Graptolite - Hello Ceylon
Graptolite's Sailing Log
Martyn Pickup & Heike Richter
Wed 21 Jan 2009 19:41
We arrived outside Galle harbour early morning and contacted the Harbour
Master and the Yacht Agent then we had to sit outside the harbour for the
next eight hours waiting for Navy clearance to enter the harbour. This is
partly as they have a problem with Tamil Tigers and partly as they couldn't
care less about us yachties.
We then had a parade of officials who are, without putting too fine a point
on it, are a bunch of thieving bastards. When Customs people come aboard and
start using your ship's stores as a supermarket and filling up their empty
briefcases with your booze you know you are in a country that has some
problems. I'm trying not to let this influence my opinion of Lankans in
general but first impressions usually always count. It has taken from sun-up
to sunrise to get most formalities completed and we are promised
free-pratique tomorrow when somebody else comes along to see if we have
plague or not.
This evening a plausible spiv on the streets called Joseph has already taken
us on a tuk-tuk tour of the town and has also promised us laundry,
flag-making and tour services and anything else we want. And he also plied
us with arrak, a local spirit made from coconut sap toddy. We'll see how it
goes.
M