November 10, 2021 · 1:19 pm

Charith Asalanka marked as Sri Lanka’s Sturdy Number 3 Batsman

Rex Clementine in Dubai

It took Sri Lanka three years to find Asanka Gurusinha’s successor at number three. In the year 2000, Kumar Sangakkara came along and he occupied the slot for 15 years breaking world records at will. For six years, Sri Lanka searched for Sanga’s replacement without much success. Given the way how Charith Asalanka went about things in the T-20 World Cup, there is enough evidence that we have found Sanga’s successor and the man himself confirms that. “I think Charith Asalanka has done extremely well. He looks like the caliber of player who will have a long career, score a lot of runs and win a lot of games for Sri Lanka,” Sangakkara told Sri Lankan journalists during a virtual interaction from Colombo.

Sri Lanka’s Charith Asalanka plays a shot during the second one-day international (ODI) cricket match between Sri Lanka and India at the R.Premadasa Stadium in Colombo on July 20, 2021. (Photo by ISHARA S. KODIKARA / AFP) (Photo by ISHARA S. KODIKARA/AFP via Getty Images)

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November 10, 2021 · 12:09 pm

Roger Byard at the Cutting Edge in Forensic Pathology

University of Adelaide Newsroom, October 2021, where the title runs  “GUARDIANS OF THE DEAD PODCAST: TRUE STORIES AND FASCINATING CASES FROM A WORKING FORENSIC PATHOLOGIST”

Professor Roger Byard has opened up his case files and trawled back through his personal recollections for a new podcast from The Advertiser and the University of Adelaide, Guardians of the Dead, which sheds a light on the macabre but fascinating world of forensic pathology. “I say that pathologists are almost the guardians of the dead, because we are the last doctor to look after this person and this is a person,” Professor Byard , Chair of Pathology at the University of Adelaide, said. “Father, mother, brother, whatever. They’re part of a family and there are people who will miss this person for a long time so we have tremendous responsibility in this.  Particularly for parents who’ve lost a child or a baby, they want to talk to me… they just want to eyeball the person who looked after their baby. And so I can look at them and just say ‘this is not (just) a case. This is your dead child. And we can’t imagine what you’re going through, because we’re so saddened by it.”

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November 10, 2021 · 12:15 am

Family Research straddling Cairns, Lanka & the World: Larry Andresen

Over the last 12 months, researchers and visitors at the Cairns and District Family History Centre would have seen a sprightly, bespectacled, grey haired gentleman, peering intently into the microfilm reader screen. He is busily transcribing films that have nothing to do with his own Anglo-Scandinavian Heritage.

Larry Andresen, [sic?] in Cairns Family History, at  https://cdfhs.org/ancestry-in-british-ceylon-vital-records-research/  with this title  “Ancestry British Ceylon – Vital Records Research,”  3 March 2017

My name is Larry Andresen [sic?], and I am researching British Ceylon birth, marriage and death records.

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November 9, 2021 · 7:37 pm

JR Jayewardene Eviscerated by Rajiva

Rajiva Wijesinha’s New Book entitled “JR Jayewardene’s Racism, Cold War Posturing and the Indian Debacle “

This account of JR Jayewardene’s political life is a unique departure in Sri Lanka, for we have no tradition of analytical biography. This book tries to fill the void, by analysis of the first Executive President of Sri Lanka who ignored all principles in creating a constitution designed to perpetuate his power. The corrosive effect of ad hoc amendments, including to the electoral system, has not been thoroughly examined, but should be in view of the increasingly hopeless situation in which this country finds itself.

 

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November 9, 2021 · 6:52 pm

Lankan Grandmothers for the Roost

Capt Elmo Jayawardena  … whose preferred title for this tongue-in-cheek essay is “Rata Yana Grandmothers”

Remember the bygone years! Daughters got married and became pregnant a few rounds more than the current rate. The average production line extended to a foursome. Some even went further, “A” team types and came close to two-digit figures of adding new inhabitants to walk the planet.

