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Contents 08 Sri Lanka Facts File 09 Hon. Minister’s Message 16
10 Chairman’s Message 11 Editorial 12 Jogging for a healthy lifestyle 40
14 Modernising the Weekly Fair 16 Facilitating Domestic Seaplane Travel
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24 Negombo For All That’s Fun in Sri Lanka 34 Busy Bandarawela 40 Aluthgama Gateway to The South 52 Magical Creations of COIR 24
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56 Ella Highlighted
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60 The Galle Fort A tourist destination from the past 68 Pettah Colombo’s Bizarre Bazaar
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74 Colombo’s Great Museums 78 Chinese Acupuncture 80 Currying Flavour
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86 Sigiriya The Wonder of the World 92 The Veddas of Sri Lanka 96 The Western Province Helps Service Providers 99 Western Province The Development Front
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SRI LANKA FACT FILE National Flag
The National Flag of Sri Lanka is the Lion Flag. A Lion bearing a sword in its right paw is depicted in gold on a red background with a yellow border with four Bo leaves pointing inwards in the four corners of the �lag. Two vertical bands of green and orange at the left end represent the minority ethnic groups. It is an adaptation of the standard of Sri Wickramarajasinghe, the last King of Sri Lanka.
Country Name: Size: Location:
Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka 65,610 km2/25,332 sq mi An island off the south-eastern coastal shores of India, 880 km north of the Equator, in the Indian Ocean. Administrative Capital: Sri Jayawardenapura Commercial Capital: Colombo Government: Independent Republic Languages: Sinhala, Tamil and English are widely spoken throughout Sri Lanka. Ethnic Groups: Sinhalese - 74 % Tamil - 18 % Muslim - 07 % Burgher (descendants of Dutch and Portuguese colonists) and others - 01 % Religions: Buddhism - 70 % Hinduism - 16 % Christianity - 07 % Islam - 07 % Climate: Low Lands - tropical, average 27C0 Central Hills - cooler, with temperatures dropping to 14C0. The south-west monsoon brings rain to the western, southern and central regions from May to July, while the north-eastern monsoon is from December to January. Sri Lanka climate is ideal for holiday makers throughout the year. National Flower: The Blue Water Lily (Nymphaeastellata). Population: 20,926,315 Population Density: 309 people per sq km Life Expec. at Birth: 74 for female, 64 for male Literacy rate: 91.8%
An Island A Paradise
REGENERATING TOURISM As part of my efforts to promote tourism in the Western Province, in keeping with my mandate as Minister and following the vision presented by Sri Lanka’s President, Mahinda Rajapaksa and his cabinet, it was decided in 2011 to publish this magazine, Amazing Sri Lanka.
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of a.
It was always my wish to promote not just matters and places of interest to visitors to the Western Province, but to reveal the extraordinary attractions for tourists to be found throughout Sri Lanka. The Western Province is currently the gateway through which all visitors to this island must pass.
However, that is changing as development is steered beyond the Western Province in an effort to extend the benefits of tourism to other parts of the country. This is spearheaded by the construction of both a seaport and an airport in the south of the country, another of the enterprises inspired by the vision of President Rajapaksa.
Hon. Nimal A. Lanza Minister of Road Development, Animal Production & Development, Housing & Construction, Fisheries and Tourism Western Province
We support wholeheartedly the improvement of the tourist infrastructure throughout Sri Lanka, and the Tourism Ministry of the Western Province is working in tandem with central government to play our part effectively. In this respect we are sponsoring many events that appeal both to tourists and Sri Lankans. The Colombo marathon is an example and for sponsorship in this we are indebted to support from Lanka Sportreisen.
Today, Sri Lanka - and particularly the Negombo zone (which is an important part of the Western Province) - enjoys a very good German market share (as well as from the rest of Europe). I have worked tirelessly to regenerate the relationship and affection that the people of Germany have for Sri Lanka. As a result, we have built up a cordial and very close friendship with top business communities there. We have also forged links with members of the Chefs’ Association of Cologne. This has resulted in an exchange of three top chefs between our two countries every six months for cross-cuisine exposure, both to promote Sri Lanka cuisine and to train Sri Lankan chefs.
