Village, our saviour

Reviewed by Padma Edirisinghe

Admitting to a weakness at quotations yet I remember faint traces of them. One such is, "The person behind the book is as important as the book". Of course. It is almost a redundant statement for both are equally important. There can be no book without a person behind it penning it all. And unless the book is highly academic, in a creative work there is no obstacle for the writer's personality to creep into the book, especially if the writer chooses to do so.

I met the author, Henry Kumarapperuma almost accidentally at a writers meeting and never set eyes on him again. But as I read the book he gifted to me I could see him peeping through every page. Calm, relaxed, contemplative, unpretentious.

And of course the marks of the Do-Gooder stamped on him for good, has been living out of the island for many many years. But chooses not to speak in the Bard's language. Not because he detests it but simply because he loves his own language. He loves the country of his birth and its rural culture in which he was lovingly nurtured. In fact he seems to have got obsessed by it as time effluxed. There is nothing like catharsis, if you tend to get obsessed by something. So he has ventilated all his memories back home via "Gam Saraniya".

Of course he is no novice to the writing field as he has authored three other books but he contends that this is his most significant work so far into which obviously he has put in his optimum expertise not only in the field of writing but in observation and recapitulation of events.

Not knowing the writer's initial background I am unaware whether the coastal belt is his home area but he does present a graphic account of life on it among the coir weaving community which sets the stage for a good part of the book. The poverty, the resultant squabbles, yet the communal spirit pervading it all, the hopes and aspirations of its younger generation are all brought into play here.

The blurb introduces him as a double degree student of Colombo University which he has not forgotten in all its ramifications. The society he experienced there too is a tale to be told. So it needs a little ingenuity to bond the two themes together. With much effort a few of the more intelligent boys and girls find their way there. And that opens the curtain on the lives of young men and women just past their adolescence, experiencing the campus life. Their trials and tribulations, the varied vicissitudes they face, their romances all are related in a steady style that has a fascinating equilibrium of its own. There is also the cry of the missionary and the visionary. He has rosy plans for his country in the future and here he draws encouraging examples from the country he lives in. Attitudes have to be changed, new approaches have to be experimented and boldness should replace timidness - but all this to suit the framework of a rural society. For him the Village of Sri Lanka is uppermost and was uppermost. From ancient times through the medieval period it was so. And the tradition is worth continuing. City can be the nexus of many things but to the village we must return.

Hence Gam Saraniya, "Village, our saviour".

A full-pouched guide book to Australia

Reviewed by Carl MULLER

So you think the kangaroo's pouch is meant for the baby. But what else is in it? Hard to tell, isn't it? I mean to say, if I wanted a room with a view, I wouldn't like people asking if they have any Brussels sprouts in there. But this handy guide is not only one of the most lively and whacky I have come across, but it is so down to earth that one wonders how well the writer has assembled both wit and wisdom in bringing within covers a full pouch, brimming with information that serves up, for migrants and visitors, a full platter.

As it is said in the Foreword [do the Aussies say "Forward',?] it all began with a sort of "reasoning things out." And it is asked: "Why should everyone who goes there fumble and falter at this new life business when the author has already done the necessary fumbling ... ?"

Yes, that's the beauty of it all. Rajaman has stuck to the nitty-gritty and has his say in his own extraordinary way; Rajaman is a Mr. Bean-like character who will guide you through all stages of life in Aussie while explaining things in simple terms and with humor.

To begin with, I have always wondered what our Sri Lankans in Australia think of the cricketers. There is Professor Michael Roberts, who gave an in ­house talk recently on "Ramblings on the History and Sociology of Cricket" at the ICES auditorium in Kandy on August 21st. He was pretty hard-nosed himself. He had a lot to say about cricket, the ethnic warp, the culture, and in passing, said that the Aussie cricketers were a bunch of something. I couldn't quite catch the word but it did sound like those feathered creatures we call "bustards."

Oh well, let that pass, shall we? The guide book does not drift to sports [if we can really call cricket a sport nowadays] so we are spared much that would have no bearing anyway.

