The episode of the flying sausage

by Padma EDIRISINGHE

How many can boast that they were just on the spot when a notable event got the green signal to go ahead or better still when the actual event was orchestrated? Anyway very powerful events do not erupt suddenly. For years the underlying factors keep churning and simmering till the whole drama finally comes to a head or climax and just bursts out.

This "outburst" is usually preceded by a fiery catalyst which however is more visible than the undercurrents. While the main actors and actresses of the drama strut on the stage, lesser folk too play their roles.

This group who serves by simply standing and watching, later, if they are so inclined ascend to the role of narrators and themselves achieve some importance. For example a 90 year old German woman about to depart the world hit the headlines recently by announcing that she was on the streets watching the Nazi terror, Hitler cum retinue, parade the streets prior to his invasion of Poland which was the final spark that ignited World War 11.

Some get their names etched just by quoting first or second hand information from an authentic source. Author Kehelpannala quotes his grandmother who in turn quotes her grandmother, a Lady-in-waiting in the Courts of Kandy who had been on the spot when the whole drama of the massacre of Ehelapola family took place.

A proud boast of one of my relatives at Banduragoda off Mirigama is that his great great grandfather had watched the flight of the last king of Lanka. Now in disgrace he was taking an obscure route from Meda Mahanuwara to Colombo via Weuda, Giriulla, Mirigama and Negombo and then by sea vessel to Colombo jetty.

That was to prevent the royal crowd getting murdered by an infuriated populace. By the time I came into this funny world, monarchy was a thing of the past. The last king and his harem had been deported to Vellore and his crown and throne and the very flag had all been shipped to "the mother country".

The last item was left bundled up in an Army Hospital at Chelsea till one of our patriots retrieved it. That was the audacity of the imperialists. So the story I am going to relate has nothing to do with kings and queens but with a shifting population that lived on the sylvan banks of Mahaweli for four years, the most.

The stage of the drama was a Hall for females. This famous seat of learning after much debate in the ruling chambers had been taken miles away from the capital of the country with many an altruistic motive in mind.

One objective was to reach out to the masses and embrace within the University folds the poor girls and boys from the underprivileged schools in rural areas. Doubled with the Scholarship scheme introduced by the great C. W. W. Kannangara dubbed The father of Free education, many were the boys and girls who came in from these schools even though the medium of higher education then was English.

I was initially referring to sparks that ignite notable events and onlookers who come into the limelight just by watching them. Well, I may aspire to such fame by this tale.

The spark that shook the campus for about three days and stalled lectures was actually seen by me. It was not a spark but a flying sausage.

It flew just across the dining hall followed by peals of laughter perhaps to crow the fact that a University society is nothing but a microcosm of the outlying society and that there is nothing to prevent cankers of the larger society seeping into the smaller society.

As the sausage flew there were titters and giggles, nothing out of place in a female hostel. But it ballooned into something ferocious when the RED or Rathu Sahodarees took up the cause of the humiliated girl and conveyed the news to the Rathu sahodarayas. They were a fiery lot with allegiance to Soviet Russia and waiting to galvanize themselves to action and bellow slogans like "Down with the capitalists", "Down with the Suddas" "Hail a classless society !" disturbing the sylvan surroundings. Just a few months after entry they, already feeling the pulse of segments of the class-ridden society, were looking for something just like the Sausage incident and so got down to immediate action. (That Soviet Russia is no more and is as liquidated as these comrades who have opted conveniently for capitalism in later life is another matter).

Coming back to my "watching role", I was seated at the table close to the Kultur table. We had named it so for an unwritten tradition had grown during the last two months or so, that only the girls from certain elite schools in Colombo sat there. God help those who even accidentally sat there. The jeers, the sarcastic comments just screamed. Here I must mention that not all the girls from these prestigious schools acted arrogantly. But a good many of them did, almost conveying the idea that others were just polluting this institution by their presence. That particular day, it happened that a very unsophisticated girl from Ruwanwella Central who always kept to herself and never knew about unwritten traditions and so forth, planted herself on a chair at that table. The response was as usual but the simple girl never noticed anything unusual.Those were the days of extravaganza. They were the late 50s, when rebel movements by disgruntled youths were still miles away. Courses for dinner, European style. Forks, knives, spoons provided, since baked beans, slices of cheese, yellow flops of butter and sausages just cannot be tackled with fingers. The Ruwanwella girl cut a sausage with such ferocity that half or all of it flew and landed on the head of a member of the Kultur Club! All hell broke loose. The simmering cauldron had overflowed finally.

I actually saw the sausage fly. The laughter that issued from those at that table already much amused by the trespassing, I can still hear.

The strike that followed via the intervention of the Rathu Sahodarees was not a protest against this particular incident but against the escalating snobbishness exhibited by a particular group ever since the sessions began.

Their own upbringing seems to have bred the idea that the best of education is the patrimony of the upper class.

The others who came in were just trespassers who should be kept at a distance. Perhaps as "the educated pariahs or Untouchables".

The Ruwanwella girl would have been equally bright as them or even brighter to enter the University under probably difficult circumstances but no one had given her a pre-training in how to tackle a sausage with a fork and knife. Never were sausages on her menu at home. Nor was degrading others on the social menu of the rural entrants. The village monk preaching under the lushly foliaged Bo tree had seen to it that they imbibe correct values and civilized behaviour patterns. Respect for others was one of them.

Thus I conclude the episode of the flying sausage enacted in the late '50 s.