Every year we tie ourselves with the Essen Trade Fair, the third largest fair in Germany in which almost all the European countries take part. Sri Lanka was the partner country at this fair in 2011 - a rare opportunity from which we gained good exposure making this a very successful promotion. As a result 60 top businessmen visited Sri Lanka with a view to promoting investment in Sri Lanka. This was the result of my invitation and even today from time to time these same businessmen visit Sri Lanka often with their friends and I am proud to say the friendship we have built up has proved very productive. As a new venture, the Western Province Tourist Board will be one of the main sponsors at the launch of the Merian Magazine in Germany in March 2013, in which Sri Lanka will be enthusiastically promoted. Our own magazine, Amazing Sri Lanka, is now in its third edition. It has expanded so much thanks to the dedication and hard work of my chairman of the Tourist Board, Claude Thomasz. To him and his loyal team, I extend my thanks and congratulations for a job well done. I am proud that visitors to Sri Lanka, because of the efforts of my colleagues at the Western Province Tourist Board, now have an interesting and reliable source of information about amazing Sri Lanka!
SRI LANKA PIONEERS A warm welcome to tourists to Sri Lanka! Whether you are on your first visit or returning to see more of this amazing island, I wish you a wonderful time and hope you will take home with you many pleasant memories of Sri Lanka.
Although Sri Lanka has attracted visitors from overseas since ancient days, you are in a way a pioneer. You have arrived as many initiatives are being introduced by both the government and private sector to make Sri Lanka even more appealing to tourists. In support of the government’s aim to host 2.5 million tourists by 2016, the Western Province Tourist Board, under the dynamic leadership of the Minister of Tourism for the Western Province, the Hon Nimal A Lanza, is at the forefront of these developments. One of our initiatives to encourage tourism is the publication of this magazine, with the objective of providing helpful information for visitors, as well as a keepsake of the interesting places to be seen in Sri Lanka.
In this issue we carry features on places as diverse as the island’s first tourist town, Negombo, as well as on the Western Province’s southernmost coastal town, Alutgama. Tourists can try train travel with the two-and-a-half hour journey from Colombo to Galle, where the ancient Galle Fort is an irresistible attraction, as our articles reveals.
Claude A. Thomasz Chairman Western Province Tourist Board
We carry articles on the attractions of two hill country towns, the busy Bandarawela and that ‘Hikkaduwa in the hills’ – the beautiful Ella. Colombo is not ignored as our writers explore Pettah and discover some little known museums in the commercial capital. Market life is an essential part of Sri Lanka and we feature a government initiative to make markets more convenient for daily business. Markets are popular for the ingredients that go into Sri Lanka’s national dish, rice and curry, the topic of our appetising article, Currying Flavour. We also look at an ancient craft, that of coir making, and at our cultural heritage site of Sigiriya, together with an article on the Veddas.
I am pleased to welcome as the Editorial Consultant for this issue of Amazing Sri Lanka, the famous British author, travel writer and long-time resident of Sri Lanka, Royston Ellis. He lives in a restored century-old cottage in Induruwa and publishes a weekly newsletter about Sri Lanka, with a readership of 200,000. (www.roystonellis.com/blog).
Sri Lankans are friendly and helpful to visitors and, in that manner, if there is any way that I, as Chairman of the Western Province Tourist Board, or my staff, can be of assistance during your stay here, please contact me.
Board of Directors: (From left to right)
Mr. Palitha Abeywardhana Director Mr. W.M.R. Roy Tissera Deputy Chairman Mr. Claude A. Thomasz Chairman Mr. S.G. Wijayabandu Director Mr. F.R. Karunanayake Director
SERENDIPITOUS SRI LANKA My association with Sri Lanka began serendipitously.
Sri Lanka is associated through legend and copywriter’s plagiarism with serendipity. It is an easy acceptable word that conjures up the serenity of old Ceylon with the rapidity of change in modern Sri Lanka.
Royston Ellis
Editorial Consultant
Serendipity is defined by the dictionary as ‘the faculty of making happy and unexpected discoveries by accident.’ It is attributed to Horace Walpole who coined the word, in a letter written in January 1754, from the title of ‘a silly fairy tale called The Three Princes of Serendip’ that he had read as a child. The author of that story was an Italian, Michele Tramezzino, who published his book in Venice in 1557. The news then of the introduction of Christianity to a mysterious, distant island known variously as Ceilao, Zeylan, Taprobane and Serendip, would have made the setting for the story topical as well as tropical.