Since the author is telling us of Rajaman [who calls himself cross-bred] and what that matey has to say, let's listen to him, shall we? Some extracts are in order:

"Don't get me wrong, mateys. We all bleed and poop much the same way, and as such, basic functions are the same. But... knowing about the little differences can make a big difference." "You [don't) jump across a highway to run after a bus, because the driver wouldn't stop however red-faced and pitiful you [look)." "...in Aussie... people are almost always guided by maps, signals and signboards. Learn to read maps, signals and signboards..." (in this country either you know where to go or you don't. All signboards are plastered over with politicians' faces or announcements of spoken English Classes!) (Driving around Australia?) "Melbourne to Sydney - 10 hours. Sydney to Brisbane - 12 hours ... Flying could be a cheaper and quicker option ..." The book is crammed with a lot of vital information: All houses have gas-pumped hot and cold water. No need for "geezers" (Boy, these Aussies can't spell. Never heard of geysers?)

Settle for a good real-estate agent. Rental rates may vary between States - from pricey Brisbane to cheaper Adelaide. What is more, look for rentals without bond or lease agreements - and don't forget, there are caravan parks, youth hostels, houseboats, student halls. Generally you'll pay A$250 per week at a motel, but a home stay with food, only A$190. A furnished one-bedroom apartment per week, A$260; unfurnished A$190.

You are given the lowdown on buying your own home, and naturally, you need to eat. Rajaman suggests you "get adventurous with it." The supermarkets have it all, but of course one banana costs A$1.62 and a 500g packet of pasta A$2.28. Think that steep? You'll pay A$28 for a kilo of big prawns and A$13 for two kilos of chicken breasts, while a kilo of fresh fish fillet is A$12. Potatoes are cheap: A$1.50 per kilo.

Rajaman suggests you munch on apples [1 kilo organic only A$ 5.89] His maxim is "stay healthy, eat well and drink lots of water" (There are usable loos everywhere!)

The book gives you recipes for a tuna chunk, tomato and unsalted butter sandwich; a chunky beef pasta; and points you to a weekly website with more that 12,000 recipes. He also reminds that supermarket outlets give away recipes for free.

You are told where to go for clothes, and if you have just moved in and with no furniture, call the Salvation Army. They deliver basic furniture free to help you get along. As for clothes, there are the thrift shops like St. Vincent de Paul Stores that offer clothes of all types for a dollar or two.

You are told how to drive, and take public transport, ticket prices ands buying a validated ticket before boarding a bus or train. As for air tickets, always read the conditions.

Perhaps an important segment of this guide is in the matter (and manner) of getting a job. As Rajaman says:

"You arrived in Aussie in one piece, you got a good enough place to stay, bought food and cooked pasta and bought undergarments and towels and hopped on a bus for the first time to go on the job-hunt - so that you can continue to pay the rent, buy food, travel, and be happy..."

There are plenty of casual jobs - but there are the recruitment agencies and he suggests you register with as many as possible and read the fantastic on-line job directory.

All details on the Australian Migration Process are also included - very valuable indeed ­and include visa processes and the category you apply for. Don't migrate illegally. It will result in years in confinement before your case is heard.

Coming to sex life in Aussie, it seems to be pretty rampant. Ashe says:

"Females think about it 30 percent and males 70 percent, so that's a neat round hundred. This involves the pub culture, nightclubs, plenty of drugs and alcohol This is Aussie free-spiritedness - booze, sex and rock'n 'roll. Naturally, we are given points on 'safe sex' and 'sexually transmitted disease' HIV and Hepatitis.

"You are also given a lowdown on the eight Aussie territories and that final crackerbarrel:

"... This whole world is like a fruitcake and we need all kinds of nuts to make it go round. And if the bake is to come out right in the end, the nuts have to mix differently: there's got to be sombre Chinese peanuts; dancing African nougat nuts; formal Japanese square nuts; reserved English dry nuts; spiritual Indian spicy nuts; easy going Australian salty nuts; and striving Sri Lankan coconuts and much, much more. As you can see there are all sorts of nuts in the world; and as we go around doing this "living business" sometimes we get so caught up "on the surface of the nut" that we forget that our "core is made of the same stuff" and we are "essentially" the same everywhere. And thus in ignorance we bare our teeth and bristle at each other.

