MORE ADVENTURES & MISADVENTURES

CONFESSIONS OF A GLOBAL GYPSY

By Dr. Chandana (Chandi) Jayawardena DPhil

President – Chandi J. Associates Inc. Consulting, Canad. Founder & Administrator – Global Hospitality Forum, chandij@sympatico.ca

Trying Hitch-hiking

A month passed after our period of suspension from the Ceylon Hotel School (CHS) and being gated for cutting school for a five-day cycle trip. Once again, I was hungry for an adventure. Over the holiday period, I did a week-long hitch-hiking trip around Sri Lanka with a friend. We faced some challenges, as hitch-hiking was not a common practice in Sri Lanka in the early 1970s. Our overnight stops included houses of CHS batchmates in Kandy and Nuwara Eliya, a rent-free hostel near Kataragama kovil and my aunt’s house in Akmeemana. We achieved our target of zero spending for travel.

More Cycle Trips

1) Kandy

Soon after that I did another cycle trip. This adventure had four main differences – I went alone, included the hill country in the itinerary, did not cut school and borrowed a better bicycle from a friend. I named the bicycle ‘The Lone Rider.’ It was a three-day trip from Colombo to Kurunegala on the first day, Kurunegala to Kandy on the second day, and back to Colombo on the third day. I stayed in my CHS batchmate’s homes in Kurunegala and Kandy.

I was not able to cycle for seven kilometres going up the steep hill around Galagedara, just before reaching Kandy. I pushed the bike for a long time to reach Kandy. The key challenge was the next day when I went downhill. Flying down (on my bike) Kadugannawa’s deep slope was a nightmare. For around seven kilometres, the brakes did not work to stop or reduce the speed of the bicycle. I was petrified, but quickly realised that I must keep my balance and clearly focus on not colliding with any fast-moving trucks on the narrow road. Slight rain made the road very slippery. I was also scared of falling down the mountainous road, which certainly would have been deadly! I was fortunate to return to the CHS hostel unharmed, covering a distance of around 260 kilometres. I improved my speed and became a better cyclist, since the adventure of ‘The Iron Horses.’

2) Kurunegala

A few months later, I planned another cycling adventure. This time, four of my fellow ‘Iron Horses’ joined the trip. We were surprised when one of the younger CHS Lecturers, Mr. Desmond Fernando decided to join. He was always friendly and informal with the students.

There are many interior Sri Lankan towns that have mysterious mountains and towering rocks as backdrops, and Kurunegala is one of them. Thanks to its picturesque setting with eight peaks, most especially the famed Elephant Rock, Kurunegala has much that makes it remarkable. Once an ancient capital, it also has a history worth becoming familiar with.

Our hosts in Kurunegala, my CHS batchmate, Sunil Perera and his elder brother Leslie, loved to party, sing and entertain. They were the ultimate hosts. Every evening we had a big booze and music party before a late dinner. We were woken up early in the morning on our second day in their house, by Leslie. He said, “Machang, let’s climb the Elephant Rock and have our breakfast on top of the rock with some gin remaining from last evening.” A couple of us were hungover from previous evening’s heavy drinking. That was no excuse for Leslie, we soon ended up having a big breakfast on the rock with neat gin!

The next day they took us on a picnic lunch. It was to a venue popular among locals, Bathalagoda Lake Park. This was believed to be built in the 13th century. A stone inscription on the embankment revealed the historic significance of the lake. A little bit of history and lots of food and booze made this trip very enjoyable. We also learned a lot from our lecturer, Mr. Desmond Fernando. He used his talent in interesting story telling to break the ice at parties attended by people we had never met before. I made a mental note that this is a skill I must cultivate.

3) Matara

Since I commenced my hotel management career the very next year, I organised a few cycle trips with the teams I managed. I also organised a couple of cycle races. In 1976, I organised a cycle trip to Matara with members of my team at the famous pioneer resort in Hikkaduwa – Coral Gardens Hotel (where I worked as the Executive Chef and Assistant Manager). The highlight of that trip was a nice swim and a heavy lunch after several rounds of arrack. A major problem stemmed from that.

Some of the riders had too much to drink. They simply were not fit enough to cycle back to the hotel from Matara. I had to think quickly outside the box, in consultation with the few who were relatively sober. We rented a large truck and a driver from a local trader in Matara. We placed all our bicycles in the truck. As the truck had no seats at the back we sat on the floor while we were driven back to the hotel. Those supervisors who were drunk fell asleep during the ride. When we were very close to Coral Gardens, we got off the truck and paid the truck driver. Then we cycled back to the hotel like heroes!

