BRUNO ON ELLA ROCK

While I was travelling around the island of Sri Lanka, fate would have it that during my climb up Ella Rock (the hill above the town of Ella) I came across an Italian named Bruno. He was sitting at the top of the main lookout, above a great drop into the valley, playing his guitar. Simply someone you notice at first glance. And speaking of that first glance, he didn't look much like an Italian anymore. :) I listened to a few of his songs and photographed the surroundings. But then I couldn't resist and went to ask him whether I might record one of his songs. He agreed at once, and so the video you'll find at the end of this article came to be.

Then Bruno and I got talking, and I learned that he had already been on the road for five months. He had started out from Italy and travelled through Slovenia, Croatia, Bulgaria, Turkey, Iran, Pakistan and India, until he reached here in Sri Lanka. How your route can cross paths with someone like that, I can't fathom, but perhaps it was meant to be. He told me how wonderful it was to travel through the Middle East, how warm-hearted the people are there, inviting him into their homes and playing host at once; how it wasn't until the winter months that he reached the foothills of the Himalayas, where he froze at minus 15 degrees Celsius; and what unbelievable views open up as you pass through the Karakoram valley. How immense the walls of Nanga Parbat are, rising to over eight thousand metres above sea level… And we talked about many other fascinating things too. Whenever I meet people like this, I always regret that I'm nothing but a mere tourist, whereas they are true travellers.

It was very interesting to talk with him for a while and to learn the amusing fact that, as an Italian, he had never actually been to Rome. Unfortunately I had planned the drive from Ella to Tangalle for that day, so I couldn't linger any longer. I took down Bruno's e-mail address so I could send him the video I'd filmed, wished him lots of luck on his onward journey, and had to set off again. I hope he's doing well and has made his way another few hundred kilometres further along his path.

Note: Filmed spontaneously and handheld at the top of the Ella Rock lookout on a Nikon D800 with a Rode VideoMic Pro and supplemented with a few shots from the same Nikon and a 4K Xiaomi camera. Please forgive the sound quality, both because of the microphone used and the filming location, and because of Bruno's guitar, which really has a lot of miles behind it by now. :)