One curious thing which struck me as we arrived at Sri Lanka airport recently: duty- free shops selling heavy white goods.. washing machines, ovens, refrigerators etc. Hmm.. I have travelled to quite a few airports in my time, and it's the first time I've ever seen this!
On one hand: it makes sense to save duty on expensive, big things. In fact, more sense than saving tax on small items like cosmetics and alcohol. On the other hand: you can't put a refrigerator in your hand-luggage. And even if you're buying it on return to Sri Lanka as a local (which is what I guess people do?) you presumably have to have a van waiting to help take it home?
Interesting. If the logistics are easy for the latter, I am now wondering why other airports don't have duty free shops selling such things - or even for larger items, duty-free cars, for example? I can imagine these cash savings would make pretty good business, but I am guessing there must be legalities which make it not worthwhile in places like Singapore or London.
Anyway, if you're visiting friends in Sri Lanka and want to take them a washing machine as a gift, here are some of the shops!
http://www.airport.lk/passenger-guide/shopping-dining.php
Yep, I have just been to Sri Lanka! (Surprisingly close to Singapore, and from my brief experience there - a really wonderful country.) Anyway, we did many fab things there, and among them was a rural village visit, with a local cooking lesson from a friendly Grandma. In fact she was both friendly, and extremely strong - as a lot of the daily cooking chores appeared to require quite high amounts of muscle-power!
So, we were shown some basic domestic techniques such as how remove the husks and make rice flour, make rope from coconut husks.. Followed by how to make a local roti (flatbread) and coconut sambol (a kind of dipping chutney).
The Roti
Was made with millet (fluffy, three-pronged 'flowers' which required work in a heavy-duty mill to create flour). Added to the flour was water, seasoning, and coconut milk (made from a fresh coconut, and again requiring some efficient break-in work to access the nut using a scary-looking metal prong!) The dough is quite sloppy, but kneaded, spread flat between two banana leaves (which are soaked in water in advance, so that they don't combust during cooking) and put over a small toasting fire for about 5 minutes.
The Sambol
Fresh grated coconut, chilli, salt and pepper, a small reddish onion (I think that's all?) were then ground under a large rolling-pin style pestle and mortar, and served in dipping bowls to be consumed with the freshly baked roti.
The meal was delicious, actually! The cooked roti is a sort of dense pancake with a strong creamy-coconut flavour to it, which went really nicely with the spicy chutney.
Another of my Christmas packet gifts from Japan - and it's taken a little guesswork as my kanji reading is not great (to decipher what it is, or how to make it!) But it seems to be a case of add-boiling-water-then put over rice. It might not look it, but it was pretty tasty! And incredibly easy (especially as I also have a rice-cooker).
'Don' 丼 is short for Donburi, and seems to mean basically 'anything over rice, in a bowl'! 親子 refers to a mix of egg, chicken and a few other ingredients. So it's a kind of flavoured scrambled egg rice topping.
