Nick Brookes, writing at MURALI END where the title runs ”How Kamindu set the world alight”
It’s been quite the year for Kamindu Mendis.
Cast your mind back to January. Kamindu was on the outside looking in – yet to make a mark in any form of international cricket. For years, he’d been ‘the next cab off the rank’, yet that tag is misleading. Kamindu was more like a tuk-tuk driver searching for passengers in the wilderness; waiting for a fare which increasingly looked like it may never arrive.
Nick Van Der Hoeven … with the highlights being the work of the Editor, Thuppahi
Before I discuss the incredible life of Hendrik Ambrosius Johnson, I just wanted to state that my interest in my Ceylonese genealogy was not deliberate, nor has it been a long -time passion. Quite the opposite. It was thrust upon me in fairly strange circumstances. Sitting at my work desk close to 20 years ago, then in my early 30’s with a young family, I decided to google ‘Sri Lankan Genealogy’.
Within 20 minutes I had met a second cousin (Kyle Joustra) and within 4 hours he had given me a 152-page Bloodline report outlining a staggering 22 generations dating back to medieval Brugge to a direct descendant born around 1270. Staggering. Not only did a line go back that far, the document contained pretty much all my direct grandparents going back at least 7 generations (or about 250 years). Again staggering. In that document, which I let sit in a filing cabinet for 15 years, there are over 1,800 relatives either direct or great uncles or aunts by blood or marriage.
Johnny De Silva
Fernando, Anthony Carl, Son of the late Felix and Etta Fernando, loving brother of Audrey and brother-in-law of the late Quintus de S. Wijeyeratne, beloved Uncle of Sriyan and Geraldine, Samantha, Sanith and Ashuntha, Surein and Anushka, cherished Grand Uncle of Ashinsa and Nishan, Rashmi, Sahein, Chelan, Shanya and Shevin, passed away peacefully on the 18th April. His remains lay in state at A.F. Raymonds Funeral Parlour on Saturday, 20th April from 8 AM – 1 PM. Cremation was at Mount Lavinia Cemetery at 2 PM.
Filed under cultural transmission, heritage, life stories, performance, sri lankan society
Michael Roberts …. repeating an old TPS item [with highlighting added] because of the implications of the recent TPS item by Bedgar Perera re Prof Rex Clements.
The years 1966 to 1975 were heady days in Ceylon. Especially so for some of us in Peradeniya Univeristy where the CEYLON STUDIES SEMINAR was launched in November 1968 by a few members of the Arts Faculty assisted by the facilities provided by Professor Gananath Obeyesekera at the Sociology Department – located then on Lower Hantane Road away from the centre of teaching. Not least among these facilities was the service provided by the Sociology Department peon Sathiah[1] who cyclostyled the written seminar papers beforehand for circulation so that those who were keen could read any presentation beforehand if they so wished – a procedure that also maximized discussion time. This background service was seconded by the typing services of Mrs Hettiarachchi in the History Department and Mr Kumaraswamy in the Sociology Department.
Sathiah — an essential servicing hand …
& Bishop Lakshman Wickremasinghe, who perceived the depth of the festering ethnic split early on
Filed under accountability, anti-racism, centre-periphery relations, communal relations, cultural transmission, democratic measures, demography, disparagement, economic processes, education policy, Eelam, electoral structures, ethnicity, governance, historical interpretation, island economy, land policies, Left politics, life stories, nationalism, politIcal discourse, power politics, power sharing, racist thinking, self-reflexivity, Sinhala-Tamil Relations, sri lankan society, world events & processes
Bedgar Perera
Fr Aloysius Pieris .… now residing at the TULANA RSEARCH CENTRE in Kelaniya, Sri Lanka
Cyril Ponnamperuma was an ex-Jesuit. As a former Jesuit scholastic, he studied at Sacred Heart College in Shambaganur (in the State of Madras or Tamilnadu). The Sacred Heart College was an international Jesuit Philosophate where he secured his Licentiate in Philosophy (L. Ph), as did many of us Lankan Jesuits.
Licentiate in Philosophy is a universally recognized ecclesiastical degree (not a BSc) and had nothing to do with the Madras University. That degree corresponds to an M. Ph in a secular university today.
Ponnamperuma on right with George Keyt
Michael Roberts
Kumar Sangakkara’s recent step as a front-personage for tourism in Sri Lanka (see https://thuppahis.com/2024/09/29/kumar-sangakkara-for-tourist-trips-to-sri-lanka/) calls to mind his bold steps on behalf of ethnic compromise and reconciliation in Sri Lanka in the 200os. In these efforts he was joined at diferent moments by Murali and Mahela [tsunami relief tours) and his wife Yehali (visit to St Patricks College in Jaffna, 2009).
These instances underline the weight of the messages in an article from my pen which was presented in GROUNDVIEWS by Sanjana Hattotuwa and Co towards the end of THE YEAR 2012.
Standing now in the year 2024 this essays — as well as the comments it attracted — may serve as useful points of departure for meaningful commentary.
Filed under accountability, anti-racism, art & allure bewitching, British colonialism, centre-periphery relations, Colombo and Its Spaces, communal relations, constitutional amendments, cultural transmission, democratic measures, economic processes, education, ethnicity, governance, heritage, historical interpretation, landscape wondrous, language policies, legal issues, life stories, literary achievements, modernity & modernization, nationalism, patriotism, plural society, politIcal discourse, power sharing, press freedom, reconciliation, Royal College, self-reflexivity, Sinhala-Tamil Relations, sri lankan society, tolerance, truth as casualty of war, unusual people, world events & processes
Your chance to support a 2024 a film on a great Sri Lankan artist, conservationist and visionary, Nihal Fernando (1927-2015).
In search of Nihal Fernando …. A documentary film by Martin Pieris
Filed under architects & architecture, art & allure bewitching, citizen journalism, cultural transmission, heritage, landscape wondrous, leopards in the wild, life stories, nature's wonders, photography, photography & its history, plantations, sri lankan society, travelogue, unusual people, wild life
Thuppahi is pleased to present a photo of the key personnel located in Sri Lanka who were involved in launching the new cutting/edge academic venture known as THE CEYLON JOURNAL this year.
Filed under accountability, art & allure bewitching, British colonialism, centre-periphery relations, communal relations, cultural transmission, democratic measures, demography, discrimination, economic processes, education, ethnicity, female empowerment, governance, heritage, historical interpretation, human rights, Indian Ocean politics, island economy, landscape wondrous, language policies, Left politics, legal issues, life stories, literary achievements, modernity & modernization, patriotism, performance, photography, politIcal discourse, power politics, press freedom & censorship, racist thinking, self-reflexivity, Sinhala-Tamil Relations, Sri Lankan cricket, sri lankan society, Tamil civilians, travelogue, unusual people, women in ethnic conflcits, working class conditions, world events & processes
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