"As some wise guys said, Sri Lanka was and is the cradle of humanity. Why? Because we have a varied combination of nuts including Sinhalese, Tamils, Burghers and Muslims in Sri Lanka: a complete multipack of humanity living in the isle. And as we do our trip around the world, we sing out the old tune that Sinhala Aachchi is too domineering, the Tamil cousin is too rebellious, the Burgher aunty is too vacillating and the Muslim uncle too clannish! But I say these Sri Lankans are a resilient mix of nuts and not to be underestimated because, despite their differences, when the boat is rocking, they bind together in a strong mix as we have seen in the recent past.... I mean, which country has had all traces of kingdoms, invasions, colonialism, warfare, terrorism, the tsunami, tyranny, inflation, abductions and insurgency all in one and can still talk of a quality of life? Sri Lanka!! And who resurfaces smiling, despite all? Sri Lankans!!

Beautifully enough, this guide also carries a poem by G. K. Samarakoon that you simply must read. This is a guide book extraordinaire, and it brings Australia to you in so many ways no other does.!"

Two new books on the last phase of the Kandyan Kingdom

Reviewed by C. M. Maddumabandara,

Professor Emeritus and former Vice Chancellor of the University of Peradeniya

It is indeed with a certain amount of pleasure and pride that I read these two revised editions released by Ananda Pilimatalavuva who is qualified to speak with some hereditary authority on the Maha Adikaram and the other Kandyan chieftains at the Kandyan Court during that last phase of our kingdom. As he relates in the first book, it was almost on his father's lap that he first listened to the stories on the origins of his family. Having dealt with the Maha Adikaram in his first book he goes on to relate the fascinating stories of the other chieftains and of the Venerated Monk Variyapola Sumangala Thera and the part they played in our First War of Independence. The indefatigable writer through his dedication and commitment to the subject has further researched the facts relating to this period in these two revised volumes. They jointly present a competent narration of dynastic rule and its travails and tribulations during the last phase of our kingdom. Although often denigrated by socialist politicians, dynastic rule had always been in the blood of South Asians and it does not seem to have waned in Sri Lanka even after 60 years of independence!

The Kandyan Kingdom with Kandy as its capital was the last bastion of the Sinhalese. The Kings depended heavily on the nobility - the `Civil Service' of the kingdom - for its administration. After Narendrasimha, the last Sinhala King, the Vaduga Nayakkars of South India succeeded the throne against all old established custom. Excepting for the last King Sri Vickrama, the others were quite acceptable especially Keerthi Sri Rajasimha due to his contribution to Buddhism, the accepted religion. It is with the greedy Western intruders who dispensed the seeds of hatred, intrigue, disloyalty and personal greed to conquer this resourceful island of ours that our troubles began.

The Kandyan nobility was not a repressive aristocracy nor were the peasantry enslaved by them. They were a self-righteous peasantry who as described by Robert Knox were fit to rule once the mud was washed off them. According to the writers Okakura of Japan and our own Ananda Coomaraswamy, "This was spiritual feudalism whereby caste makes a peasant in all his poverty, one of the aristocrats of humanity".

Having been born to this stock of Kandyan peasantry and having listened to the tales of my own ancestors I can believe the deeper dimensions of Kandyan society, culture and its governance was beyond the grasp of most modern historians who were anaesthetized by their education at colonial missionary schools and universities. It is part of this "unwritten Kandyan history" that Ananda Pilimatalavuva attempts to excavate and reveal in his two books on the last phase of our kingdom - a laudable endeavour that deserves commendation.

To turn to a few issues that always nagged my thinking on the history of Kandy and its chieftais, the underlying motive of the writer in his first publication on the Pilimatalavuvas is to "place the true historical facts before the reader and rehabilitate the name of Pilimatalavuva Maha Adikaram in a proper perspective so that he would emerge as a true patriot rathe than a traitor as some writers have attempted to paint him." This is because his ultimate motive as a "king-maker" was to see a Sinhala ascend the throne in place of the Vaduga Nayakkars of South India. As the historian Colvin R. de Silva points out, "Pilimatalavuva aimed at the throne himself intending thereby to expel the Nayakkars and re-establish a truly Sinhala dynasty".

