Mr. Cliff and Friends Go to Sri Lanka, Part 2: The Womit

*Warning: This blog post will be 50% about throwing up, and 50% about the once in a lifetime opportunity to trek through a world heritage rainforest site, the only one of its kind on the planet. It’s unfortunate that those two things are intertwined, but in order to accurately portray my experience, I feel the need to tell it like it happened and try to help you understand what I felt at the time. I’ll try to keep it entertaining, so you have a little bit of reason to keep reading. But if this post isn’t the least read of all my blog posts, there is something seriously wrong with my readership. But it will also be an interesting challenge for me to make a post about womit (for explanation of womit, read my PREVIOUS POST) entertaining.

Let’s get graphic. Don’t think less of me after reading this post.

**I actually decided to make the text talking about ralfing a different color, so you can skip over those parts if you want to. Also, special thanks to urban dictionary and thesaurus.com for all of the different synonyms of “vomit”. If you don't want to read about spewing, don't read the maroon text.

If you want to read about the experience from the viewpoint of someone who was actually able to enjoy it, I highly recommend reading Andrea and Alan’s blog! They do a much better job of writing an actual Blog, and not a collection of 3,000 word short stories like I do.

- October, 2006-   Manhattan, Kansas

College kids do dumb things. That’s no secret. It’s also those dumb things that are what you talk about when getting together years after, and the things that make college the best time of your life. The dumb thing we were doing this particular weekend? 8 AM case race. BEFORE leaving to tailgate before a home football game.

The challenge had been thrown down. The eight of us who live at 823 Laramie had divided into two teams to see who could drink 30 beers faster. A good old fashioned case race. The four of us that live on the top floor vs. the four that live on the bottom two floors. What better way to assert your superior masculinity than to prove you can drink beer faster?  I look at my comrades in our huddle and see a beer drinking dynasty. Byron Noll, who has been described by many people as a mountain of a man. Brandon Deiter, 6’6” of pure Northeast Kansas fury. And the incomparable Branden Comfort, who you might not want in an all day drinking marathon, but this was a sprint, and he excelled at that. And then there's me. The only member of my team standing below 6’3”, but I make up for it with a healthy beer belly that I have worked hard to acquire the previous 4.5 years of college.

The opposition? It’s like the Washington Generals playing the Harlem Globetrotters. Andy Wilcox (as featured in my blog 1 Down, 6 To Go) is the only original member of the opposing team that showed up, as the others (including Brett Beem who I’m pretty sure had made the initial challenge) had fled in terror. You have to admire Andy’s courage as he prepares to go to battle with a ragtag group of replacements. A small crowd has gathered to watch the epic bout in our living room, where we have set up a table so we can keep track of the other team across from us. It’s not Holyfield vs. Tyson, but its close. You can feel the tension in the air as we wait for the signal to begin. My mind wanders back to the feeling of being in the starting blocks before a 100M dash at a track meet, 5 years and 30 pounds ago. The familiar butterflies flutter around in my stomach. Perhaps it knows what is about to happen.

Finally the gun sounds. As inspirational 80’s music plays in the background, the bottom floor sprints off to an early lead, as they chug their first cans of Natural Light in impressive time. They are excited, and are trying to intimidate us with their smashing of beer cans and fist pumping. But a smile forms on my lips, as I know that this is a foolhardy tactic. Even though it’s a sprint, chugging is not advisable, as your team will have to average 7.5 beers apiece, and your body can only take so much chugging before your stomach revolts. My team knows this, and we deploy our strategy of steady gulps followed by a few seconds of rest to allow ourselves to expel the excess carbonation. Its 10 minutes before we’ve caught up to their torrid pace. 15 minutes in, their first team member is down. He's headed outside to empty his stomach contents. 20 minutes in, their second team member is down, and it’s clear that we have it won.

