Sri Lanka - Hotel Kandalama

The Kandalama Hotel was apparently built with the intention of creating a fusion of natural beauty and modern luxury that retained an intrinsically Sri Lankan characteristic.

Its creator is Geoffrey Bawa, a figure of legendary proportions in Sri Lanka's modern era. In a helicopter, he navigated the countryside that surrounded the ancient cities until he found the perfect location that would be the setting for his masterpiece.

Bawa's keen attention to natural surrounding is evident in every facet of the Kandalama Hotel. It is build around an outcrop and overlooks the spacious Kandalama tank.

The numerous corridors throughout the hotel open onto the neighboring rock face and are replete with the omnipresence of avian creatures. At times, the hotel seems to pulse with life, causing you to wonder whether it was created by the hands of man or simply grew out of the forests which surround it.

Two of the hotel's three sections are build on elongated stilts that avoid disturbing the flow of rainwater and lush vegetation has grown to surround the structure, making it seem as though the place is so blessed that Mother Earth herself has embraced it.

Personally, I was just relieved to find a functioning toilet and a clean bathtub but that's neither here nor there.

I met a 21-year-old Sri Lankan lifeguard and he told me that he was going to visit his girlfriend in Kandy. I think the he may have mistaken me for a philanderer because he started telling me how he would date copious numbers of girls as though I knew what he was talking about. He also kept replacing the word "date" with "use," which I felt offered some insight into his perspective on the fairer sex.

He would say things like: "I use a girl for about six months and then I try to find another."

He then told me that he was going to try to go to Italy. Apparently, he had at one point saved a 60-year-old Italian woman with CPT and she had sent him a check for $1000, which is a pretty penny in Sri Lanka. He had used $300 on a new cellular phone, a Discman, a television, and put the rest into savings.

After he had saved her life, he had kept in touch with her and one day, found out that her husband had died, creating a situation which he felt he could potentially capitalize on. He planned on traveling to Italy because he felt that the woman would "help him."

The lifeguard also told me that he had met the Father of one of the Backstreet Boys but had not kept in correspondence with him.

Later, a couple of girls began swimming in the pool and the lifeguard tried to get me to talk to them with him. I was a little tired so I declined and returned to my room.