Making vacation plans with Kim in Male, Maldives – my response to her

I’ve heard that flights are now resuming from the Maldives, but earlier, the news reported that all flights from the Maldives were cancelled. Please update me as soon as you can with what’s happening on your end. Is the vacation still on? Will you still be coming to Sri Lanka? Does Dru still have a job, or will you return earlier to Canada?

IA couple of comments. . . It might be best to leave Kandy for the end. It would likely be much easier to arrange for a van from Colombo with Fahim possibly helping in negotiations. Fahim has made a few comments that are worth passing on.

When you negotiate a daily rate for a van, it could be for the van and driver only, and petrol will be additional, or the petrol and driver could be additional, or it might not include the cost of the driver’s food and lodgings, or any of the above. So while you may have been hearing rates as low as 1500 rupees for a day, that likely doesn’t include petrol or food and lodgings for the driver. Or the price per day may include a certain number of kilometres, and anything above that is extra.

Another consideration is that you may arrange things in advance, and have a driver show up, see just how white you are, and all of a sudden the price is two or three times what was negotiated, and the driver claims a misunderstanding.

If you arrange things on the spot, you’ll likely end up paying considerably more than if Fahim arranges it in advance. Plus, by arranging things on the spot, the driver can always claim a misunderstanding later as he jacks the price in the final tally.

Travel times. Depends on the day – Poya day versus weekend versus during the week. Depends on the vehicle and the driver. Depends on the weather. Depends on whether there’s any construction happening. Depends on time of day. I can’t say that I’m overly surprised. Flexible is always best as this is a country where everything can go wrong.

Author: LMAshton
Howdy! I'm a beginner artist, hobbyist photographer, kitchen witch, wanderer by nature, and hermit introvert. This is my blog feed. You can find my fediverse posts at https://a.farook.org/Laurie.

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