If you know where to look, you can find the numbers all over Ena de Silva’s house. Faded yet still legible, the white scribbles mark each tile in the parquet floor, each pebble and boulder in the sunny interior courtyard. Under their layer of paint, the bricks are numbered, and so are the columns and … Continue reading
It begins in Kotte and ends in Kanda Uda Rata. Along the way, it passes through Hanwella, Ruwanwella, Hettimula, Ganethenna and Balana. The ancient Colombo Kandy route is 13 miles longer than its modern counterpart but it is not the added miles that would have defeated modern motorists. The palanquins and elephants that moved along … Continue reading
In spite of or perhaps because of the identical pale yellow plastic fork earrings dangling from each ear, Sasha Perera catches your eye and then keeps it. The child of a Sri Lankan Tamil father and a Sinhalese mother, Sasha was born in London, has lived in Singapore and Malaysia and is now based in … Continue reading
A single sentence on the back of Chandima Rajapatirana’s t-shirt reads ‘nothing is impossible’. As far as personal mottos go, this one suits its wearer to a tee. Diagnosed with autism and apraxia as a four- year- old, Chandima has defied the prediction of specialists. The man who they recommended should be institutionalised is today … Continue reading
At www.movingimages.asia, Sharni Jayawardena and Tarika Wickremeratne take a walk about Slave Island, Kannan Arunasalam films ‘portraits of resilience’ in Jaffna and Menika van der Poorten searches out what’s left of the planter Eurasian community. Employing photography and film, the series is modelled on one that ran in the New York Times – the Emmy award … Continue reading
Kades of every description line the streets of Colombo. Many are family businesses, passed down from one generation to the next, and populated with loyal customers who wander in several times a day for breakfast, lunch and dinner, with the odd tea break in the middle.They offer affordable, simple, hearty fare and no-nonsense service; and … Continue reading
Tucked into a corner of a narrow residential street, the Devalaya Road – Purana Pattini Devalaya is a little oasis of calm in Battaramula – except on festival nights. Then the small property becomes the busy heart of the community – the rapid pulse and throb of drums fill the air, everywhere there are laughing children, … Continue reading
When Dr. Leo Kanner first wrote about autism in 1943, he changed the way many people understood intelligence. The first scientist to clearly define autism, Kanner was working with 11 children who appeared to be mentally retarded. Among his many conclusions was included his belief that despite their massive communication problems, some of his subjects … Continue reading
They still talk – across the dining table, in the theatre foyer, over a cup of coffee – about the first time Equus was staged in Sri Lanka. More than three decades have slipped by, and the play still holds its own, looming large in many memories. Controversial, shocking, so far ahead of its time, … Continue reading
Smriti Daniel 