But then, I get greedy. I do the quick math and realize that we have a chance to beat the 30 minute barrier. As “Eye of the Tiger” blares on the stereo, our team wordlessly agrees to kick it into high gear, a fierce determination in our eyes. We have a new opponent; the clock. 5 beers apiece down. 6 beers. 7. But it isn’t meant to be, as the clock ticks past the half hour point. We gave it our all, but just came up short. But we still have our original goal to finish, so we get back to business. As the clock ticks towards 32 minutes, I am the last person on my team with beer in my cup. My teammates start to slow clap, as “The Final Countdown” fittingly plays in the background.

I’m so full. I’m pretty sure that my stomach can’t take one more sip of beer. But it would be showing weakness to ask a teammate to finish for me. They have done their part, now it’s time for me to do mine. I stare into my red Solo cup, and see a mere half inch of Natty left in the bottom. One sip, that’s all. I steel myself to finish, driven forward by the slow clapping as it gradually increases pace. I close my eyes and throw it back, and hold my arms in the air in triumph. We embrace as a team, celebrating our achievement. But then it feels as though my throat is getting smaller. Uh oh.

There’s no time to navigate my way to the trash can. Luckily my cup is still in hand, and luckily the first wave is all foam. That allowed me time to get to the trash can for the subsequent waves of recycled beer ruminating from my system. After I finish, my dinosaur calls finally subsiding, I go to the bathroom to brush my teeth so I can continue celebrating with my teammates and head to the tailgate. I look in the mirror as I wash my face and see that during the recent turn of events, I had broken blood vessels in my eyes from the sheer force of my recent regurgitations. When my parents ask what happened to my eyes when I meet up with them later at the tailgate, I realize that dancing around the topic is a fruitless effort around my friends. I’m not sure, but it’s possible that my mom has never been more proud of me than she was at that moment.

May 2012 – Sinharaja Rainforest Park, Friday May 18, 2012- 6 years later

I automatically knew something was wrong right when I woke up. It was early; 5:30 AM since we needed to leave for the rainforest by 6:30. I felt like crap. I was still stuffed from the three plates of Indian food I ate the night before. It didn’t feel like I had even started to digest it in the 10 hours since I ate it. So breakfast was out of the question for me. The nice people at the hotel had packed us a breakfast, but I didn’t even want to think about food. Especially as I started having curry burps. But as I got up and started moving around, I started feeling better. There was just this feeling deep down in my stomach things could unwind in a hurry if something in my belly was triggered.



Pre-wommit. Still thought I was invincible.



We got all packed up for the rainforest and met our Jeep driver, who our guide had hired the night before to take us to the rainforest entrance, because we definitely needed a jeep for the roads we were traveling on. This jeep had seen its share of rainforest roads, and it was the type with bench seats on the outside that faced each other. It also had open sides, so you could enjoy the view on the drive. After driving for a while, he pulled over to the side of the road and ran into a house, and came out with two adorable kids donned in their school uniforms and also a giant bag filled with something heavy enough he was carrying it with two hands. After inquiring what was in the bag, we were informed that it was a giant python, but not to worry because it was dead. I don’t know how big it was, but judging how much he was struggling to carry the bag, and judging by the size of the lump in the bag, I’m guessing the snake was 10-12 feet long, no joke.  I decided to poke the bag to ensure that it was indeed a snake. Yep. Snake. Later we found out from our guides that the snake was indeed not dead. But the residents that live near the rainforest often times find these snakes in their houses and they bring them back to the rainforest to turn free. WHAT?! A little ways further up the road the kids hopped out of the jeep on the side of the road that wound up further into the mountains to walk the rest of the way to school.



Stopping on the way up for a photo op. (Picture stolen from Andrea and Alan)

After half an hour more of driving, all the while viewing the lush and stark beauty of the the hills and trees and wildlife, we finally reached the outside edge of the rainforest where vehicles were no longer allowed. So we hopped out of the Jeep and met our guides. We were also provided with leech socks, which are big booties that you put over your socks and the bottom of your pants, and tie at the top. Obviously these are to keep the creepy crawlies from climbing up your pants legs. Or maybe it’s so they can laugh at the dumb sissy white tourists, since no one else had leech socks on.


