Postcard from Sri Lanka: Mark Boucher

Before we arrived in SL, we were all told the story by the guys who had been here on the "A" tour in '98 that July and August was not to the best time of year to tour here. The reason being was that this is the rainy season and they had lost about 3 of their 6 weeks to the monsoon waters from above. Well, talking about the monsoons and rainy season, with the kind of hot and humid weather we've been experiencing the last few days, we're hoping and waiting and praying to experience a little of the watery manner from above. And if it were castle flavoured, even better!

We ventured out to the IL Ponte Italian restaurant a few nights back at the Hilton hotel just for something different. Myself, Neil McKenzie, "Bridge" Terbrugge and the Fizz tried out a few of their pizzas and we had the customary bottle of Rose for the table. (We had to explain to Bridge how they make rose, its red and white mixed together isn't it?) And who should we see there wining and dining a new local friend..can't say, can I!

Fortunately, my roomie Jacques has bought along his laptop computer and apart from the local TV which ain't that great, we've been occupying ourselves with links golf games and a few movies on the DVD. We got the Beach movie with "Leo" on DVD from Gary Kirsten and it's just so appropriate that it came from him, as it is pretty much a reflection of Gary's lifestyle. The king of the mullets, we salute you and thank you for your insanity that keeps us sane, normal, on the straight and narrow.

Jacques has picked up a computer virus, called the "kak" virus and we aren't too sure where it came from and who sent it. Hopefully it's the only virus he's picked up. Only the doc will know.

The mullet of the tour award thus far goes to Neil McKenzie. Just to demonstrate to you how this kind of award gets bestowed upon someone, we decided to have some coffee around the pool as the sun was just setting and it was the perfect way to end a day off. Neil then decided that we had to drink our coffees standing in the pool. Not sitting around the pool at one of the tables with the other guys. No, we had to be in the pooI. I mean where does he come from?

We arrived in Galle for the first test match a few days ago. Its like a real pretty, picturesque holiday resort but unfortunately the sea is a bit too rough and dangerous to venture into and thus we've been spending a lot of time in the hotel pool cooling off. However, it's quite difficult to cool off in a pool with water the same temperature of a jacuzzi. We did venture onto the beach where we bumped into one or two locals climbing the palm trees in search of coconuts and through their toils we got to drink coconut water (from the yellow coconut) and we also got some brown coconuts to eat.

Until the next time, this is Mark Boucher for CricInfo.