Food & clothes - life's essentials

Today we started work again, following a wonderful weekend travelling. First off was the school where we negotiated with the principal various issues such as the price and quality of the school meals and the lack of security at the school. It was especially confusing when the teachers started talking in Sinhala whilst we tried to understand what they were saying from their facial expressions! I was surprised at the complexity of these issues – with all sorts of politics involved in what you would think to be a simple decision!  We also saw the children preparing for the end of term celebration that will take place tomorrow.  

After this we went to the bakery to agree a new price for the food for the school; the price of staples in Sri Lanka has risen by about 30% in recent years and this led to a decrease in quality of the food at the school. We negotiated a new price to allow for the increase in price which will hopefully result in better food at the school from now on. (The picture shows Lucy and Udaya negotiating the best price at the bakery)

Later in the afternoon we gave out the clothes donated by people at home to the people of the fishing village. It was a bit of a scrum with several people trying to hoard clothes for themselves but overall it was a fairly controlled event! It was great to see in particular 3 young boys who changed into their t-shirts as soon as they got them.