Donning the leach socks. At this point, just assume that most pictures I stole from Alan and Andrea, as about 2 minutes after this picture was taken I was more worried about living than taking pictures.

 They also chopped open coconuts for us to have a nice refreshing snack. All it really did was stir up my stomach contents to prepare it for the onslaught that would soon start.

This was just a flame to the fuse. Just didn't know it yet.

At this point Andrea said I should just throw up, but I informed her that my stomach was made of steel, and that I hadn’t thrown up in 6 years, and I wasn’t about to break that streak on an intentional puke. She then laughed and told me that I had just tempted the universe and that I would soon pay for it. I thought I had been keeping pretty good score with the universe, and I thought we were about even at the point. Turns out I was wrong. It soon became obvious that I was going to blow chunks all over the place. So I admitted defeat and separated myself from the others, who were standing and waiting. It’s an odd feeling, this whole throwing up thing. It had been so long. But as the inevitability came to pass, the last 5.5 years flashed before my eyes, as wave after wave of rice, curry, and coconut juice was spewed forth from my system. All I could think about was having to start the clock over. But man, did I feel better.  I was a brand new man. Of course I had to document the experience by taking a picture of it (which I’ll refrain from posting). I was also disappointed with myself that I had not asked Andrea and Alan to take a picture of me in the action. But just in case, I instructed them to do so in the future if the opportunity ever presented itself in the future.

Finally we were all set to go on our rainforest trek. It was amazing, and a very surreal experience to be walking through a famous rainforest in Sri Lanka. Our guides were awesome. They were incredibly knowledgeable about all types of plants, animals, and everything we saw really. If we had a question about something, they had an answer. They could spot things amongst the thousand different shades of green that an untrained eye would never be able to see. One time we stopped and one of the guides just dodged off the path and into the dense plants and trees. 4 or 5 minutes he reappeared and told us to come with him. He had found two awesome little forest owls that were sleeping. They were so cool! They were tiny, and vibrantly colored, as owls go. Here’s a little info about the plants and animals from our travel agent:

The vegetation is classified as tropical wet evergreen forest and the area under the reserve is 11,187 hectares. Out of the 331 woody trees and lianas identified 192 (60%) are endemic to Sinharaja. Regarding Fauna, 141 bird species recorded here and 24 are endemic (27 for the entire country), Butterflies 65 species (1 endemic), Fishes 10 (07 endemic), Amphibians 19 (08 endemic), Reptiles & Snakes 29 (14 endemic), and Mammals 40 (07 endemic).

Here are some pictures of some of the cooler things we saw:



Spider that was as big as my face. Saw a lot of these guys.



Cool kangaroo lizard. Looked just like a kangaroo when it jumped!




I don't remember what this plant was called, but it looks suspiciously like a condom. It traps bugs in the liquid at the bottom and digests them as food. Very cool.



Cool tiny frog.

One thing that was not cool about the rainforest; it was hot. Debilitatingly hot. And humid. I sweat quite a bit as it is. But ten minutes into the trek I was soaked in sweat, especially since my little barfing session. Twenty minutes in, it was clear that whatever it is that caused me to vanti etu (local language for vomit. See what I did there?) the first time was not done with me yet. I started to feel like crap yet again. So I hung back from the group again. It turns out that Alan and Andrea had been listening, as they got a picture of me tossing my cookies this time. And this time I coughed up even more than I did the first time. I was pounding water trying to keep hydrated, as I was sweating profusely by this time, my shirt completely saturated.



On the spot as they promised! This could be an Ansel Adams.

