This has been an extremely rewarding experience and I have thoroughly and completely enjoyed every aspect of this trip and the experiences that have gone with it (both enjoyable and difficult). I feel a sense of pride the team and have greatly enjoyed been a part of it. I have made a great many new friends both English and Sri Lankan and feel it has given me more confidence and skills and I hope that I have been able to give a bit of something back to the people who gave so much to us.

The work has been a great experience. Coming from mainstream average work in the UK I had such a great time taking on the gardening work and getting stuck in to some good old fashioned manual labour and loved learning the traditional techniques they use in the field. All the projects went so well and were so enjoyable. The schools, teachers and children were a pleasure to spend time and work with. We made close friends with many of the teachers and other contacts that we met and we could not have done the work without them, and we hope to keep in touch with them all over the coming years. The football programme that Oliver took charge of was another big success which came from nothing and he put a lot of good time and work into it but again we couldn’t have done it without the help of Ramsey and his contacts. I loved playing football with the kids and although I couldn’t be involved in the project, I really enjoyed the closing ceremony and the 4 games of football I had. The other project in Vikumgama, the crafts that Rose and Poppy ran, was a huge success and the quality of art work by the women was astounding. Seeing it all displayed at the closing ceremony was indeed a treat and the ceremony as a whole illustrated just how much the people of the village were committed to the work. The other big success was Beams drawing and subsequent painting and I think I can say with some confidence that without him the quality of the art work might not have been at such a high standard (it definitely wouldn’t if I had been drawing!).

Overall thank you so much for this experience I have had such a fantastic time and it has inspired me to see more of the world than I thought possible. I look forward to hearing more over time of what is happening with the work that we have started. I’m excited to hear more in the future of the project work as it progresses and am also excited for the future of the people of Sri Lanka who have given us so much.