Day 14 - Kottu

This weekend marks the final one of the month. Here in Jaffna, on the last 3 days of the month, they hold fasting, which all of the congregation join in with, and a time of peace and prayer; a way to reconnect with God and focus on the important things in life. Saturdays incorporate 3 prayer meetings in Tamil along with the bonding of the church family.

Woken surprisingly this morning, greeted to banging on my bedroom door by Vanuja, Shalu and Sinthujan - encouraging me to get up and ready for the most exciting day of the month!

We headed to church for 8:30 to help set up the first prayer meeting. This was over within an hour, and we were back home by 10am. The first meeting was praying for the local community, Irupalai and Jaffna, which was excellently attended by the church congregation. For them, this is of huge importance. Every time I am in Sri Lanka, and particularly Jaffna, the community ties and spirit captivate me, and strike me a the overriding character and charm of this place.

After the first meeting, myself and Sapthika sorted out a few of the recently arrived shipment boxes from the UK, full of clothing, toys and shoes for The DP Store. This occupied us for a couple of hours, filling in the time before the next prayer meeting.

The next prayer meeting was focussing on the wider area - this is the province Jaffna is located: The Northern Province. The meeting was praying for unity, peace and community within the province and seeing positive change come.

After this second prayer meeting, the only thing I could be drawn to was a nap. A two hour nap at that!

The 5:30pm prayer meeting was preceded by lots of playing with bouncy balls, and kids games with Thenu. This meeting was finished by 7pm, and we were able to be home (and eating!) by 7:30pm.

On route home we picked up my favourite Sri Lankan dish to date - Kottu. We stopped at the side of the road, at what appeared to be a dodgy street food vendor, but the risk of any sort of food-poisoning was worth it for the explosion of flavour in my first bite.

This is Sri Lanka!