Sri Lanka becomes a wellness hotspot for Ayurvedic medicine | Travel Stories from The Post and Courier

The secret to learning something is to give yourself over to it.

I went to Sri Lanka to learn about Ayurvedic medicine. I entered with a true beginner’s mind, learning first how to spell the word.

Most of the people who come to Sri Lanka to immerse themselves in Ayurveda are suffering from life itself. Stress and burnout.

As the sun came up over the Indian Ocean, we gathered for yoga and meditation in an upstairs room at Ayurvie Weligama, a retreat center where people disappear from the world for weeks at a time to focus on clean eating and daily herbal treatments.

The teacher constructed each pose, telling us how to do it, then correcting us one muscle movement at a time. And when we were in the right position, we stayed in it, breathing and letting our bodies adjust to the feeling.

The man next to me let out a long sigh as he stretched his back. Women grunted trying to get in position. Most of the people in the room looked to be in their 50s and 60s, not retired, just taking a break. They seemed to be leaving their desks for the first time in years and surveying the damage to their bodies.

The warm, humid air softened muscles and joints as we breathed and held a position. My sinews felt like the texture of dried grass, being watered.

The teacher told us to hold one nostril closed and breathe out to the count of 10, then alternate nostrils. Breathe in to the count of 5.

The act of counting and concentrating, one nostril at a time, shut out the rest of the world. The sound of the roiling waves outside was constant and covered my head and ears like a blanket.

I wondered how I would change in two weeks of this. Ayurveda heals the mind through meditation, heals the body through yoga, herbal treatments and a careful diet.

On the one-lane road between the retreat center and the ocean, a three-wheeled truck drove by playing “Fur Elise” over a loudspeaker. A man sat in the back of the truck, selling fresh bread and cakes to neighbors as they ran out of their homes in response to the music.

A large white Buddha meditated in a glass case on the street corner. A man stood in front of the case, lighting a stick of incense and covering his face in prayer with his cupped hands.

While so many countries are dealing with over-tourism, Sri Lanka is hoping to attract people to the island.

This is Sri Lanka’s moment. After 30 years of civil war that ended in 2009, after bombings that made headlines in 1999, after a pandemic and economic crisis, this is the moment of peace and new beginnings.

There is a new president who has promised to reform the government and restore the hard-hit economy.

I was invited to visit by the Sri Lanka-America Chamber of Commerce to witness the moment.

Sri Lanka is placing its bet on wellness tourism, digging into its thousands-year-old traditions of Ayurvedic medicine. In the past couple years, retreat centers have opened along the coast and in the mountains, most of them family-owned.

We followed the coast and then climbed into the mountains.

We drove by a tourist on a motorcycle with a surfboard strapped to the side. Tuk-tuks filled the road with bright colors: green, red and blue. We turned onto a dirt road and slowed down to let a gathering funeral pass, mourners dressed in white, women standing under umbrellas as a light rain fell.

Sri Lanka is so beautiful that it’s almost hard to believe what you’re seeing. Imagine the Big Sur coast, but surrounded by the tropics and water so turquoise blue it seems to be lit from within.

Each night, after the sun set, I headed outside to swim.

In the courtyard of Kayaam House in Tangalle, there is a long infinity pool that stretches almost to the Indian Ocean. As I swam, I could hear huge waves breaking against the shore.

The water was warm and I felt stronger than I had in a long time, as if I could swim forever. With each lap, I thought I should stop, but it was like my body was thirsty for the water and the night air.

Maybe it was the yoga and meditation in the morning and at night.

Maybe it was the healthy Ayurvedic diet. Ghee instead of oil. Coconut instead of sugar. Warm water instead of cold. Steamed instead of fried. Fresh papaya, mangos, bananas. Okra salad. Lentils. Bowls of curry.

I swam toward the ocean and stopped at the end of the pool to look out and listen. The heads of spindly Dr. Seuss coconut trees swayed above me and lightning bugs glowed in the fronds.

The national game

I came to Sri Lanka as a blank slate, open to learning everything the country had to offer. I learned about food, about the ancient healing arts of Ayurveda. I learned about Buddhism and how happiness, or something like happiness, can come for an entire culture by shifting expectations toward acceptance of what is, a belief in fate and the auspicious calendar of one’s life created at birth.

And I learned about cricket.

Until I walked the streets of Negombo, a fishing town just outside Colombo, I had never seen a cricket match.

Sri Lanka famously won the 1996 World Cup. As if overnight, there were cricket matches being played every evening in every neighborhood.

Toward the end of my trip, I sipped a tamarind and arrack cocktail and reflected on what I had seen with Russel Arnold, cricket commentator and former Sri Lankan cricketer. It was a warm night on the balcony of Aliya Resort with views of Sigiriya rock in the distance.

I asked him why cricket was so popular in Sri Lanka.

