I made it!

Very quick posting just to say I made it here in one piece. It was a 3 hour wait at Glasgow airport, a 6.5 hour flight to Dubai, 1.5 hours to wait there, 3hrs 45 min flight to Colombo, 1 hr to get through customs and baggage and a 4.5 hour drive to Galle so when I got here I was filthy and hot and sticky and hadn't slept for a day nor eaten for 16 hours (yep I was counting). All I wanted to do at that stage was turn on my heels and flee. But I didn't obviously and today is a new day. Arriving at Colombo airport and waiting for the driver to pick me up was amazing - mind blowing in fact. The cacophony of sights, sounds and aromas that hit you is immediate and intense. The air is so stiflingly hot you can smell it along with the petrol fumes that permeate the atmosphere. The noise is incredible too - from the whistling policemen (not tunes, orders!) in brown uniforms to the sound of monkeys outside your bedroom window, it's all new and all exciting.

Before I go, one quick aside to demonstrate how we all get stuck in one groove. I was lying in bed under my mosquito net and lovely cool fan today and I heard a weird noise which I identified as some idiot with a parrot like mobile ringtone. Obviously it wasn't, it was a parrot or something similar. I'll be back in Glasgow in April looking for parrots!!!