I Love Sri Lanka

I have heard our parents speak of the many great (and a few ugly ducklings) men who wrought Sri Lanka after our independence and led it well with vision and patriotism, those who did not see Sri Lanka as an means to wealth but loved it and treasured its people as well its resources. Those mens worth was not in rupees but in their actions and ego-less devotion to their country. Today we are a country where politics is everything and all. We have heard this quote from many a Minister who’ve justified their political ambitions at sports meets, religious events, book launches, school award ceremonies and many a mundane and civil events, calling on hate where it is unwelcome and unwanted.

I’m a person who travels quiet frequently by public and occasionally private transport to Colombo, Gampola, Kurunegala, Kandy, Awissawella, Anuradhapura, Galle ect. It has been a shame for me to see our beautiful landscapes, roads, pavements, walls of houses and shops, monuments and other public and private property become ad space for politicians to paste posters, banners, cut outs, hordings, graffiti etc., to promote themselves.

If these people really loved Sri Lanka and those they will serve, certainly they would not destroy property and natures beauty for personal gains. Especially in these dire times when such lofty advertising expenses could be used to help the public and the many in need. An astounding figure is from a personal contact who said a printer has received such an order for 600,000 posters at 10Rs. per copy, which is an awesome amount of 6,000,000Rs (six million). Think of all the money spent on large hoardings, spray cans, paste, people to carry these acts out and transport. This is sadly carried out throughout the country. And yes this is for the upcoming parliamentary elections in April 2010.

This trend for large scale advertising has become the latest fashion in politics during the last few years and saw a major lift during the presidential elections where the advertising was everywhere from local TV, print media such as new papers and magazines, facebook, new york times web, you tube, various blogs, posters and hoardings, handouts, vehicles with loudspeakers glorifying the glorified etc.,

I wonder when all this is done, who will collect the garbage???? we know how great our municipal councils are.

Jax

Hello friends,

I should’ve left “Asta Lavista (Babe?)” on the last post because you guys might have thought  we have gone with the wind.

So thank you for your patience and for returning to ilovesrilanka.

This is a list of topics we hope to cover during the next 2 months. We have painstakingly dissected a small part of the enormous amount of problems facing us in Sri Lanka. Yet i must stress, Sri Lanka is a land like no other in culture, Buddhism and all the faiths, beauty, nature and its fauna. Only we create problems and we must resolve them.

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Today May 08 is the Buddhist sacred day of Vesak (a full moon day). Today, 2550 odd years ago the Buddha was told to have been born then at the age of 35 attained Enlightenment and passed away at the age of 80. This may or may not be true but according to Buddhist tradition this is thus.

On many discussion boards, i have seen many people from around the world become a bit disappointed to know that lay Buddhists practice old and more Hindu oriented practices like worship of various deities for many reasons. This is of course can be attributed to our heritage from neighboring India and also a human factor where people feel their problems can be told to someone higher than them in hope of gains when the mind is weak and lonely. I too may one day ask silently for a miracle But today is truthfully a Buddhist day where many sermons and various festivities are organized.

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Following is an article i found while surfing the big blue bitstream today. It shares ideas which i agree upon and also in the end regards a facet of some of the Sri Lankan sangha i abhor.

By Mano Singham

Of all the major religions, Buddhism (as originally formulated) probably comes closest to atheism and being scientific. If someone, for whatever reason, cannot believe in god but feels uncomfortable with calling themselves an atheist and feels the need to be part of some well-established religious tradition, Buddhism probably meets that need best.

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For more than a year, i have been wanting to write this article. The reasons behind this are a plague for the residents of Angunawala. A water project, a so called development to benefit all has been a problem so obstructive to daily life of ours, that we have had to spend many a day (mostly on half day from work) at the offices of MTHojgaard and the Pradeshiya sabaha (Divisional secretariat).

The said water project which was started on 27 May 2006 & is due to be finished on May of 2009 has been the reason for:

• un-patched roads to our houses for more than 2.5 years
• Catchment area for water which comes to road has increased due to new roads to water tank and the uncovered area for water tank which has removed trees and growth.
• Small culvert put by the company which results in water coming onto roads. Also no proper drainage system.
• of huge pot holes which are dangerous to both man and vehicle
• of large tunneling (for water pipes) on the small roads to our houses which are slowly constructed damaging our vehicles and at most times making the use of vehicle or the road impossible
• the sinking roads and culverts due to heavy machinery (i.e. Backos, Cement mixers, trucks etc.,)
• severe dust pollution from the mud filled roads on dry days.
• of slippery and dangerous roads on rainy days (pregnant women, elders and children are unable to travel)
• of large scale road wash ups due to poor drainage at the water project site (water tank).

This had been going on for nearly three years without respite.

Are we also not tax paying, bill paying citizens of Sri Lanka? And we have had water from previous lines from the Udunuwara water project. But i also agree this project will benefit a larger number of people who are living around the kandy district. It is the disrespectful and untimely as well as lazy work schedules followed by the workers employed or sub contracted by MTHojgaard & its engineers and overseers who are to blame. We have seen severe thefts happening as no officer of MTHogaard is present most times. This has resulted in slow work and low quality work.

For an instance, they laid the pipes for from the main Peradeniya – Gampola rd to the water tank at Angunawala more than 6months prior. But they have had to repair many leaks and replace some pipes due to bad work and are still repairing these pipes. The road to the water tank which is less than 0.5kilometer was dug and not traversable by vehicle for nearly 2 months. A friend slipped on the road and could have been injured but for luck. We have had to go on the stone ridges on the road sides to go to work.

Also it really hurts as some parts of the road was built by the residents by pooling money and was only used for about an year before the water project ruined the roads. You can see from the pics below this.

Here are some photos.

anugunawala rd

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It was a hair raising news alert on my mobile telling me of an attack on the Sri Lankan Cricket team in Lahore which really shook me out of routine. It was supposed to be the 3rd day of the  2nd test between Sri Lanka and Pakistan, held at the Lahore Gadafi stadium.

The attack had occurred as the team were nearing the stadium. The following image from BBC shows the exact attack plan in motion.

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Many banners were seen around our Universities displaying slogans to ban the Private Medical College at Malabe.

I think the Students who protest against this are irrational. can’t they understand that it’s the middle class students who couldn’t gain entry to Medical Faculty, maybe by a very small margin are the ones who are going to be benefited by these Colleges. The rich can go abroad and get whatever degree they want. But I’m sure there will be some standards set in this Private College so the knowledge of the doctors who pass out from it will be equal to any other doctor in the island.

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It was the 8 FEB 09, I was munching a krisko and going to my usual bog, the computer room when i heard the news. It was around 8.15 p.m and the news made me stop.

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Hi All. This site was in our minds for well over an year. After much deliberations and thinking, i chose wordpress to power the site and thought a blog model would be well fitting the purpose as people could comment on various articles.

So hope you guys will make this a place to be, a place to know the what and the who. SO join ilovesl and start blogging on everything Sri Lankan.