Thuppahi's Blog

Michael Roberts, …… in 2008

The printed version of this essay can be found in Michael Roberts: FIRE and STORM. ESSAYS IN SRI LANKAN POLITICS, Colombo, Vijitha Yapa Publications, 2010, Chapter 9 …… ISBN 978-955-665-134-8. It was presented earlier on web in Groundviews on 23 April 2008 where it attracted 19 Comments ………………. https://groundviews.org/2008/04/23/how-does-one-become-sinhalese-or-tamil-in-sentiment/

How does one BECOME Sinhalese or Tamil in Sentiment?

Michael Roberts

on 04/23/2008

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Item from Harry Solomons in Facebook, October 2025 introducing HARJAS SINGH, a former worker at his Kingsgrove Sports Shop, who hammered 314 runs from 141 balls for Western Suburbs in a Sydney Premier Leagur match….. losing ten balls in the  process.

  Andre Benoit in https://www.rt.com/news/625708-new-cold-war-front-line/  …. where  the  title reads “Contained no more: China has a plan to break America’s chokehold”

Washington’s warships guard the chokepoints. Beijing digs for exits on land. The clash is just beginning.

©  This image was generated using AI technology

The rivalry between China and the United States has become the defining axis of global geopolitics, and nowhere is it sharper than in the Indo-Pacific. Washington, guided by the doctrines of naval strategists Alfred Mahan and Nicholas Spykman, has long pursued a “thalassocratic” strategy: controlling the seas and coastlines of Eurasia to prevent any continental power from pushing outward and threatening American trade.

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Chamila Talagala in Facebook, early October 2025

Some time back, while at the Colombo Law Library, I found myself counting the pages of a book I had just bought. I was sitting at a table, carefully flipping through each page. A colleague noticed what I was doing and laughed, saying: “මොන පිස්සු වැඩක්ද මේ කරන්නේ? වැඩක්ම නැති වැඩක්!”

I smiled quietly. To truly understand someone, you have to step into their shoes. For me, there was always a reason behind that seemingly odd habit. Experience shapes us, and sometimes, what looks useless is actually born from necessity. After all, how many of us check that all pages are there when we buy a new book?

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Jeremy De Lima, reviewing  SUNSET  OF ILLUSIONS by Manilka Fernando writing under the pseudonym of C. M. Fernando …

 A book on Sri Lanka FOR Sri Lankans and anyone interested in the 26-year war which decimated that beautiful isle!  Loaded with facts and nostalgic memories, it conclusively proves how friendship and love can overcome war.

Factual Fiction is relatively a modern genre, although according to the New York Times¹ it has been around since the time of Plutarch, an ancient Greek philosopher. ¹https://www.nytimes.com/1966/05/15/archives/fictional-facts-as-factual-fiction.html

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Anuruddha Lokuhapuarachchi in Facebook, October 2025 …. with highlights  imposed by  The Editor, Thuppahi

This photo of Prime Minister Harini Amarasuriya is the result of an attempt to create an artistic photo in an official photoshoot. There, light and shadow express the isolation of responsibility with a weight that exceeds the balance of the image. Her look off camera suggests reflection and supervision, spreading her thoughts to the future of the nation beyond the frame. The sharp side lights fell on her face created an artistic depth going to the Italian Chieroscuro style. There symbolically, light becomes an image for clarity and also becomes the memory of the struggles that darkness suffered. Silence provides strength and silence provides stability.

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Lalith Lankatilleke’s Book on The Way to Address Poverty & Underdevelopment

Bio-Data  on Back Page

Lalith Lankatilleke (75), trained as an architect and planner in Sri Lanka, embarks on an epic journey at the age of twenty-six into the heart of Africa, following his passion to contribute to the advancement of humanity. In his mission to transform the lives of poor, marginalised people, he encounters a stark dichotomy between how people think and how professionals and bureaucrats define ‘development’. Throughout his endeavours, he observes this contrast across various societies and cultures, yet the underlying message remains the same: true development must be realised from within the people themselves. Development imposed from the outside cannot address the diverse needs of communities and invariably fails. His journey of unlearning and relearning from the people is vividly chronicled from 1976 to 2014, covering twelve countries across Africa and Asia.

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Tommy Fernando

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M. Shamil Amit …  in  Daily Mirror, October 2025

In an unexpected but determined display, Sri Lanka’s Under 19 girls, many of them from the provinces, made a clean sweep of the five match T20 series against the visiting Australia Under-19 side. It was like putting the icing on the cake when the budding women cricketers of the island pulled off a convincing six wicket win in the fifth and last match at the Rangiri Dambulla International Cricket stadium on Monday.

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