Today the story is different. “One is enough, and he will get all we have,” is quite a common comment and a few over-step the planned reproduction limitations purely by accident and reach the second round. Either way the count is kept low relative to the statistics of the previous generations.

Thank God.

Let’s make a few comparisons, I do recall the yesteryear, same show, as common as grass blades. The drum major of a mother-in-law invaded and took over the whole show, lock stock and cradle. Of course, she did not come alone but with Asilin or Cicilin who was her lifetime faithful in the domestic department, Mary and the little lamb type who accompanied her everywhere.

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November 9, 2021 · 6:07 pm

Joe Biden’s Gas Outage at Glasgow Gathering

Prince Charles at his Best at the Glasgow Summit

At Glasgow, the Duchess Camilla
Said, Biden’s a jolly good fella.
But his tasteless solution
For Mankind’s pollution
Was too lengthy and loud and a smeller.

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November 8, 2021 · 11:11 pm

VANNI HOPE continues Its Charitable Reach

“the reason someone smiles today”

                                                                                                                                                                               

 ONCE AGAIN MANY THANKS FOR HELPING US  TO SERVE INDIVIDUALS AND FAMILIES IN THE POOREST COMMUNITIES IN SRI LANKA.

A very big thank you to  our sponsor

Our underprivileged and vulnerable community back in Sri Lanka still need  our help and Vanni Hope intend to extend this assistance and would like your ongoing support.

HERE IS THE YOUTUBE VIDEO LINK = https://youtu.be/BB9UBY3cElc

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November 8, 2021 · 7:34 pm

The Obelisk marking the Battle of Randeniwala

Arundathie Abeysinghe, in e-Lanka, 28 October 2021 …

A monument constructed at the ninth kilometer post on the *Ella–Wellawaya Road near the village of Randeniwela is a unique obelisk to commemorate the Battle of Randeniwela (Battle of Randeniya or Sinhalese – Portuguese War), a battle fought on August 25th 1630. The battle was fought between Portuguese forces commanded by the *Governor Constantinu De Saa de Noronha and King Senarath’s (1604–1635) youngest son Prince Maha Astana (pre coronation) who was later crowned as King Rajasinha II (1635–1687), the second ruler of Kandyan Kingdom and his brother Prince Vijayapala.

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November 7, 2021 · 1:00 pm

Paliganeema: Cycles of Revenge…. Kill … Retaliate … Kill in the 1980s

Sanjeewa Karunaratne, whose chosen title = ” Stories from Civil War– Young Girl’s Wish” …. see http://www.sanjeewakarunaratne.com/index.php/blogs/hungry-counsel/stories-from-sri-lanka-s-civil-war-young-girl-s-wish

 

 

 

 

 

 

Pix from Stephen Champion’s pictorial book inserrted here to highlight the ‘fiesta’ of kill and counter-kill

I call him Jayantha to protect his identity. Calm and collected, he was a good friend at high school. His parents were middle-class schoolteachers. During high school, some of the friends visited Jayantha’s home; and they were talking weeks about how pretty his elder sister was. Not surprisingly, she was to become the beauty queen of this small town. Inspector Dammika was in charge of the police station in this town. Through my good friend Mike, I met this soft-speaking police officer and happened to spend a night at his bungalow. He was Mike’s brother-in-law. At the time, I did not know that he got charged with her murder. A few years later, Dammika and his father-in-law were assassinated. A couple of year later Mike got killed.

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November 6, 2021 · 7:12 pm

Sri Lankan Army’s Alms as Arms across the Ethnic Divide

Retd Brigadier Hiran Halangode** has told me about a schoolmate from Ananda College, one Kumar Weerasuriya, who has donated over 15 houses with funds from friends and labour from the Army in Jaffna. He indicates that Weerasuriya is “a true son of Sri Lanka who gives back to all Sri Lankans with all his mite. You may be able to share his story in Australia and globally.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Halangode has also sent the three images presented here of houses donated by 3 different individuals to the homeless in Jaffna. Their stories can be extracted from this website, which is the Jaffna Security Forces website on Civil Affairs. [www.cimicjaffna.lk Continue reading →

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