I knew nothing of that when the publisher of my bestselling series of historical novels set in the Caribbean, suggested that I write a novel based on the life of James Brooke, the white rajah of Sarawak. To make the long haul flight to Sarawak bearable, I looked at the map and decided to stopover for a few days in Sri Lanka.
Like so many visitors from the 19th century onwards, my first night in Sri Lanka was spent at the Galle Face Hotel. I wasn’t to know then that I was beginning an association with this island that has so far lasted 34 years.
To be honest, I didn’t think much of Colombo on arrival and hired a taxi the very next day to drive me to Trincomalee. I rented a room on the beach at Uppuveli and decided to soak up the atmosphere as well as the sun. After a couple of weeks relaxing and making new friends I continued my journey to Sarawak where I spent several weeks researching for my novel.
It was only when I returned home and began to receive letters from the friends I had made in Sri Lanka, inviting me back to this amazing island, that I realised I was missing the country. I missed the enchantment of the scenery, the rich culture, the lifestyle, the beguiling smiles and the healthy, flavoursome cuisine, all of which invigorate a visitor who has an open mind. My chance arrival in the isle of serendipity was indeed a happy discovery, as I hope is the arrival of every visitor to these shores. As with any long relationship, there are times of difficulties but the compelling personality of Sri Lanka makes such problems trivial.
During three decades of living here permanently, I have tried in my writing of guidebooks and magazine articles to attract readers to visit Sri Lanka as tourists. Nowhere in the world offers the visitor so much. I know that people who have never been here are intrigued by Sri Lanka. My own weekly newsletter about Sri Lanka (www.roystonellis.com/blog) attracts nearly a million hits a month. People around the world want to know more and more about this country.
Visitors arrive first in the Western Province, the gateway to all that is great about this country. I felt especially honoured when Claude Thomasz, the chairman of the Western Province Tourist Board, telephoned in mid-2012 and asked if I would help him as Editorial Consultant with compiling this, the third issue of Amazing Sri Lanka.
It was a suggestion I couldn’t refuse since it gives me a chance to promote Sri Lanka, and all the government is doing for the country’s development, to tourists, business visitors and potential settlers. It’s my way of saying thanks to Sri Lanka for an enduring association, born of serendipity. I welcome readers to this magazine in the hope that all will share my enthusiasm for amazing Sri Lanka. Amazing Sri Lanka
No. 204, Dencil Kobbekaduwa Mawatha, Battramula, Sri Lanka. General:
+94 (0) 11 7631705
Advertising: +94 (0) 11 7208384 Fax:
E-mail: Web:
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Layout & Designing: Nadun Egodage Feather Pen Visual Studios
The contents of this publication may not be reproduced in whole or part in any form without the written consent of the publisher. All rights reserved © Amazing Sri Lanka 2012
Opinions expressed in this magazine are those of the writers and not necessarily endorsed by the publisher.
Jogging for a healthy lifestyle Jogging as a means of improving physical fitness began in Britain in mid-17th Century. Walking, jogging and other exercises are essential for a healthy life. Physical exercises are most important in preventing / controlling diabetes, heart aliments, high blood pressure and mental depression. William Shakespeare talks about jogging in his play The Taming of the Shrew written in 1593 and Australian Author Rolf Boldrewood refers to it in his 1884 novel My Run Home. This led to the subject being cited in dictionaries. Today jogging tracks are found in many areas of Sri Lanka. In the past the most popular jogging track was the Galle Face green. Later jogging spread to Kiribathkumbura in Kandy, the area near Diyawanna Oya close to the Parliament and to Independence Square. Colombo 07. Now plans are underway to build jogging tracks in several other
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selected cities and towns. It helps to develop an efficient and fruitful life-style thus making an important contribution to the progress of a community and a nation.
