New Horizons – 13 – Consolations

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Aluwihare, Anne Ranasinghe, Arjuna Parakrama, Batik, Belihuloya, Bill McAlpine, brass foundry, carpentry, Dileeni Raheem, Diyaluma, Embroidery, Ena de Silva, Fr Stephen Abraham, Gale Bangalawa, Harin Abeysekera, Horton Plains, Ian Goonetilleke, Ismeth Raheem, Jean Arasanayagam, JVP, K1, K2, Kadurupitiya, Knuckles range, Maduru Oya, Mahaweli, Michael Ondaatje, Nihal Fernando, Nirmali Hettiarachchi, Nuwara Eliya, Peradeniya University, Peter Burleigh, Priyani Abeysekera, Punyakanthe Wijenaike, Shanthi Wilson, Shirley Perera, Suja, Uda Walawe, Wasgomuwa, Yala, Yolande Abeywira

In those years of constant change in the mid-nineties, continuity in terms of family life was provided most solidly by my aunt Ena. We had become great friends way back in 1983, when my adventures at S. Thomas’ had prompted her to seek to get to know me better. We got on superbly from the start, and as she said on her 90^th birthday, when it was clear that she was dying, there was no reason to be sad for we had had such good times together.

These were first and foremost at Aluwihare, her wonderful home in the hills, which she had transformed into a magic retreat, full of colour and exotic artefacts. In addition to the batik and the embroidery done by her girls, as she still called them a quarter of a century after they had begun working with her, she had created employment for the boys of the village too, a carpentry shed and then a brass foundry. And then she had also started a restaurant, not one but two for she had no sense of restraint, K1 as she called it down the hill from her home where meals could be booked by tour groups, K2 on the roadside, which was not only a Kitchen but also provided rooms to stay.

The first was catered to by her own cook, Suja who she claimed could not boil water when she had first come to work, but who now produced the most marvelous concoctions. The other provided work for the middle aged ladies of the village, some of them relations. Though they exuded confusion as they bustled about, they were quite charming, and those who stayed and those who ate were entranced. The American ambassador, Peter Burleigh, used it seems to stay there often, which may well have been for nefarious purposes, but he was dearly loved by the ladies.

We had gone down often to Yala in the eighties, with memorable holidays during the times of turmoil, when we had the Park practically to ourselves. But when the JVP insurrection was over, more and more people began to visit, so we found other places too, Uda Walawe and Horton Plains and more frequently Wasgomuwa, which was a relatively short journey from Alu, over the Knuckles range to the Eastern plain.

New Horizons – 3 Belihuloya and Buttala

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Aluwihare, Amparai, Anamaduwa, Ananda Coomaraswamy, Batulu Oya, Belihuloya, Beragala, Buttala, Chitra Wickramasuriya, David Woolger, Diyaluma Falls, Gam Udawa, Getamanna, Gill Juleff, Haputale, Ismeth Raheem, John Keleher, Mahaweli, Mahiyangana, Matale, Matara, Medawachchiya, Neil Kemp, Nirmali Hettiarachchi, Paru Nagasunderam, Polonnaruwa, Rahangala, Rex Baker, Samanalawewa Dam, Somasundara, Vavuniya, Weerawila

I also much relished in my new job the opportunities I had to travel outside Colombo, to explore again and again what I had once described as the widest range of beauty to be found in the smallest compass in the whole world.

I had got used to frequent travel in my last years at the British Council, first for the office on the Furniture Project which had been started for the North and East soon after the Indo-Lankan Accord. When that unraveled, we had persuaded the Overseas Development Administration to transfer the funds to two other Districts, in addition to Amparai, which remained comparatively safe for travel.

The two selected, because of their proximity to the East, were Matale and Matara. I was able therefore to drop in frequently on my Aunt Ena in Aluwihare and on my father’s brother and his wife in Getamanna. But I also stayed often in Resthouses, and grew to love what I saw as their unity in diversity. The country had a range at different levels of comfort and cleanliness, ranging from the dingy old one at Mahiyangana to the lovely new one in the same city, on the bank of the Mahaweli. I loved too the little ones, at Batulu Oya, and Weerawila overlooking the reservoir, and Anamaduwa looking over paddy fields when Chandrika first changed the clocks and the evening stretched out for ages, as I remembered from Summer Time at Oxford.

Rajiva Wijesinha’s The Past Is Another Country – Down memory lane with Ismeth Raheem

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Geoffrey Bawa, Ismeth Raheem, The Past is Another Country

The Past is Another Country is a series of interviews with individuals distinguished for their contributions to culture and to society. In addition to discussing their individual contributions, the programmes explore the context in which each of them functioned. The interviews, by Rajiva Wijesinha, cover a range of developments in post-independence Sri Lanka, and present a panoramic view of social change in the latter half of the 20th century.

Ismeth Raheem is an architect who worked with Geoffrey Bawa for many years, and was then responsible for a number of interesting buildings hotels combining traditional Sri Lankan concepts with modern developments. He is also a polymath, who has studied and written about the manner in which Sri Lanka has been seen and presented in pictures and photographs and writings during the colonial period. His knowledge of ancient irrigations systems is also perhaps unrivalled.