He said Sri Lankans are physically perfect for it. It’s a game they can win and shine on the international stage. It’s a success story and a unifier.

He showed me a picture on his phone of a dozen men standing in the branches of a tree, craning to see the field. He described the feeling of a seasoned pitch and the way it felt in the Dambulla stadium the day before as thousands of people roared for Sri Lanka.

Until I came to Sri Lanka, I had never seen the circular swing of a fast bowler. But just days into my trip, I quickly learned that if you want to see a Sri Lankan light up, just ask about the game. In their voice, you can hear the crack of the bat and the cheer of the crowd and the nostalgia of after-school practice on a hot day.

On my first day there, it was raining. The side streets were flooded in Negombo and traffic moved slowly. When the rain let up enough to go for a walk, clouds still hung low over the Indian Ocean. I ventured out with Senaka, owner of LyfeTraveller, and coordinator of travel within Sri Lanka. We had no agenda, only for me to get a first look and to shake off the long flight.

“Should we go to the fish market?” I asked.

“Why not?” he said.

“Why not.”

Fishermen were squatting on the beach, repairing nets and cleaning gear. House crows circled and landed. They walked the beach, gingerly lifting each foot as they looked for remnants from the busy day of boats coming to shore and fish sellers displaying the catch on plastic-covered tables.

The smell of fish filled the air among the crows.

Because of the rain, most of the fish were covered by black tarps and most of the sellers had gone home. A couple women remained, offering a mix of fish displayed on a table, like a window out into the sea.

As we approached, one of the women seemed nervous. I put my hands together against my chest as I’d seen other people do and tried out the one-word greeting I had just learned. “Ayubowan.”

Her face opened up into a huge smile, and she said it back. We both let out an exhale, relief at an interaction gone well with a stranger.

Across the street from the market, a group of boys were playing cricket. We leaned and watched, my fingers hanging from the chain-link fence and my attention completely captivated by the game as Senaka explained the rules.

The sun started to come out.

Behind us, women were spreading out a pile of silver fish onto a tarp to dry in the sun for the next day’s customers.

Warm oil

My days were filled with healthy food, meditation and different herbal treatments, made with plants often grown nearby. At Santani Wellness near Kandy, I was invited to experience shirodhara, a traditional Sri Lankan treatment where oil is poured on your forehead from a large copper pendulum. They say it slows down aging, improves memory and helps you sleep.

My eyes were covered with a cloth.

I was surprised to feel afraid at first, to breathe in quickly as if I was about to go underwater. My body reacted as if I could drown.

As the first hot oil flowed over my forehead, I gasped for air, instinctually, ready to be submerged. But the logical part of my brain quickly calmed the primal part and I knew I was safe.

A copper pot with a small spigot hung from a wooden frame. A woman poured batches of heated, infused oil into the pot and released it onto my forehead. Back and forth, ear to ear, hairline to eyebrow.

The longer it lasted, the more I relaxed. It was the softest touch, almost affectionate in its lightness and warmth.

One side of the room was an open wall, so that we were practically outside. Trees covered every inch of the undulating mountains all around.

A light rain fell just long enough to cool the air and make all the leaves glow. A mist rose from the valley floor.

The oil continued to pour. The longer the oil moved back and forth on my head, the more I noticed the shape of my own skull, as if from the inside, as if the oil was clearing my mind.

Birds chattered from the trees. A yellow-billed babbler. A bright Tickells blue flycatcher. A yellow Indian white-eye with its black ring spectacles buried its head in a flower looking for insects.

The sound of a man’s voice rose up through the mist, a Buddhist chant.

Buddha’s tooth

Not far away, deep in the rainforest, rests the city of Kandy.

For 1,000 Sri Lankan rupee, I bought a tray of purple lotus blooms from the flower vendor at the entrance of Sri Dalada Maligawa, the Temple of the Sacred Tooth Relic in Kandy. The flowers were covered in tiny bees, picking up the last of the water and pollen from the yellow centers.

They were given to me in a cardboard tray that I carried on my palms as I walked through the entrance of the temple.

It was Oct. 17, the day of the full moon, which means it was the monthly holiday for Buddhists in Sri Lanka called Poya.

Buddha was born, experienced enlightenment and died for the final time on a full moon. And so, each month on the full moon, people gather at the temple. Each of the 12 full moon days are dedicated to a different event in the Buddha’s life.

On this day, as I walked onto the temple grounds, we were marking the end of a three-month period of fasting for monks, the end of the rainy season and the beginning of sowing season. Soon, monks would be presented with a new set of robes for the year, a tradition marking the end of the rains.

I knew none of this. Only later would I read for hours and get lost in the celestial worlds and traditions of Buddhism, trying to understand what I had just seen.