The focus of this article is on the jogging tracks of Oruthota, Gampaha and Kelaniya-Mahara which have been built under the Rivers and Waterways Management Project of the Sundara Gampaha (Beautiful Gampaha) programme. Dawn was breaking and the first rays of the sun were upon Gampaha when we began walking along the newly-built jogging track in Oruthota. The track-building was done under Western Provincial Council Minister of Tourism Nimal Lanza’s direction on the advice of Economic Development Minister Basil Rajapaksa. The objective is to promote physical fitness and good health among the people, the Sundara Gampaha programme aims to con-
trol floods, develop paddy cultivations for ensuring food security, improving bio-diversity of the area and create a healthy community by protecting the natural environment. Protection of marshes and wetlands will help to purify water resources. Gampaha District is experiencing rapid urbanisation and the Gampaha town is fast developing. The history of Oruthota goes back to the time when the Sinhalese armies fought against the Portuguese invader. Since the Oru (boats) the Sinhalese soldiers used were anchored here it earned the name Oruthota. In the past the only road in Oruthota was a cart track and the chief livelihood of the villagers was paddy cultivation. They also cultivated rubber, coconut, betel and pineapples. Their products were transported by boat across the Ooruwal Oya. In the 1940s this place had a wooden bridge. Later in the 1960s a better one
was built which is now being replaced with another new bridge. Kalu Palama or the black railway bridge has enhanced the beauty of Oruthota. Among the first settlers in Oruthota was Lewnis Appuhamy who hails from Hasalaka. Not being far from Gampaha Town, Oruthota became a populated area by the 1990s.
The area where jogging tracks have been built was earlier a marshy land and had abandoned paddy fields. The lack of a system to allow the smooth flow of water from the Ooruwal Oya caused floods in Oruthota. Today the entire irrigation channel system has been properly built. The scientifically built jogging tracks are located in an attractive environment. The Ooruwal Oya flows calmly. The repaired channels and canals have helped to re-cultivate the abandoned paddy lands. The approach roads to villages have been developed. Protection for river banks has been provided at a low-cost. Hundreds of plant varieties including herbal plants cultivated on either side have added to the beauty of the surroundings. These include aquatic plants that help to purify water. Thermal power is used providing lights to the jogging tracks. The Butterfly Bridge there looks identical to its counterpart in Galle.
At Oruthota we met Chandra Menike (63), her son Mahesh Pallewatta (34), daughter-in-law Nishanthi (32) and granddaughter Nethumi (03). Chandra Menike said it was a great joy for her to see jogging tracks in the area during her lifetime. She is confident that the flood control system will prevent floods like the ones that occurred 1956 and 2010. Oooruwal Oya which begins from the Pilikuththuwa Mountain flows into the sea at Ja-ela. The jogging tracks have joined three villages – Oruthota, Bendiyamulla and Moragoda. This has also resulted in a bio-diversity bridge between Pilikuththuwa forest boundary and Gampaha Botanical Gardens. This project is part of an extensive programme focused on Attangalu Oya river basin in the Gampaha District. It will become a waterway connecting the Gampaha Botanical Gardens and the Pilikuththuwa Forest and improve the living conditions of the people. The project will help to protect and improve the natural environment and water resources in the area. Increased cultivation of different plant varieties have helped to yield more springs bringing water to wells, according to Karunathilaka Bandara (53), a father of two and a polio victim. He comes there daily to do physical exercises. The presence of mobile sales outlets proved that the current development trends will soon raise the economic level of the rural community there.
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Modernising the Weekly Fair The Sathi Pola -- or weekly fair -- concept is a longstanding and important feature of the national culture of this country as it serves as a centre for the exchange of village urban produce. Recently, Sri Lanka’s Economic Development Minister, Basil Rajapaksa, opened two modernised Sathi Pola facilities, one in Minuwangoda and the second in Bopitiya in Wattala, both in the Western Province. The Government has taken steps to introduce the Divi Neguma Sathi Pola programme for modernising the main weekly fairs throughout the country to meet consumer requirements, since 80 per cent of Sri Lanka’s population live in rural and the plantation areas. Minister Rajapaksa addressed the meeting held after the ceremonial launching of the Divi Naguma Sathi Pola programme at the Minuwangoda town on 20 May. The extent of the main building of the Minuwangoda Sathi Pola has all modern facilities and was built with Economic Development Ministry funds. The construction was undertaken by the Western Province Road Development Authority (WPRDA).