Not Good Enough for InterContinental

Towards the end of our second year at CHS, we heard some good news. The first five-star hotel in Sri Lanka, Hotel Ceylon InterContinental needed 20 well-trained part-time waiters to work during the grand opening of the hotel. I was thrilled with this news. As I was good at restaurant service, I was somewhat sure of this opportunity. However, when the principal announced the names of the 20 second-year students chosen by CHS, my name was not the list. I knew that Herr Sterner disliked me, but did not expect him to deprive me of this valuable experience. Perhaps, that was his revenge for my role in organising the previous cycle trip and cutting school. I was disappointed and depressed when my batchmates described their experience at the one and only five-star hotel in the country. My desperation gradually became a strong determination to gain that five-star experience, without an official recommendation from CHS.

Flipping Hamburgers at a Small Cafe

One day when I was passing the famous Galle Face Hotel, on my way from CHS to the hostel, I dropped in at a small local cafe then called ‘The Windmill’. It was advertised as the first hamburger restaurant in Sri Lanka. There were no internationally branded fast-food restaurants in Sri Lanka at that time, in fact not until the early-nineties. ‘The Windmill’ was very small, but the layout was well-planned for a fast operation and was quite trendy. I introduced myself to the Manager, Mrs. Chithra Perumal, a well-known cookery demonstrator. She interviewed me immediately. I paused a little to read her personality and adjusted the way I communicated with her. That worked in my favour. She offered me a part-time job as a Grill Cook from the very next day.

My job was simply flipping hamburgers, but the manager occasionally asked me to make other dishes I had learnt to prepare at CHS. The few evenings I worked there each week; I was the last to leave after the manager locked the cafe. Her husband, Mr. Felix Perumal was a senior police officer, and came to pick his wife soon after we closed the café at 11:00 pm. They both were friendly and on occasional Saturday evenings went out of their way to drop me at my home in Bambalapitiya Flats, after work. Mainly because of the friendliness of the manager, I enjoyed my fifth part-time job. It is always nice to work for superiors one likes, respects and can le

arn from.

InterContinental through the Backdoor

While working at the Windmill, I never lost sight of my then goal to get into Hotel Ceylon InterContinental. I was pushy in getting introductions to the Personnel Department (Human Resource was not a trendy term at that time). Finally, after some persuasions I was hired as a part-time banquet waiter a few weeks after the grand opening. I was most impressed with their service standards and I learnt a lot. At that time Sri Lanka hardly had any hospitality managers with five-star experience. Therefore, Hotel Ceylon InterContinental managed to get work permits approved by the Ministry of Labour for twenty-three expatriate managers to open this hotel.

At that time, Gamini Fernando (years later the General Manager of Colombo Hilton) was the only Sri Lankan operational manager. He was the Front Office Manager and his team included a young Lobby Manager – Chandra Mohotti (years later the General Manager of the Galadari Hotel). Forty years later, Sunil Dissanyake, one of my batchmates who worked as a part-time banquet waiter became the General Manager of the former InterContinental now rebranded as the Kingsbury.

Mastering Five-star Banquet Service

Mr. Mansourian, the hotel’s Banquet Manager came from Egypt. He was also a good trainer. We served at dinner banquets with elaborate menus with Beef Wellington as a favourite main course. Once an accident happened when one of my batchmates, Kotte, raced with another student with a butter carving made for a buffet table, on a tall trolley from the cold kitchen to the ballroom. It was a large butter carving of a dolphin, which hit the beam of a low celling in the stewarding area. The head of the dolphin broke and that angered the German Executive Chef. Kotte nearly got fired.

The ballroom of Hotel Ceylon InterContinental was the grandest and most prestigious venue for weddings in Sri Lanka in 1973. However, as the socialist government led by the Prime Minister Sirima Bandaranaike had restricted catered weddings to a maximum 150 guest, the hotel could not book any large wedding banquets. That meant that weddings with over guests served only soft drinks. When I served at such weddings my tasks were limited to serving the soft drinks and changing ashtrays throughout each function.

The hotel’s standard was maximum one cigarette butt in an ashtray at any given time. Banquet waiters were trained to cover the used ashtray with a single cigarette butt with a clean ashtray, place both on the banquet tray and then place the clean ashtray on the table. Mr. Mansourian watched the banquet waiters very closely, like a hawk. If he ever noticed two cigarette butts in one ashtray, that became the last shift of the part-time banquet waiter serving such a table.

I quickly learnt that attention to details was essential for quality assurance in five-star hotels. It was in my sixth part-time job that I was exposed such strict discipline in maintaining five-star service standards. That banquet service training and experience at the Hotel Ceylon InterContinental in 1973 was very useful for me ten years later when I worked as a banquet waiter at some of the best five-star hotels in London. It was during my graduate student years in England.

From 1983 to 1985, I worked in London in between my classes and research as a banquet waiter at the Dorchester, Savoy, Claridge’s, London Hilton and InterContinental London Park Lane. Coming first in a special banquet service training program in 1984, I was chosen to serve the Queen of England, Prince Philip and the British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher at a royal banquet held at the best British five-star hotel – the Dorchester. Thank you for the training, Mr. Mansourian!