All I knew at the time was that I was among thousands wearing white. Some were tourists like me, there to see the place that holds a tooth of the Buddha at the center of the temple complex under a golden roof. But most were there to leave flowers, say a prayer, give a blessing.

Many spent the entire day there. They sat against the wall, legs outstretched, barefoot and wearing white from head to toe. One woman was reading the newspaper. Some were quietly talking, but most moved in and out of prayer, pressing thumbnails against their forehead, palms together.

I carried the lotus flowers up a set of stairs to a room full of people, most on the floor, praying. I joined a group leaving flowers on a long wooden gallery in front of the chamber that houses the tooth. Like the others, I paused and gave each flower as a blessing to people I loved and one flower blessing for myself.

A man stood behind the gallery, occasionally pulling the hundreds of flowers closer together to make room for more. The room was hot and humid and full of the smell of the flowers.

Sri Lanka is home to some of the most important Buddhist pilgrimage sites in the world.

Even if you aren’t Buddhist or a spiritual person, it’s impossible not to feel a sense of awe and overwhelm as you look up and realize what was created 2,300 years ago and still stands.

We traveled three hours north from Kandy to Anuradhapura.

The Sacred City of Anuradhapura is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, built in the third century BC around the cutting from a sacred fig tree where the Buddha experienced enlightenment. The cutting was planted in 288 BC and grew into a tree that still lives today and is the oldest living human-planted tree in the world with a documented planting date. The heavy branches of the tree are propped up by golden stakes.

We arrived at night. A few worshippers sat at the base of the tree listening to the voice of a chanting monk. In the corner of the courtyard was a container of brooms for sweeping the ground as a kind of veneration. People sat against the wall in pairs and read aloud from prayer books, their voices matching.

The tree was uplit, and the light was magnified into the dark night by the gold of the fence around the tree and the branch supports.

Nearby, and within eyesight of the bodhi tree, is a white stupa — the largest building in the ancient world after the pyramids. It glowed in the night, and we joined hundreds of people dressed all in white as they walked around its base, chanting, praying, and offering flowers and cups of juice.

The air was smoke-filled with incense. Stray dogs wandered among the pilgrims. People tied small ribbons on the stone elephants carved into the pillars, a reminder of the animals living in the surrounding jungle.

8th ‘Wonder of the World’

There was one last place to see before leaving Sri Lanka. Sigiriya Rock, just two hours north of Kandy, is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and called, by some, the “Eighth Wonder of the World.”

There is a world playing out every day at Sigiriya Rock. The men who wait on the stairs for people who look lost, to give them directions and offer them a tour. There are the men at the bottom who sit on the rocks, selling souvenirs — wooden elephants and Buddhas. There are the monkeys that wander up and down the stairs, ready to catch any piece of dropped food, ears perked for the sound of candy wrappers. And there are the hornets.

Signs near the entrance warn visitors to be quiet. “Noise may provoke hornet attacks.” Hornet is the wrong word. They are hanging colonies of rock bees that get agitated when people get too close.

They were nowhere to be seen as I prepared to climb the stairs.

There are 1,200 steps to the top of Sigiriya Rock. The steps are uneven, a combination of metal and rock. Don’t look down, a man said as I started to climb. I see hundreds of people a day who make that mistake, he said.

I thanked him for the advice and kept walking. The path clings to the side of the rock in places, just a metal plank wide enough to walk single file. If you don’t look down, if you look straight ahead, the way unfolds one footfall at a time without fear.

This is one of those places in the world where the journey is just as important as the destination. Next to the metal stairs, here and there on the rock face, there are small indentations that were once the way up the rock, just deep enough for a toe, just wide enough for one foot.

This was a fortress once, built for one man to keep himself alive, for King Kashyapa to defend himself from his brother after he killed their father. His reign lasted from 477-495 AD. It’s the strangest short story that left us an incredible artifact. At the top of this rock, there are the remains of a palace and a series of pools that fed an elaborate garden.

It is a wonder of its time and of any time.

You can see Sigiriya Rock from miles around in every direction, meaning, also, that you can see for miles around in every direction from the top.

Climb the stairs and you are rewarded with an incredible view of mountaintops reaching out of the surrounding jungle.

We woke up early to get there, leaving before sunrise. It gets hot during the day, climbing the stairs with no shade. It’s best to climb in the cool of the morning, and the effort is rewarded to watch day break in this place.

On the highway to Sigiriya, a man leaned out of the window of a passing truck and yelled, “Aliya! Aliya!,” the Sinhalese word for elephant. Just ahead, there was a large elephant on the side of the road, pulling dewy leaves off the branches with his trunk and filling his mouth. He was unbothered by passing traffic, and drivers were warning each other so everyone could swerve in time to miss him. Kaudulla National Park is nearby, full of slow-moving elephant herds against a picture-perfect safari backdrop of water and green fields.

