SEE ... https://www.news.com.au/travel/travel-updates/incidents/byron-bay-iconic-aussie-beach-left-unrecognisable-by-erosion/news-story/e15bc2d8e8b80280b2e ..……………………. AND …………………….https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-07-27/byron-bay-beach-disappears-as-erosion-takes-its-toll/12495864 …………………… https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2020/dec/14/byron-bay-beach-damage-worst-in-a-generation-as-storms-batter-1000km-of-coast
Island, 7 December 2020, where the title reads “Lord Naseby: UK policy statement on Lanka riddled with factual inaccuracies”
Lord Naseby, the Honorary President of The All Party Parliamentary British Sri Lanka Group has, on the basis of assurances received from the heads of ICRC, Colombo, on three occasions; denied torture was taking place in post-war Sri Lanka. In a letter addressed to Lord (Tariq) Ahmad, Minister of State for South Asia and the Commonwealth, [Naseby] reminded the Minister how some Tamils caused self-harm to gain entry into the UK.
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Jason Bittel,, in National Geographic, whose prefered title is “Tasmanian devils return to mainland Australia for first time in 3,000 years”
It’s been 3,000 years since the Tasmanian devil’s raspy shriek rang through the forests of mainland Australia. But now, thanks to a dogged reintroduction effort, 26 of these endangered tiny terrors have returned.
No bigger than a lapdog, these marsupials are famous for their ferocity and powerful jaws, which can reduce large carcasses to smithereens in minutes. But in the 1990s, the species was hit with a contagious and deadly mouth cancer, causing its only remaining wild population, on the Australian island state of Tasmania, to drop to just 25,000 animals.
Tasmanian devils, known for their ferocious temperaments, have been plagued by a contagious facial cancer in recent decades.
Dr Tilak Siyambalapitiya, in The Island, 8 December 2020, where the title reads “Wind power in Mannar,now a reality”
On a windy day, way back in 2002, an engineer from the CEB, approached the Mannar island, searching for a location to set up a wind measuring system. Those were difficult times, with the ceasefire taking hold, but a flareup between the two warring sides was imminent. He precariously crossed the makeshift bridge, on the Mannar causeway, previously blown-up in the war. Moving toward Thalaimannar, the road was deserted and full of potholes, the result of years of neglect during the war. With calculations and estimates in hand, he knew Mannar would be a superior location for wind power, compared to Hambantota, where a pilot wind power plant had been fixed three years back, in 1999.
Gerald Peiris, whose original refereed essay in 2005 in Faultlines, Volume 17, Journal of the Institute for Conflict Management, New Delhi …. is entitled “Federalism and the ‘Federal Option’ for Sri Lanka” ….. Its Table of Contents is reproduced at the end of this presentation.
On Federalism as a Modality of Conflict Resolution
“The successful operation of federal systems requires a particular kind of political environment, one that is conducive to popular government and has the requisite traditions of political cooperation and self-restraint. Beyond this, federal systems operate best in societies with sufficient homogeneity of fundamental interests to allow a great deal of latitude to local government and permit reliance upon voluntary collaboration. The use of force to maintain domestic order is even more inimical to the successful maintenance of federal patterns of government than to other forms of popular government. Federal systems are most successful in societies that have the human resources to fill many public offices competently and the material resources to afford a measure of economic waste as part of the price of liberty”.
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Selva Kanagasabai, whose original title in this essay presented in 2005 [before Larry passed away] runs thus “Larry “Evergreen’ Schokman now foliates Florida” …. while highlighting emphasis has been imposed here and there by The Editor, Thuppahi
During the 1950s, changes began to appear in the management of tea estates in (then) Ceylon: Although most of the planting jobs were still the preserve of British expatriates, political realities and foresight opened opportunities for young Ceylonese to enter this challenging and rewarding occupation. Initially, it was mostly Trinitians and some Royalists who were selected (probably due to a perception that Rugby players were better suited for the outdoor life on plantations). The presumption was “if you played hard, you worked hard!”
