Achieving bliss in Sri Lanka

But they ultimately confronted the same pervasive emotion that gives us metal detectors and guardrails, spell-checkers and insurance policies, hedge funds and prenuptial agreements. They confronted their fears: of flying, of foreign shores, of unfamiliar cultures, of nightly news reports, of maps of the Middle East.

And they called a travel agent.

Two days after they arrive in Sri Lanka, we travel an hour south from Colombo's Mount Lavinia Hotel to the wedding location, the Taj Exotica Hotel in Bentota, where we all sit around a table in the hotel's five-star restaurant.

Claudia, my half-Sri Lankan fiancee, her brother, her English grandfather, my four parents, their three children and assorted cousins eat goat-cheese-and-spinach-stuffed ravioli, lobster and shrimp cocktail and drink several bottles of Australian zinfandel. The food is delicious; the waiters are gracious, if a little curious about the origin of such a large and amalgamated gaggle of travelers.

"I have to admit," says Mom, "I'm a little embarrassed that I was as scared as I was." She is, no doubt, thinking, among other things, of the six rolls of toilet paper still packed away in her luggage, just in case. She looks around at the expansive, wood-paneled dining room, out the huge picture windows overlooking the palm-lined swimming pool, at the rolling surf beyond, and at all her children sitting around the table.

"This is very nice," she says, and she smiles.

RIDING ELEPHANTS
"Its skin is rough and leathery," observes Dad, "and it has these little hairs that prickle you when you touch it."

The wedding party and guests are split among Bentota's three main hotels. The Bentota Beach Hotel, where my dad and sister have been riding elephants, is the least expensive and serves an eclectic mix of families and European students away for school-break trips. Its placement next to the Bentota River allows it access to the waterskiing, banana-boat riding and jet skiing demanded by the most discriminating spring-breakers. The Taj Exotica is a massive white-marble palace just up the white sand beach and built around a crystal-clear pool and lush gardens. The Saman Villas is a chic smaller property on a rock outcropping about a mile farther up the beach and home to deluxe spa facilities and isolated luxury.

For about $5 at the Bentota Beach Hotel, each of the hotel's two elephants, Mandy or Bruno, will kneel down so guests can climb aboard, and then they will sashay the 100 yards or so across the hotel compound, dragging their inch-thick chain leads.

Every morning at about 11, their handlers take them down to the Bentota River running next to the hotel to bathe. They slide under the brown water, almost completely submerged, with only the tips of their trunks sticking out to signal the presence of these two-ton animals. They seem to delight in occasionally spraying a well-aimed trunk-load of water in the direction of any unsuspecting passers-by on the shore, evoking rolls of laughter from everyone who didn't get wet.

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