{"id":103186,"date":"2020-06-05T14:56:18","date_gmt":"2020-06-05T21:56:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=103186"},"modified":"2020-06-05T14:59:23","modified_gmt":"2020-06-05T21:59:23","slug":"sri-lankan-cafe-owner-feeds-and-shelters-stranded-tourists","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2020\/06\/05\/sri-lankan-cafe-owner-feeds-and-shelters-stranded-tourists\/","title":{"rendered":"Sri Lankan cafe owner feeds and shelters stranded tourists"},"content":{"rendered":"

Courtesy Hindustan Times<\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n

Ratnayake, a cafe owner in Ella, a former colonial hill station in Sri Lankan tea country, organized free food and shelter for dozens of stranded tourists.<\/h4>\n\n\n\n
\"\"\/<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

COLOMBO, Sri Lanka (AP) \u2014 The tourists came to see the magical waterfalls and mountain views of the lowland jungle and rainforest. But then the pandemic hit, and they were stranded in Sri Lanka.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When flights were canceled and the airports shut down, Darshana Ratnayake came to the rescue.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ratnayake, a cafe owner in Ella, a former colonial hill station in Sri Lankan tea country, organized free food and shelter for dozens of stranded tourists.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We were totally blown away,\u201d said Alex Degmetich, a 31-year-old American cruise line entertainment director.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s pretty remarkable,\u201d he said. Coming from Western society, where nothing is really given to us and we have to pay for everything which is fine. But here, locals providing us \u2014 tourists \u2014 free food and accommodation, is really humbling.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Sri Lankan government imposed a nationwide curfew on March 20 to curb the spread of the virus, sealing off entire regions of the Indian Ocean island nation. Degmetich was among 40 tourists from 11 countries stranded in Ella, 200 kilometers (120 miles) east of the capital, Colombo.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ella\u2019s famous treks tend to draw a young backpacker crowd, and Darshana knew they\u2019d soon be out of money, and the small bed-and-breakfast lodges out of food.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He was right: Many of the tourists had just enough money to pay for the trip, and broken supply chains meant the lodges were running low on provisions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Darshana established his Chill Cafe as a juice bar with two tables 13 years ago. The business has grown to a full restaurant and boutique hotel with 72 employees.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Just after the curfew was imposed, Darshana prepared a list of those staying in lodges and began boxed dinner deliveries. And he convinced lodge owners to let their guests stay on for free.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Our livelihood depends on tourism. We must help tourists when they are in trouble. Money isn\u2019t everything. We must help and share at difficult times like this,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He said he also donated 5 million Sri Lankan rupees ($27,000) to tour guides who lost their income when tourism came to a standstill.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Darshana said Sri Lanka\u2019s bloody, decades-long civil war had a huge impact on tourism in Ella. Any time a bomb went off in the country, he said, tourist arrivals fell sharply. For 25 years, separatists from the minority Tamil community fought for a separate state. By the time government forces crushed the rebellion in 2009, U.N. estimates say some 100,000 people had been killed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With the war\u2019s end, Ella\u2019s visitor numbers rose sharply, averaging a thousand people a day, he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Darshana has expanded his support to both lunch and dinner each day \u2014 without, he insists, sacrificing on quality or customer service.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Rebecca Curwood-Moss, a tourist from England, felt hopeless when Sri Lanka\u2019s curfew was imposed. She said Darshana\u2019s meals have done more than fill empty stomachs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the box, we didn\u2019t just find the delicious homemade rice and curry, but we found hope,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Courtesy Hindustan Times Ratnayake, a cafe owner in Ella, a former colonial hill station in Sri Lankan tea country, organized free food and shelter for dozens of stranded tourists. COLOMBO, Sri Lanka (AP) \u2014 The tourists came to see the magical waterfalls and mountain views of the lowland jungle and rainforest. But then the pandemic […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-103186","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-business"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/103186","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=103186"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/103186\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=103186"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=103186"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=103186"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}