Although Pilimatalavuva Maha Adikaram was of mixed ancestry being descendant from North Indian Brahmins, Pandyan Royalty and native Sinhala aristocracy, his dream to install a Sinhalese on the throne remained undiminished.

Keeping an open mind, the writer refers to the folk-lore extant at that time according to which the last king was supposed to have even been sired by the writer's illustrious ancestor! King-making had always been a hazardous affair and Pilimatalavuva Maha Adikaram was subsequently beheaded by the very king who was nurtured by him. However, hidden behind this cruelty the king had a soft corner for the Maha Adikaram and asked him to retract the evidence against him and save his life even after the execution order against him was given. The great patriot refused to accept such minor mercies from this wicked king and was executed sometime around May/June of 1811.

The invading British colonizers finally established their hegemony over the Kingdom of Sinhale only after the brutal massacre of the people in and after the revolution of 1817/1818, best described by the author in his quotation from A.C. Lawrie, District Judge of Kandy, an Englishman who wrote "The story of the Kandyan insurrection of 1817 - 1818 and its suppression by the English can only be related with shame. By 1819 hardly a member of the leading families was alive. Those spared by the gun, sword and banishment had been consumed by cholera and small pox. The descendants of the leading families were no more and the leaderless peasantry were engulfed in ignorance and apathy".

In meager recompense they established their colonial missionary schools with the declared intention of "civilizing the sons and daughters of Kandyan chieftains" i.e. whatever was left of them after their brutal massacre in and after the revolution, to brainwash and proselytize them to suit their sinister designs. This clossal damage caused to a civilization of great antiquity has never been rectified, compensated or even regretted by these `so-called' empire builders who boasted cultural supremacy.

Among the chieftains dealt with in the second book, Ehelepola is the most outstanding. A close relative of Pilimatalavuva Maha Adikaram, he too was motivated by the same vision to redeem the Sinhala throne. He nearly succeeded but for the treachery of the English and some of our own leaders who crossed sides for benefits of office and lands from the new rulers. After aiding the English to arrest the king, he only wanted to be treated as a `friend of England' but the treatment meted out to this declared friend of the English was shameful and atrocious. He was finally allowed to die as an open prisoner in far away Mauritius; away from his people and without any trial. What a record of human rights by `Great' Britain!

The other chieftains dealt with are the Mollogodas, Pilimatalavuva alias Kapuvatte Diva Nilame, Pilimatalavuva Disava of Sath Korale, Ellepola Nilame, Kappitipola Disava of Uva, Madugalla Uda Gabada Nilame, the Levuke Disavas and Ven. Variyapola Sumangala Thera. According to the stories coming down from my own ancestors who escaped into the jungles of Nuwarakalaviya, in some Valuvas the entire households had been brutally murdered including expectant women leaving no heirs. Thereafter, the rulers surreptitiously created a new set of chieftains from the lowly elements of the traditional manor households giving them English first names for easy identification and ensuring their loyalty.

At a later date (1905) Ananda Coomaraswamy in his "Open Letter to the Kandyan Chieftains" noted the pathetic situation of temples, their frescoes, ambalamas and even the valuavas of the new generation of `Kandyan' chieftains with no effort even after independence on the part of the Kandyan Peasantry Commission and its successors as well as the authorities of the Cultural Ministry of Independent Sri Lanka to right those grievous wrongs.

These two books by Ananda Pilimatalavuva as revised and enlarged editions include two new chapters on the traditional beginnings of the kingdom and their territorial flags and open some dim pages of our history and display the adverse long-term impact of colonial rule. Both books are very readable and written with very patriotic feelings.

They are well-illustrated and have pleasing dust covers. The murals of chieftains, their writings and personal effects are well illustrated. I greatly enjoyed perusing some of the historical documents as well as photographs of hitherto unknown olas carrying the seal of some of the prominent chieftains and the `Olinda Kolumbuwa' (a traditional indoor game-board with rich wood carvings) which has been artistically used to illustrate the chapter headings, reflecting the fine taste of the author and the publisher.

These two books are a reader's delight; collectors and librarians will find them invaluable as a source for historical information, reference and research in their libraries.

Books available at Lake House Bookshops, Sarasavi and Vijitha Yapa Bookshops.