Category Archives: Royal College

March 26, 2023 · 1:11 am

Serving Sri Lanka: Skandakumar on Mevan Pieris

Somachandra Skandakumar’s Address at the Launch of Mevan Pieris’s THE COMMUNITY,21 March 2023 … with highlighting imposed by The Editor, Thuppahi

Chief Guest Professor G.L Pieris, Guest of Honour, the  Reverend Warden Marc Billimoria, distinguished Guests, Ayubowan ,Vanakkam, Assalam Aleykum, Good evening,

It was three years ago that an equally eminent Thomian Anura  Tennekoon invited me to speak at the launch of his book. Today I am privileged again by one of similar standing and must thank Mevan for the opportunity. Such moments merely reinforce the values of our two great Institutions, where the fierceness of competition on the playing fields have led to the strongest of bonds off it .

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March 24, 2023 · 4:00 pm

The Royal-Thomian Cricket Match: Its History

Uthpala Wijesuriya, in The Island, 17 March 2023,where the title presented is  “The Earth’s Greatest Rivalry” … while the highlighting in this presentation has been imposed by a Thuppahiyaaaaaaaaa.

The Royal-Thomian or the Battle of the Blues, the world’s second oldest uninterrupted cricket battle, will unveil for the 144th consecutive year this week. The encounter pits the boys bearing the crests of the Elephant and Palm Tree against those bearing the Cross and Dove.

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February 16, 2023 · 8:18 pm

Vale: Anthony Anghie of Royal College and Many Turbulent Events

Gamini Seneviratne, in The Island, 4 October 2022, where the title is simple: “Anthony Anghie”

When our lot entered Royal College over 70 years ago, Tony was yet there at a distant remove as Head Prefect and, at closer quarters, muddied, on the rugger field. He was also visible commanding the cadet battalions. His brothers, Trevor the place-kicker and Maurice the wizard scorer over the line eclipsed him at rugger but in and around the school he was instantly placed as its leader. Trevor took to medicine and migrated to Oz via Diyatalawa; I last met Maurice in Perth, Oz: he was on the water wagon. Their father was an iconic character too, making the Hostel a place that provided such comfort as schoolboys had a right to expect.

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February 8, 2023 · 10:37 pm

Gamini Goonesena as a Legend

Hugh Karunanayake, presenting an old article from 2012 once again, with this title “Farewell to a Legend of Our Times” … with “Times” standing for the past inhabited by us octogenerians … & ….. the highlighting here being the intervention of Thuppahi

A gathering of family, friends, former schoolmates, and members of the Australian cricketing fraternity, assembled at the South Chapel of the Rookwood Cemetery on Friday 12 August 2011 to bid farewell to the legendary Gamini Goonesena one of the greatest achievers Sri Lankan cricket has ever known.

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December 26, 2022 · 7:25 pm

A Royal-Thomian Cricket Match Remembered Not Only for the Cricket

Hugh Karunanayake

                                               “Oft in the stilly night

                                                Ere slumber’s chains has bound me

                                                Fond memory brings the light

                                                Of other days around me

                                               The smiles, the tears,

                                               Of boyhood years”  

The Royal Thomian match of 1951 will for long be remembered for its nail-biting finish, and for the manner in which the Royal College team led by skipper T. Vairavanathan  extracted a victory from the jaws of defeat. It will certainly occupy a top position in the history of the series, the second oldest school cricket encounter in the world, (the first game being played in 1880).

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December 2, 2022 · 6:43 pm

Michael Wille: A Necessary Hero

Eardley Lieversz

I spoke to Michael Wille over the phone on 7th July of this year. I was visiting a former neighbour and she got Michael on the line.

I confessed to him that he was my first cricketing hero and that the 1957 Royal-Thomian was the first one I remember watching. I repeated what my dad told me about him sleeping on his late father’s bed before the game.

 

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November 30, 2022 · 8:32 pm

Michael Wille on His Cricketing & Migrant Journeys

Michael Wille passed away in Melbourne this week. His account of cricketing life at Royal College in the mid-1950s and his experiences in Melbourne in subsequent decades was, I am proud to say, featured in oneof my defunct websites a few years back and Ralph Wickremaratne & Justin Labrooy brought it to my attention.  HERE it is word for word. May he rest peacefully …. with a bat alongside him … Michael Roberts

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November 21, 2022 · 11:45 am

Leslie de Saram and Aubrey Martensz: Straddling Ceylon & the British Empir

Hugh Karunanayake, in The Ceylankan, Journal of the Ceylon Society of Australia, No 100, vol 25/4, November 2022, where the title reads “Two Acclaimed Lawyers who migrated from Ceylon During the Days of the ‘White Australia’ Immigration Policies” … with the highlighting here being an imposition by The Editor, Thuppahi

The names Leslie de Saram and Aubrey Martensz are not likely to evoke sentiment of any kind from contemporary Sri Lankans. They were two outstanding lawyers who not only dominated legal practice and legal education, but also were very influential members of the profession and of Colombo’s social scene. Both de Saram and Martensz were at various times partners of the well-known legal firm FJ and G De Saram, founded by Leslie de Saram’s grandfather, FJ de Saram Senior, in 1841.

FJ De Saram (Snr) was the grandson of Maha Mudaliyar Christtofel de Saram the son of Johan Henriques de Saram who was only 14 years old when taken to England by Governor Maitland, handpicked from among the leading “native” families as suitable for higher studies. That headstart created a dynasty of lawyers.

Leslie De Saram 

JA Martensz

 

 

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June 28, 2022 · 9:15 pm

Remembering George Turnour: Scholar & Administrator Extraordinary

Hugh Karunanayake

Thirty seven years ago, on 13 April 1985, the British Prime Minister of the day  Mrs Margaret Thatcher during her visit to Sri Lanka to open the Victoria Dam, said  in an address to the Parliament of Sri Lanka  “The remains of an ancient civilization are visible in many parts of your island. Two thousand years ago, your irrigation system far exceeded in scale and sophistication anything existing in Europe. That great chronicle the Mahavamsa, has passed down to us the story of your island’s development.”

 The Mahavansa and the history it contained would probably  have been lost in the mists of antiquity if not for the  indefatigable efforts of a Civil Servant by the name George Turnour.

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February 8, 2022 · 7:59 pm

Cricketing Stalwarts farewell Vijaya Malalasekera

Item in The Island, 8 February 2022 …. https://island.lk/crickets-greats-bid-farewell-to-vijaya-malalasekara/

A large gathering was present yesterday at Kanatta to bid farewell to former Sri Lanka Cricket chairman Vijaya Malalasekara. Malalasekara represented Royal College and then Cambridge in cricket. He opened batting in the varsity match of 1967 against Oxford. Incidentally, Malalasekara and Mano Ponniah became the first Asian pair to open batting in a varsity match. Ponniah was one of the pallbearers at the funeral.

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