Images of Jaffna
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- Category | Our Heritage
- Published on Wednesday, 13 November 2013 06:19
The rebuilt Jaffna Library at sunset. Photograph ©Chulie de Silva
Beauty buds from mire
And I, a singer in season, observe
Death is a name for beauty not in use
Hikkaduwa reflections on a Jaffna morning
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- Category | Our Heritage
- Published on Wednesday, 13 November 2013 05:15
Jeyaharan 51 Years. Photograph© Chulie de Silva
Outside the small hotel we stayed in, the wind howled in the night. It was eerie -
On a Trail of Ivory Carving
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- Category | Our Heritage
- Published on Wednesday, 13 November 2013 03:53
Ivory inlaid table top. Nooit Gedacht, Unawatuna, Sri Lanka. Photograph©Chulie de Silva
Does your family hold heirlooms of ivory inlaid combs of yesteryear? Ivory combs or panawa in Sinhala were apparently flirtatious gift, an expression of love and at times a gift given surreptitiously during a clandestine affair.
Puttalam and Ibn Batuta
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- Category | Our Heritage
- Published on Wednesday, 13 November 2013 04:28
Puttalam, situated about 80 km north of Colombo, is often lashed by severe storms. Today (3 Oct 2009) as I write. Over 1000 houses were destroyed completely another 500 damaged. I am not sure if it was a storm like this that drifted the sailing vessel of one of the greatest Arab traveler of the medieval times to land in the Puttalam lagoon in 1344. He was non other than Ibn Battuta, the native of Tangiers in Morocco. He had set out for the traditional pilgrimage to Mecca, got bitten by the travel bug and continued to roam for some thirty years a record 75,000 miles covering all Muslim countries except central Persia, Armenia and Georgia.
From a Bangla Shuvo Noboborsho to a Sinhala Shuba Navavarsha
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- Category | Our Heritage
- Published on Tuesday, 12 November 2013 11:37
There are no auspicious tmes in Dhaka. Here life does not revolve around the good and bad times as predicted by the horoscope men as ours do in Sri Lanka. Their New Year logically