Travels with Ena: Home Stays – Part 4

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A Way in the World, Affiliated University College, Anil’s Ghost, Anuradhapura, Australian High Commissioner, British Council, Commonwealth, David Woolger, Dileeni Raheem, Dodo Fernando, Ena de Silva, Ena de Silva Fabrics, GELT Centre, Gill Juleff, Herbert Keuneman, In the Skin of a Lion, Ismeth Raheem, Jeevan Thiagarajah, Many Voices, Michael Ondaatje, Nihal Fernando, Nirmali Hettiarachchi, Peter Rowe, Phyllis Ratwatte, Raji Ratwatte, Regi Siriwardena, Richard de Zoysa, Running in the Family, Scott Richards, Shanthi Wilson, Suren Ratwatte, The English Patient, The Enigma of Arrival, The Ground Beneath Her Feet, The Moor’s Last Sigh, Yala

In addition to writing and loafing, there was also much talking. In the early years there was usually some sort of a party there, one or other member of what we termed the Hard Core, the group of relations (which of course included Shanthi Wilson, her parents having been close to both Ena and Phyllis for decades) which went to Yala. As that generation, my sister and Raji and Suren Ratwatte, and those they wed in the course of the eighties, became too busy for more than the occasional trip, I found an older generation in attendance, to go with Ena to Yala and also spend time at Alu. Nihal and Dodo Fernando were the main figures early on, and later  Ismeth and Dileeni Raheem, all of them entertaining companions, full of fascinating information, not always the most useful.

I also took up several of my own friends, all my foreign guests whom I thought worthy of the honour, and the few local friends I thought Ena would find congenial. Ena’s favourite amongst them was Nirmali Hettiarachchi, who also took her family up on occasion, while Jeevan Thiagarajah also got on extremely well with Ena though I would have thought they did not have much in common. But, like Richard, his ancestors had been part of the circles Ena had moved in, and even more than Richard he had extremely good manners of an old fashioned sort, which Ena much appreciated. She did not however have any good words to say about Jeevans’s wife, and as usual her instincts proved correct, for some years later there was a most acrimonious parting.

Travels with Ena: Yala and other travels – Part 4

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Aluwihare, Bogowantalawa church, Dilini Raheem, Ena de Silva, Ismeth Raheem, Julia Cameron, JVP, Kadurupitiya Bungalow, Manik Ganga, Talgasmankada, Uda Walawe Park, Wasgamuwa, Yala

I spent several Christmases with Ena at Yala and later at Wasgamuwa. The first of these was in 1987, when her daughter Kusum too joined us, and Ena decorated the Bungalow and its surroundings magically, Japanese lanterns winking at us through the trees as dusk fell. We were in Talgasmankada, the most distant bungalow, on the banks of the Manik Ganga. In those early days we would regularly venture also into Block Two, which required a permit and very steady driving in a good vehicle. Raji furnished both, and we would have long days out in that arid plain, a marked contrast to the lush jungle of Block One. We rarely saw anything, but the landscape was enchanting, and the picnics in isolated spots of green that had sprung up around scarce sources of water.

A friend from England joined us for two more Christmases, in 1990 and 1991, when Kusum came out again with the husband she had married in 1989, at a series of weddings including a spectacular ceremony at Alu at the height of the JVP problems. In 1990 there were just a few of us, which was bliss, though Kusum terrified poor John, having decided that someone who had been to Oxford and taught at Eton needed to be taken down a peg. This was grossly unfair, for John was never obtrusive about his position, but as Ena said, Kusum was just being Kusum. To me she was absolutely charming, and it was a pleasure to talk to someone so obviously bright who was keenly interested in the social and political upheavals going on in Sri Lanka at the time, without the partisan commitments evinced by so many in what might be termed the Colombo establishment.

Travels with Ena: Yala and other travels – Part 3

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Acts of Faith, British Council, Days of Despair, Ena de Silva, Harin Abeysekera, Ismeth Raheem, J R Jayewardene, Mahasilawa, Nihal Fernando, Patanangala, Philippine People’s Revolution, Priyani Tennekoon, Richard de Zoysa, Romesh Dias Bandaranaike, Shirley Perera, Steve de la Zylwa, Tangalle Resthouse, Tissamaharama Resthouse, Waruna Karunatilleke, Yala

Work at the British Council prevented me from going on all the Yala trips that Ena and her troops indulged in that year. Richard joined them quite often, more than once having to travel in the back of the pick-up so he could stretch out a leg swathed in bandages or otherwise requiring special attention, after yet another motor-cycle accident. Once he was accompanied by Steve de la Zylwa, which prompted an exciting story of being confronted by a leopard when they had gone swimming at Patanangala, though the rest of the party were not entirely convinced that there had been any real danger.

I was actually only once on a Yala trip with Richard, in 1986 when the Philippine People’s Revolution was happening. By then he was very close to Waruna Karunatilleke, who was helping in his work for Lalith, and had brought him along too, though Shanthi disapproved thoroughly, and even Ena found Waruna not exactly sympathetic. His determination, which Richard indulged, to listen to the news as the drama in Manila developed, seemed perfectly understandable to me, but Ena and Shanthi thought it quite alien to the Yala spirit. Richard, who of course sensed what was going on, gradually then moved away from the group, though this may have been as much because of the political involvements that were beginning to grip him, which also moved him away from Waruna too by the end of the decade.