Colombo's land of the dead

Unlike mega cities that usually hush up their main cemeteries, the cemetery of our capital sprawls almost across the heart of the city for acres and acres. The proletariat that includes me calls it simply Borelle Kanatte. Very easy to locate with the somber tombstones of the Buddhist deceased and the more glaring large crosses and angels hovering over the Christian dead providing further landmarks.

Actually our island has double capitals, Sri Jayewardenepura, the administrative capital and Colombo, doing all the rest. It may surprise some readers to know that the ancient Palace of our Kotte kings is today marked by a Karakoppuwa or Portuguese word for cemetery ,I presume. More likely, Dutch going by Kakkussiya (lavatory) and Kussiya. (kitchen -both Dutch words), Anyway, the more learned can dispute this. The Karakoppuwa lies along Maligawa road today, the nameboard the only other tell-tale mark. How come?

According to legend of the area what happened was that this destructive race with evangelical zeal, burnt down the palace and built a church in the premises. Any left overs of the palace they transported to Colombo to put up their colonial buildings. In course of time, with the population reverting to the former faith and the converts going over to Colombo, the church fell into disuse. The cemetery, an integral part of the church and known by the name Karakoppuwa yet remains. So, try to locate the resplendent Palace of yore over which Kotte poets wove their fabulous verses, and you would be shown the Karakoppuwa. Woe to the foes , yet times are long past.

Cemetery

Coming back to Colombo's cemetery, its land had always been a land of the dead according to local sources. Massive trees grew in the forested area said to be an extension of Kumbikale, but while the kumbi or ants grovelled beneath, there dangled here and there on the boughs of the giant trees , corpses. They belonged to criminals of the area on whom the locals had done their own justice.

While working in the Ministry of Education, under the Creative Writing Project I ran a project of getting young writers in schools to put out booklets on places of historical importance in the island, carrying not only researched data but photos and illustrations and dramas invented on the data. I did not expect the matter to be 100 percent historical for the children were not writing academic treatises. Yet some exploited it to sling mud on the initiator.That is Sri Lanka. And this too is Sri Lanka. A recent book on females had usurped the photograph of the head of the country opening the exhibition of these precious books that came from all over the island, which in the caption changed the venue of the exhibition from the National Archives to Visakha Vidyalaya and the woman who monitored it from me to another, as she chaperoned the great one.

Last resting place

Go to courts on the matter? The just cannot be bothered. Truth will be the victor one day. Coming back to the topic, one of the books submitted was on "The last resting place of Colombo " ie.the Kanatte cemetery. It was submitted by Devi Balika Vidyalaya of Colombo, the most fitting school to choose this topic. This school's euphemistic name happens to be Delovak Athara Vidyalaya or the college between two worlds, for on its left is Castle Street Hospital where new life blossoms out daily and on its right is Colombo's main graveyard sprawling on prime land where many a Colombo or nearby resident whose life is flushed out enters. Due to the steep rise of those about to die and the dearth of land within, for new graves, many are said to book space beforehand paying exorbitant amounts.

I cannot resist relating this piece before going on. There were two Andersons among our British governors. One was highly popular because he came here in the aftermath of the Martial Riots that entailed also the seizure of many a land of the Sinhalas by an avaricious community. Assisted by Maha Mudaliyar Solomon Bandaranaike he ensured the return of these lands to the original owners. But alas, he died at Nuwara Eliya of appendicitis and the corpse had to be brought to Colombo. Many lined the road to touch the coffin out of reverence but since this delayed the journey, the coach that carried the corpse of the great one raced at high speed. English newspapers following day titled it all melodramatically, "The case of the flying coffin" that even British newspapers had copied. The Sinhala newspapers had, however, been more sensitive as respecting the dead.

Governor

All this and many a detail I encased in an article I wrote on this governor which prior to publication had been submitted to a proof reader. Days later this person almost chased behind me on the streets and informed that after that article appeared robbers had dug up Governor Anderson's grave and removed many valuable accoutrements as his gold watch, gold pipe and even gold dentures! Why don't you visit the place, he said. "Well' I said suspiciously, "I have no special love for that Governor. That piece was one of a series on British governors. Anyway thanks for telling". I scoured the newspapers but there was no such report.

The following week attending a funeral at Kanatte I made inquiries from the chief guard and was told that no such thing has happened and that it is one of the best preserved graves at Kanatte for many a Britisher visits it. If ever I see the proof reader on the corridor after this he had a habit of hiding after playing that prank on me. The best part of the tale is that his own name is testament to the fact that his ancestors had once sailed across oceans from the West. Now frustrated here, he stoops to this kind of prank. Now where was I ? Yes. At Delovak Athara Vidyalaya that produced "the epic" on Kanatte, Colombo's main graveyard.

Evolution

It was a very well researched book giving its land area , location, its evolution and the mode of its upkeep. The girls had met many important officers to get the facts. Often I dream of these books, including the one on Kanatte. The Archaeology Commissioner at the time H.M. Sirisoma ( now deceased) was so fascinated with the books and the gentleman that he is without picking holes here and there to demonstrate one's own greatness, he had them micro-filmed and deposited in the Archives.

Once I climbed the steps of the Archives and wished to see them. But the reception I got was cool. The woman said that she had just come in to the post and wanted time to search for them. She sounded suspicious too perhaps sensing that dough was involved. She promised to investigate into the matter and get in touch with me. But no such touch took place..Perhaps that crop of about 130 booklets attempted on Lanka's most known historical places ranging from Dalada Maligawa to the Wonder Bridge off Badulla and the Botanical Gardens of Gampaha are still lying there.

I hope that they are safe. The woman has still to get in touch with me.