Category Archives: life stories

May 25, 2018 · 10:15 am

The Many Shadows from Black Hawk Down

Daniel Klaidman, in The Daily Beast, 10 September 2013, where the title is “The Lost Lessons of Black Hawk Down, https://www.thedailybeast.com/black-hawk-down

Twenty years later, the battle still echoes in America’s top policy circles. As the U.S. sets foot in Somalia again, men who fought in 1993 tell Daniel Klaidman what still haunts them.

Danny McKnight’s trip began in a tiny New England cemetery on Saturday, September 28, 2013—a crisp, clear fall morning. He kneeled by the gravestone of Corporal James Cavaco and placed a rock on top of it. McKnight’s wife, Linda, had painted the rock black, and on it, he had written with a silver Sharpie, “An American Hero” and “RLTW”—Rangers Lead the Way, the elite infantry unit’s motto. Continue reading →

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May 25, 2018 · 9:05 am

Scaling The Heights of Everest: Johann Peries becomes Second Lankan to do this

Editorial Item in Newsin Asia, 22  May 2018, … https://newsin.asia/johann-peries-becomes-second-lankan-to-climb-everest/

Sri Lanka’s Johann Peries successfully climbed the 29,030 feet Mount Everest at 5.55 a.m in Nepal time on Tuesday, his support team in Colombo said.

 Johann Peries and Jayanthi Kuru Uthumpala, the two Sri Lankans who have climbed the Everest

This was his second attempt. Peries now becomes the second Sri Lankan to summit Mt. Everest after Jayanthi Kuru Utumpala did it in 2016. He left the Camp at 4.00p.m last evening. His earlier attempt in 2016 was unsuccessful when his oxygen tank failed 400 meters from the summit.

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May 22, 2018 · 9:46 am

How It Became. Documenting the Ceylon National Congress

Michael Roberts

   BU4A8624 (1) Haris de Silva

The four volume Documents of the Ceylon National Congress produced by the Department of National Archives in 1977 runs into 3208 pages. In keeping with bureaucratic rigidity, the four volumes are still sold at some Rs 250. The give-away price has not enabled it to reach the public. The treasure trove of documentary data within these four volumes –  encompassing LSSP and Communist Party meetings in their early days — remain unknown and unseen. How many scholars, let alone armchair historians, know that FC “Derek” de Saram, Oxford Blue and Ceylonese cricketer of note, was among the ginger group (identified as “Young Turks” by me as the editor of the documents) who attempted to rejuvenate the CNC in 1938/39 by converting it into a party that could contest elections?[1] Continue reading →

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May 21, 2018 · 4:21 pm

Tisaranee dissects the Current Populist Currents and their Chauvinist Underpinnings

Tisaranee Gunasekara in The Sri Lanka Guardian where the title runs thus: “Blood-and-Faith Populism and Sri Lanka’s Future””

“As the great reformers of the 19th century well knew, the Social Question, if left unaddressed, does not just wither away. It goes instead in search of more radical answers.””……Tony Judt (Reappraisals)

This month, the populist wave suffered two critical defeats. In France outsider-candidate Emmanuel Macron beat Marine Le Pen. In Iran, reformist president Hassan Rouhani trounced Ebrahim Raisi, a religious hardliner backed by Supreme Leader Khameni and the Revolutionary Guard. These defeats come in the wake of other electoral setbacks for populists, especially in Austria and The Netherlands. Despite these welcome-defeats, the current wave of populism is far from spent – and would continue wreak havoc, until the forces of moderation manage to create a new synthesis between pluralist democracy and progressive economics.

Populism is hardly a new phenomenon. It flourishes best where there is economic loss and pain. Populist leaders succeed in their power-grabs by harnessing that economic pain to their political projects. Continue reading →

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May 21, 2018 · 3:26 pm

Ceylon, Percy Fawcett and the Quest for the Lost City of Zed

Vinod Moonesinghe, courtesy of Roar Life, where the title is “The Lost City of Zed: Lanka’s Link”

In March 2018, the magazine Nature Communications published an article by a team of archaeologists from Exeter University. The team had been investigating possible ancient settlements in the Amazon’s upper Tapajós Basin, using a variety of modern techniques, including satellite imagery. They discovered 81 sites from the pre-Columbian era (about 1250-1500 A.D.).

 Shooting the giant anaconda, the cover of Expedition Fawcett, written by Brian Fawcett

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May 17, 2018 · 10:44 am

Two Foreign ‘Excursions’ on the Demise of the LTTE Project … and A Local Lad’s Thoughts on the Basic Issues

Daniel Alphonsus, courtesy of The Sunday Observer, 13 May 2018, where the title is “Did the Government win the War or the Tigers lose?”…. the article being  a review of Peter Stafford Roberts’ “The Sri Lankan Insurgency: Rebalancing the Orthodox Position” and Stephen Battle’s “Lessons In Legitimacy: The LTTE End-Game of 2007–2009” … Note that emphasis in blue is the intervention of the Editor, Thuppahi

It is a truth universally acknowledged that in May 2009 the Government of Sri Lanka won the war. This extraordinary turn of events, we are told, resulted from the political carte blanche granted to the Gotabaya, Fonseka and Karanagoda troika. Licence from on high, the story goes, unshackled their hitherto caged military nous and single-minded, perhaps even bloody-minded, focus on military victory.

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May 17, 2018 · 1:02 am

GK Haththotuwagama and His Riveting Street Theatre

Extracts from the Dr. Gamini Haththotuwegama Memorial Lecture delivered by Nihal Rajapakse at OPA Auditorium on the invitation of Richmond 60-70 Group.

Wikipedia describes Dr. Gamini Haththotuwegama in the following manner. “He was a Sri Lankan playwright, director, actor, critic and educator. He is widely known as the father of modern street theatre. He is among the most influential directors of post independent Sri Lanka.”

 Dr. Gamini Haththotuwegama … GK to us Galileans and to the occupants of Ramanathan Hall at Peradeniya in the late 1950s

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May 16, 2018 · 2:11 pm

The Earliest Missionary English Schools: Challenging Shirley Somanader

Ananda Jayasinghe

Mr. Shirley Somanader’s (SS) article titled “Methodist Schools in Batticaloa and Galle are the earliest schools to sustain their continuity to the present” is subterfuge. Mr. Somanader has ‘cherry picked ‘ and compiled the history of the Batticaloa Central College.

Mr. Somanader had started a series of postings on the Facebook, and the article appeared in Mr. D B S Jeyeraj’s blog. To the writer the article is a ‘tunnel minded’ compilation.  This is an esoteric subject and needs much holistic research. An ad nauseam topic but the writer is responding in good faith in an attempt to make Mr. Somanader realise that his postings are deceptive. Continue reading →

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May 12, 2018 · 2:21 pm

Ehemai Deviyo!

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May 12, 2018 · 1:57 pm

Yahapaalanaya is Old Wine in a New Bottle

Veeragathy Thanabalasingham, of The Daily Express in News-in-Asia, 12 May 2018, with the title  “Lanka’s Good Governance regime has turned out to be old wine in a new bottle”

President Maithripala Sirisena in his speeches on two separate occasions early this week made two politically important pronouncements. Addressing the May Day rally of his Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) and its ally United People’s Freedom Alliance (UPFA) in the Eastern town of Chengalady near Batticaloa last Monday  (May 7) he declared that he would not retire from politics in 2020 when his current term of office ends; that he has a mission and a vision for the people and the country beyond 2020, and that would retire only after accomplishing them.

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