The minister observed that weekly fairs have been popular in the country since ancient times as they were places where people could do trading by bartering and consumers were able to buy their needs at reasonable prices. These fairs re�lected a way of life and were part of the people’s culture. “Therefore President Mahinda Rajapaksa has entrusted the Economic Development Ministry with the task of modernising weekly fairs throughout the island,” Minister Basil Rajapaksa said. He explained that the President’s objective in launching the Divi Naguma programme is to make the country self-suf�icient in food, to ensure food security for every citizen and also to generate self-employment. It is with this aim that the Sathi Pola construction programme
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commenced at Minuwangoda, heralding a new era in social progress.
As soon as the President entrusted the Economic Development Ministry with this task Western Province Chief Minister Prasanna Ranatunga undertook the responsibility. Thereafter Western Province Road Development Authority General Manager, R.M.S. Bandaranaike, directed the work under the supervision of Western Provincial Council Minister, Nimal Lanza. Work on the Minuwangoda Sathi Pola was completed in four months. Minister Rajapaksa stressed the need for keeping the Sathi Pola clean and reminded that it was the responsibility of the Minunwangoda mayor and councillors. He said that any renovations, repairs and maintenance should be done according to proper advice, and measures should be taken to ensure that not only people’s needs are met but also public property is protected. Minister Rajapaksa added the fair would serve as a sales point for home grown vegetables and fruits and other local products. Excess products could be sold to traders doing business in other area. He said that today everything is being done in Gampaha District according to a proper plan. Projects cover highways and byways, maternal clinics, pre-schools, reservoirs, tanks and irrigation canals, jogging tracks, culverts, bridges and toilets among others. Agrarian Services Minister S.M. Chandrasena, Western Province Chief Minister Prasanna Ranatunga, Provincial Council Minister Nimal Lanza, Deputy Ministers
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Duleep Wijesekera, Pandu Bandaranayake, Pariamentarian Sudarshani Fernandopulle and Provincial Road Development Authority engineers and other of�icers were among the large crowd present on the occasion.
On 21 June 2012 Minister Basil Rajapaksa addressed a meeting after opening the renovated Sathi Pola at Bopitiya in Wattala. He said that the Sathi Pola occupies a special place among people resident in 36,000 villages in 14,000 Grama Niladhari divisions in Sri Lanka.
The Minister said that nearly 80 per cent of the people in the country in general patronised the Sathi Polas, while almost 90 per cent of rural folk, including the plantation community, patronised Sathi Polas. The development of Sathi Polas was one important feature of the President’s programme of bringing the bene�its of development to the people.
The Bopitiya Sathi Pola, covering an area of 1.5 acres and consisting of 150 stalls, was built by the WPRDA under the supervision of Provincial Council Minister, Nimal Lanza. It brings to 47 the number of Sathi Polas in the Gampaha District of the Western Province.
State Resources and Enterprise Development Deputy Minister, Sarath Gunaratne, Wattala SLFP Chief Organiser, Neil Rupasinghe, and Wattala Pradeshiya Sabha Chairman Thyaga de Alwis also spoke. Provincial Minister, Nimal Lanza, Provincial Council Members Janaka Sooriyabandara and Randiv Rodrigo were among those present.
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Facilitating Domestic Seaplane Travel
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conomic development Minister Basil Rajapaksa recently commissioned the float aquadrome and air corridor at Dandugam Oya, Ja Ela further boosting tourism and providing a solution to frequent flood threats to the area.
The Minister said that this would open a new chapter in the country’s tourism with the Sri Lankan Airlines air taxi service operating from the scenic surroundings at Dandugam Oya, Seeduwa thereby helping infrastructure development in the Katana and Jaela electorates for the benefit of people there. It would also open for them new employment opportunities, according to the minister at the commissioning of the float plane aquadrome and the air corridor. A special event at this meeting was Minister Rajapaksa and other invitees being received by Negombo Lagoon Managing Committee Chairman Ranjit Fernando and Secretary Nimal Viani Rodrigo who earlier organised a massive protest at the Negombo town against the construction of the float plane aquadrome.
They welcomed the construction of the aquadrome and expressed their appreciation by handing over to Minister Rajapaksa a present to be given to the President.
