WA Premier lauds China and thumbs Nose at Morrison et al

 ABC News Item, 1 October 2021 ….  https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-10-01/perth-china-mcgowan-consul-general-forrest-trade-aukus-business/100502212

Key points:

  • Tensions between China and Australia rated little mention at an event in Perth
  • The WA Premier said eastern states fail to appreciate China’s importance
  • The Chinese Consul General in Perth considers the bilateral relationship strongP

Continue reading

4 Comments

Filed under accountability, australian media, centre-periphery relations, economic processes, governance, politIcal discourse, transport and communications, world events & processes

Evanjelin Elchmanar, a Sri Lankan Lass, becomes “Miss International UK”

Upali Obeyesekere

Evanjelin Elchmanar from Birmingham, U.K., has won the crown of “Miss International U.K. 2021/ 2022” defeating, more than 50 other British girls. She will compete in the “Miss World International” to be held in Japan in October 2021. According to reports, she is a lovely girl with a sweet, engaging personality, and is a strong contender to win that competition too.

Continue reading

Leave a comment

Filed under accountability, life stories, performance, sri lankan society, Tamil migration, travelogue, unusual people, world events & processes

Yohani De Silva sails into the World Stage as Singer

ISLAND Feature Article, 28 October 2021, with this title “Mega Scene for Lanka’s Singing Sensation Yohani “

UPDATE: Yohani, we are told, has been signed by an Indian company, Wingman Talent Management, and will be managed by Sonu Lakhwani, who has also had Jacqueline Fernandez under his wings.

Undoubtedly, Yohani de Silva is Sri Lanka’s singing sensation, global ambassadress and whatever more tags that she may add to her singing career, in the near future. I can’t think of a single present day local artiste who has achieved the kind of glory, and fame, that has come Yohani’s way, through her music or, let’s say, singing.

Continue reading

1 Comment

Filed under art & allure bewitching, cultural transmission, economic processes, ethnicity, female empowerment, heritage, landscape wondrous, life stories, performance, sri lankan society, travelogue, unusual people, world events & processes

Facing Anosognosia …. Discounting Altzheimers

Bruno Dor

Anosognosia  =   temporary forgetfulness_, by French Professor, Bruno Dor, of the Institute of Memory and Alzheimer’s Disease (IMMA),
La Pitié-Salpêtrière, Hospital, Paris. He addresses the subject in a rather reassuring way:

“If anyone is aware of his memory problems, he does not have Alzheimer’s.”

1. I forget the names of families …
2. I do not remember where I put some things …

It often happens in people 60 years and older that they complain that they lack memory.

Continue reading

Leave a comment

Filed under accountability, charitable outreach, tolerance, trauma, welfare & philanthophy

Entering Underworld Hell at Hierapolis in Turkey

Louise Callaghan in The Australian  27 Septmber & The Times 26 September

In the gentle light of the autumn sun, Grazia Semeraro slipped around a guard rail in the ancient city of Hierapolis and descended stone steps towards the Gate of Hell. For 37 years, the Italian archaeologist has worked to uncover the secrets of this site in southwestern Turkey, home to what its inhabitants once believed to be the entrance to the underworld: a 5ft high stone arch that only the eunuch priests of the mother goddess Cybele could pass through alive.

Leave a comment

Filed under the imaginary and the real, world events & processes

An Agricultural Calamity on Sri Lanka’s Horizon

Chandre Dharmawardena, in The Island, 27 Sa eptember 2021, with this title “Red Alert: Need to quarantine imported organic fertiliser”

When the government suddenly banned the import of fertilisers and pesticides in April 2021 and went ‘100 percent organic’, many scientists warned of dire danger ahead. The hubris of becoming the world’s first to be free of alleged agricultural toxins made the government stand firm. Its rag-tag of ideologically motivated advisors pointed to roadside mounds of leaves, or Salvinia on rivers, and claimed that enough organic fertiliser can be produced, locally, to meet all needs. It was claimed falsely that Lanka’s ancients had even made it the ‘granary of the East’.

Continue reading

Leave a comment

Filed under accountability, biotechnology, disparagement, economic processes, governance, historical interpretation, island economy, landscape wondrous, life stories, patriotism, security, self-reflexivity, the imaginary and the real, trauma, welfare & philanthophy, world events & processes

The De Kretser Genealogy

This excellent tome produced by Ivor de Krester has been loaned to me by Warwick and Peggy de Kretser of Adelaide — simple souls who espouse no airs and are friends with all and sundry. As a youngster from the 1950s Bridge on the River Kwai generation in Ceylon I knew of Warwick as a cricketer. Here in Adelaide I discovered that he had been a juvenile motor-cycle hotshot who had bagged several prizes in races at Katukurundu and upcountry. This sporting field was not part of my horizon then in the 1950s and 1960s.

Continue reading

1 Comment

Filed under accountability, Australian culture, australian media, cultural transmission, economic processes, education, ethnicity, heritage, historical interpretation, life stories, literary achievements, unusual people, world events & processes

Issues in Moulding Education and Fostering Accessiblity & Spearheads

  Usvatte-aratchi

A translation of an essay written by Professor Sirimal Abeyratne (Colombo) appeared in the Lankadeepa of 18 August, 2021. As I have difficulties obtaining typescripts in Sinhala, I will write in English. Abeyratne dwelt on two questions. First, who benefits from ‘free education’? Second, how do you engineer a knowledge centre?

Continue reading

Leave a comment

Filed under accountability, democratic measures, economic processes, education, education policy, historical interpretation, life stories, modernity & modernization, politIcal discourse, self-reflexivity, sri lankan society, teaching profession, welfare & philanthophy, world events & processes

A Tamil Association in UK seeks Dialogue towards Reconciliation

Victor Cherubim, in Sri Lanka Guardian, 26 September 2021, where the title reads “President Gotabaya Rajapaksa’s initiative for dialogue with Tamil Diaspora”

NRTSL (Non Resident Tamils of Sri Lanka)  in UK have taken up the offer of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa during his meeting with the UN Secretary General, Antonio Guterres at UN Headquarters in New York on 19 September 2021 [where he stressed] that his Government was ready to have a dialogue with Tamil Diaspora.

Continue reading

Leave a comment

Filed under accountability, centre-periphery relations, charitable outreach, communal relations, governance, historical interpretation, life stories, LTTE, politIcal discourse, power politics, Rajapaksa regime, self-reflexivity, Sinhala-Tamil Relations, sri lankan society, Tamil civilians, Tamil migration, unusual people, war crimes, world events & processes

A Layman’s History of Afghanistan

Compiled by Gp Capt Kumar Kirinde, SLAF (Retd)  = “AFGHANISTAN:  THE SOUTH ASIAN NATION IN TURMOIL Part 1″ …. compiled with use of Wikipedia

Introduction:  Afghanistan is a landlocked country at the crossroads of Central and South Asia. It is bordered by Pakistan to the east and south, Iran to the west, TurkmenistanUzbekistan, and Tajikistan to the north, and China to the northeast. Occupying 652,864 square kilometers (252,072 sq mi), the country is predominately mountainous with plains in the north and southwest. It is inhabited by 31.4 million people as of 2020, with 4.6 million living in the capital and largest city, Kabul.

Continue reading

3 Comments

Filed under accountability, Afghanistan, art & allure bewitching, authoritarian regimes, British imperialism, centre-periphery relations, cultural transmission, democratic measures, economic processes, female empowerment, fundamentalism, governance, heritage, historical interpretation, politIcal discourse, Taliban, transport and communications, travelogue, unusual people, war reportage, women in ethnic conflcits, world events & processes, zealotry