo viittä kun ruoka saapui, tulin silti annoksesta täyteen. Ei tästä kyllä voi valittaa!