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Uditha Devapriya who notes that the article that followw here was published in two parts by “The Island” in its “Midweek Review” of December 2 and December 9, 2020. It has since been edited to incorporate information which at the time of writing the author was not able to add.
Napoleone di Buonaparte
I: Viewed in retrospect, the yahapalanaya regime seems almost a bad memory now, best forgotten. This is not to underrate its achievements, for the UNP-SLFP Unity Government did achieve certain things, like the Right to Information Act. It soon found out, however, that it couldn’t shield itself from its own reforms; that’s how 2015 led to 2019. Despite its laudable commitment to democratic rule, the yahapalanists reckoned without the popularity of the man they ousted at the ballot box. November 2019, in that sense, was a classic example of a populist resurrection unparalleled in South Asia, though not in Asia: a government touting a neoliberal line giving way to a centre-right populist-personalist.
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Michael Roberts
The Roberts Oral History Project involved many stages and a range of tasks. The interviewing process has been clarified in two items –embracing personnel in Britain and thereafter in “Ceylon” (yet to become “Sri Lanka”): https://thuppahis.com/2020/12/04/the-roberts-oral-history-project-in-the-1960s-origins-outcomes/#more-47446 AND https://thuppahis.com/2020/12/06/adelaide-university-initiatives-a-michael-roberts-oral-history-project-1965-68/#more-47494.
While this work was in progress a partial consolidation was pursued by transcribing the spoken word into written typescript. The ‘engine’ for this process was my wife Shona Roberts. Looking at some dates I find that some of this work began at Bath Place Oxford itself. The bulk of the work, however, was undertaken in Sri Lanka when we were living in an annexe at Siebel Place off Peradeniya Road in Kandy. I could not type then, so the task was wholly Shona’s — a difficult job managing the spools and demanding rewinds often. I chipped in by listening and correcting the typed scripts [which then had to be re-typed]. All this was seen to in the period April 1966 to mid-1970 – a stage that saw the birth of our second child Maya Samantha in February 1967 and also involved child-minding and housekeeping tasks.
It would not be amiss to cast Shona as the “Heroine of Siebel Place.” The Adelaide University records indicate that there are a total of 1720 pages of transcripts!
Shona with Kim and Maya
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Neville Jayaweera**
The image of Don Bradman exercised almost a mesmeric hold over the imagination of my generation, i.e. of those born in the 1930s, in (then) Ceylon. The dominion he exercised was so absolute that even now, sixty something years on, most of that generation would claim that there never was and never will be anyone like the Don taking guard at a batting crease. Speaking for myself, having watched cricket in England during the past thirty summers that I have been living here, I can vouch that no batsman I have seen ever came nigh Bradman. Neither in run getting nor in amassing statistics, neither in the capacity to concentrate nor in the fleetness of foot, neither in the murderous power of driving and pulling nor in the single minded devotion to the pursuit of perfection, and least of all, as a captain, did any batsman challenge Bradman. In all these and in much else besides, he remains unique and without a peer. During those thirty years, I have watched every great batsman who played Test cricket in any part of the world, put his batting prowess on display on England’s green fields, and none amongst them can even remotely claim to have played the same game as Don Bradman. The only batsman who even hovered over the horizon was perhaps Viv Richards, and that too in his heyday in the late 1970s tours, but even him, on a scale of 100, where Bradman would be graded at 95, I would rate only in the 60s.
Ceylonese from all walks of life watching the Aussies play in Colombo, 1937 — see https://thuppahis.com/2016/07/18/social-history-within-cricket/
The Australian, 10 December 2020, where the title is “The World’s Most Powerful Women”
Angela Merkel is Numero Uno; …… Kamala Harris is No. 3 ….. Ursula von der Leyen is No. 4 ….. Melinda Gates is No 5….. SHEMARA is No 29 …. and the leading Australian power/lady ….even ahead of Jacinta Ardern …. So, it is a coup for Thuppahi to have featured her with this PIX way back in December 2015 = https://thuppahis.com/…/shemara-wikramanayake…/
thuppahi
