Today, we were sightseeing around Kandy. This included a visit to the Temple of the Sacred Tooth Relic, and looking for somewhere to watch the Perahera Festival parade in the evening. Locals were starting to line the streets from mid-morning, even though that meant sitting/standing for up to 10 hours in the rain, waiting for the parade to start!
The Temple of the Sacred Tooth Relic, is, as the name suggests, a temple which holds the remains of one tooth of the Buddha. As legend has it, the body of the Buddha was divided upon his death, and various parts were scattered across the globe, to be held in perpetuity for his adherents. This temple got a tooth. OK then.
We had been warned (again, by Dinesh, who had proven himself to be full of handy information!) about what was a reasonable price and what was an unreasonable price, for seats along the parade route.
We walked, we inspected, we haggled, we walked some more.
Eventually, we found a seafood restaurant which promised us dinner, and good seats on the (under cover) upstairs balcony, all for a reasonable price (about AUD$60). This was mid-afternoon. We paid our money, and headed off back to our hotel where we would change into dry clothes before coming out for the evening. With the rain being on and off all day, we had decided that we wanted seats that would be sheltered should the rain linger during the parade.
As we headed back to our hotel, we wondered whether we’d done the right thing. We’d just handed over a veritable fortune (for the locals), and got no receipt to verify our booking. I guess we’d soon learn.
In the evening, we headed back to our restaurant, and much to our relief, we were treated as paid-in-advance guests. Dinner was so-so, but our seats rovided a good view of the parade. I shot some images from the balcony, but also wandered down to street level for some more close-up views.
The Perahera Festival is held around July/August each year and celebrates the Sacred Tooth Relic. The parade consists of over 2000 dancers and a lot of lavishly-decorated elephants.