Soon after that we came to a fork in the road where we had the option to take a path that wound higher into the hills, and also got us into some of the thicker levels of the primary rainforest, which we all wanted to check out. After my second bout, I wasn’t feeling well at all, but I wasn’t going to let that stop us from exploring. Bad idea, for me anyways. The climb was much more rigorous that I had expected, and my energy was shot. Between being sick two times and sweating buckets, I didn’t have much left in me. I was no longer really able to enjoy the rainforest because I felt so awful. I didn’t really listen to any of the guides’ explanations anymore, as I was trying to concentrate on putting one foot in front of the other. I had one goal at that point, and that was to get out of the damn rainforest as quickly as possible. I don’t know how many spider webs I walked right into and didn’t care in the slightest, even though I knew the size of the beasts that spun said webs. That wasn’t a concern of mine at the time. There were a few times where I thought I might pass out, so I had to sit down on the ground to rest and try to muster up some energy. During one of these times of pure misery, while sitting on the root of a gigantic tree, it became clear that I was going to upchuck again. I didn’t even move from my position. I didn’t care anymore. My elbows on my knees and head in hands, I regurgitated curry and rice and coconut milk for the third time.

Womit #3. Pure misery.

After that bout was over, I wondered if I was going to be able to stand up. Realizing that there were no vehicles allowed in the rainforest, and even if there were, there’s no way they would make it up the tiny path we just climbed. I had to suck it up. So I mustered all the strength I could, and continued to concentrate on putting one foot in front of the other. Finally we started heading back downhill, which made things a little easier. And a few minutes later, we emerged out of the thick, sticky forest into a bit of a clearing. Finally a little bit of air! But I was still on a mission to get the hell out of there.

Not an ideal path to be hiking on when you're about ready to fall over.

A few minutes later I spied a little shelter that housed some benches, which I made a bee-line for. Alan, Andrea, and one guide were going to take a trail to see some gigantic tree, but there was no way I was going to be able to make it off my bench. So they had one guide stay and watch me while the other three took off on a little side route. About a minute after they left, I passed out on the bench. I awoke to a now all too familiar feeling that I was going to hurl. So I leaned over the railing of the shelter and gave her the old heave ho. Finally I must have been completely out of stomach contents, as  the first wave contained only a few grains of rice and whatever coconut juice and water was left, and the last few waves were just dry heaves. It was kind of humorous because I looked at the guide who had drawn the short stick and had to watch over me, because he clearly didn’t know what to do. He sat probably 30 feet away in the common crouching position just kind of staring at me. There's not much else he could do I suppose.  I sat up for awhile just in case I wasn’t quite done, and a few minutes later Alan and Andrea came back.

Sometime around womit #4. Even my freaking quads and knees were sweating.



Finally, after the last flat stretch of trail, we emerged from the rainforest a few minutes later. I felt like Andy Dufresne in The Shawshank Redemption after he emerged from the river of sewage.  I was upset because I wasn’t able to fully able to enjoy the awesomeness and diversity of the rainforest, but I was elated to be out of there at the same time. Luckily Alan and Andrea took a lot of pictures so I at least have something to remember to good parts by. I just wanted to be able to sit down and stop sweating. When we got back our jeep guy was waiting to take us back down the mountain and back to our rainforest lodge. I got the honor of sitting in the reclined front seat of the jeep, which felt awesome. When we got back to our lodge, we all took a quick dip in the pool, as it was the same spring water that was feeding our shower anyway. To be able to sit and soak in the cool water was amazing. That made me feel 20 times better, and after that I was pretty sure that I was done womiting. For lunch, the staff prepared pretty much the same meal that we had had the night before, in pretty much the same quantity. There was no way I was going to be able to eat that again, and very few things sounded good to me. So they brought me out a plate of different fruits, which tasted amazing. I decided to go take a nap while Andrea and Alan finished lunch, since the smell of their curry was threatening to awaken the demons inside me.



I felt good enough to pose for a picture, but not quite good enough to take off my awesome leech socks.



Soon after we checked out of our "hotel", andwe were off to Kandy, which was the next stop on our Sri Lanka adventure. We still had another seven hour drive ahead of us, but a lot had already happened that day. It was definitely a memorable experience, for more than one reason. I can only hope that it’s another 6 years before I have another one like it.  

**If you read this far, congratulations! You just spent 10 minutes of your life reading a 3500 word blog post about puke. Those are 10 minutes you'll never get back!