Our 6.30am start was followed by a 50min bus ride past paddy fields, water buffalo and the occasional water monitor (enormous dinosaur-like lizard things!). We arrived at the Faculty of Agriculture and were given a dhal and rice breakfast before being taken by jeep down a rocky track to the Nanasaala IT Centre. Here we were to have a class of about 30 kids from local villages for two and a half hours of English fun and games! We started with some warm up games outside and then brought out the i-pod and speakers for some musical bumps and statues to the sound of S-Club 7 and Busted (I think mine and Bron’s dancing was a little too enthusiastic!). Back in the classroom, using an example we drew on the board, we asked them to make posters about themselves; their family, hobbies and favourite foods. The results were impressive with lots of lovely drawings; cricket seems to be every Sri Lankan’s favourite sport! Then we got out the parachute which I had brought from home for the pre-school and had on loan for the day (earlier disaster had been averted thanks to a top-speed bus chase when I helpfully managed to forget to pick it up when we had got off that morning!). We played lots of games with it and finished with an energetic rendition of the hokey-kokey before it was time to go. The teacher gave us a much needed king-coconut to drink which was so refreshing after all that exertion outside in the heat.But that wasn’t the end of it all; we took the jeep back to the faculty’s HQ, via the ‘scenic’ route this time, and arrived just in time for a conversational English class with the university’s technical staff. After a shaky start (the adults were a lot more shy than the children had been!) we got them chatting quite fluently. At the end of the hour lesson we had heard lots of anecdotes about their best, and worst, childhood memories. We had a speedy lunch of delicious carrot rotti and yet more dhal before heading to the Crop Science department to take a careers workshop. The students were really enthusiastic to learn all about writing the perfect CV and it was inspirational to hear about their ambitious future plans. Many of them wish to work abroad and England was a popular choice amongst the Crop Scientists. We chatted to them about farming techniques in the U.K drawing from such gems as Old MacDonald’s farm and One Man Went to Mow – A far cry from the rice paddy fields that we were to visit on a field trip just half and hour later!Out in the paddy fields we saw men and women hunched over harvesting the rice with rusty scythes. Barefoot and with turbans to protect them from the sun, the farmers worked from dawn until dusk throughout the season. Although combine harvesters and such machinery are available in Sri Lanka, the poorer people of Down South still use the more labour-intensive methods of farming. The students took this all in their stride and bounded across the soggy fields in search of ‘Veedi’ rice, an unwanted species of rice which threatens existing crops by prematurely shedding its kernels. Whilst we were learning all about this (as English Literature students we felt a bit out of our depth!) a local man cycled over with a large wooden box balanced on the handlebars of his pushbike. All the students crowded around and, jostling our way to the front, we were presented with a chunky Anaconda that had been found in the field right next to us. Without a second thought the chap casually released the serpent back into the field… time for us to go! After such a hectic day, the bus ride back to Matara was a welcome relief and even the bumpy journey didn’t stop us nodding off.Mary Anne