We made it to the base of Sigiriya Rock as the sun was rising behind it. A wide path leads to the first steps of the climb. Stray dogs still slept on the edges of the path. One stood up as we walked and stayed with us for a bit, just close enough in case we had affection or food to offer, but just far enough away in case we had a stick or a boot. We had none of those things, so he wandered away.

The first real stop on the pilgrimage up Sigiriya Rock is at the base of two enormous lion’s paws. They were uncovered from the jungle by archeologists in 1898. The ascent once led from the paws to a giant lion’s head at the top, entering through the lion’s mouth. Only the paws remain.

As I climbed the metal stairs, I stopped to admire the trees that grew out of the side of the rock and the view beyond.

At the time, I was on a cancer treatment medicine with a side effect of sudden fluctuations in blood sugar. As the sun continued to rise and heat the air, I felt my hands get weak and knew I needed sugar, immediately. I reached into my bag and pulled out a piece of candy. The sound of the wrapper alerted the monkeys and they ran up the rock and up the railing of the stairs until I was surrounded. One monkey had a baby clinging to her back.

“No!” I yelled. “Not this time.” They scattered in surprise at my anger.

On my first trip abroad, I was stretching $700 over three months of traveling. Every penny counted. I splurged on a piece of chocolate and placed it next to my dinner. Monkeys filled the trees of the Uganda’s Ssese Islands in Lake Victoria, where I was camped on the beach. I had not learned how fast monkeys are and how they never miss a chance to steal candy. A monkey jumped on the table and the chocolate was gone. I’ve never forgiven or forgotten, and never trusted a monkey since.

Standing on the steps of Sigiriya, looking out toward a massive white Buddha rising from the distant jungle, I ate the candy in peace. I wondered if I should be climbing Sigiriya Rock in my condition or if I should turn around.

But why fight to stay alive and then give up on the moments that make life magical? I kept climbing.

By the time I reached the top, I needed shade and water and rest. I found a sheltered place on some steps and looked out at the unbroken views of jungle and rivers and mountains. I opened my thermos and drank fresh passionfruit juice.

A breeze took the heat out of the air and a mist was rising. I could imagine the elephants making their way through the trees to fresh water below and the monks who made this abandoned rock fortress into a monastery for years after the king’s death.

On the way down, I passed through a narrow pathway carved into the rock like a miniature canyon. On one side is a polished rock face called the “Mirror Wall,” full of lines of poetry and comments scratched into the wall by visitors, expressing their awe at what they had just seen.

A guard pointed out some of the earliest writing from 600 AD, so small that I would not have seen it without him.

I was feeling good from the juice and from wonder, and as I got to the end of the stairs, I started to see the men selling souvenirs on the rocks.

“Thank you, but I don’t need anything,” I said. “Good luck to you.”

I used to believe that the way to be a good traveler was to make it through the gauntlet of hawkers without making eye contact, to avoid getting pulled in. But I’ve softened since then and see them as the men they are — just trying to make a living like all of us.

I pressed my hands together at my chest.

“Beautiful,” one man said. I turned the corner and I heard him remember the English word, “Smile,” he finished.

Among the vendors, there was a rock overhang with the remnants of an ancient mural. It was a meditation spot for monks. As I tried to decipher what was left of the colors, a German tourist and one of the men who offers guiding services came down the stairs, arguing.

“1,000 Rupee?” the German was yelling. “I thought it was free. I thought you were just being nice. You won’t get that from me.” He stormed off and the old man looked at me, embarrassed. 1,000 Rupee is about $3.50.

“It’s hard to eat,” the man said to me.

I gave him the 100 Rupee that I had in my pocket and thought of the German tourist who was probably proud that he had gotten away without being “ripped off” by the locals.

Two weeks

British science fiction author and TV host Arthur C. Clarke is the most famous expat to make his life in Sri Lanka. He moved there in 1956 and stayed until his death in 2008.

In the book “Elephant Complex: Travels in Sri Lanka,” travel writer John Gimlette quoted Clarke as saying the ideal trip to Sri Lanka is two weeks long. Stay any longer and you’ll want to stay forever.

I flew out of Sri Lanka late at night, after two weeks of travel. I could feel the pull of the place, its reserved beauty. Its promise of health.

Before I headed to the airport, I walked into the courtyard of the Jetwing Lagoon hotel in Negombo. Everyone else was in bed for the night. My airport taxi would arrive around midnight.

The light from a doorway shone down on a welcome bowl of yellow plumeria flowers floating in water.

Sri Lankan hotels have perfected the art of the swimming pool and in the courtyard, on my last night in the country, I followed the stairs into the longest swimming pool in the country at 100 meters — twice the length of an Olympic pool.

At that length, you can really swim. Set a rhythm and disappear into meditation, just movement and water and breath.