The Minister said that the aquadrome would not only boost tourism but would also make a major contribution to the country’s socio-economic progress. He also said a year ago it was proposed to construct the aerodrome at Negombo Lagoon.
But taking into account the requests the fishing community made to the President he found an alternative location for the project since it is the duty of a people’s government to pay heed to public requests. Consequently the work was completed within a year. Various problems are not uncommon when developing a country, the minister noted. Consequently people are sometimes compelled to make sacrifices.
From the float plane aquadrome Katunayake, Sri Lankan Airlines will operate domestic flights to approximately 14 destinations within a very short period. It would hugely benefit both international and local travellers. This will also provide the opportunity to make the area a centre for establishing small and medium scale industries for the benefit of the people of the area which is near the Katana and Ja-ela electorates. Minister Rajapaksa expressed his gratitude to the Western Province Road Development Authority and Provincial Council Minister Nimal Lanza who is also the Minister of Tour-
ism for the Western Province.
The Minister added that they were taking great effort to protect the area’s natural environment and said the Thekka Gusela canal repair project and the program for cleaning the Muthurajawela canals had already commenced. Welcoming the invitees Aviation Minister Priyankara Jayaratna said that the air base has three docking bays, rest rooms, ample parking space for over 30 vehicles and a long timber pier overlooking the lake and fishing village. He further said travelling by float planes reduces travel time by more than 85 percent and gives a better opportunity to see the most attractive scenic spots in the country.
Sri Lankan Airlines Chairman Nishantha Wickremasinghe, Chief Executive Kapila Chandrasena, Social Services Minister Felix Perera and Parliamentarian Sudarshani Fernandopulle were among the others who spoke. Also present were Western Provincial Council Minister of Tourism Nimal Lanza, Deputy Minister Duleep Wijesekera and Parliamentarian Ruwan Ranatunga, The designing and construction of the aquadrome was done by the Provincial Road Development Authority.
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TOURISM IN NEGOMBO
T
he Negombo Hoteliers’ Association (NHA) was inaugurated in 1970 by founder member, M R Herbert Cooray, with just six members. It has now grown into a 25-member body, aiming to transform Negombo into the most attractive city for tourists in Sri Lanka.
Ms. Rookamanie Fernando General Manager Jetwing Sea Hotel President Negombo Hoteliers Association T: +94 (0) 31 22 76719 F: +94 (0) 31 48 70765 M:+94 (0) 77 31 16779
Development projects have begun at all tourist hotels, tourist bungalows, guest houses and pavilions, together with the category establishments such as tourist information bureaus, with a view to promoting and developing tourism both internal and international in Negombo. Maintenance of places of interest to tourists (e.g. parks, beaches, places of beauty and recreational sports, streets illuminations and development of street isles with more greenery) will steadily transform the area into a tropical holiday resort for leisure. Since Negombo is the gateway to Sri Lanka, being the entry and exit point from the airport, the impression the visitor receives is of great importance.
The creation of travel and transport counters to coordinate with hotel staff and neighbouring public, enabling safe travel avoiding delays, is an objective that could be achieved with the help and support of the Hon. Minister Nimal Lanza. The Western Province Tourist Board (WPTB) with the generous support of the Hon. Minister Nimal Lanza has installed solar power lighting on the beach and a beach cleaning machine was purchased for the first time to maintain a cleaner environment. Chairman WPTB, Claude A. Thomasz, has also made arrangements to provide beach scooters (buggy scooters) to be handed over to the Tourist Police in the area to patrol the beach (a 2.5km stretch of golden sand). In addition projects initiated to create awareness among the general public and school children in the vicinity on the value of tourism, have resulted in a better awareness among people of tourism standards. Tour guides, hotel employees, drivers, beach vendors and the community at large have been included in these educational programmes. Cultural shows, dances, music, concerts, sports and games, the provision of shopping facilities to tourists, establishment of art galleries, exhibitions of paintings and other works of art, may cater to the interest and convenience of tourists and the need for such have been identified and reviewed. Negombo with its stretch of golden mile beach and the sea beyond offers the ideal location for a holiday in the palm-fringed paradise isle of serendipity: Sri Lanka.
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NEGOMBO
FOR ALL THAT’S
FUN IN SRI LANKA For the tourist, Negombo is surely Sri Lanka’s most exciting place for a holiday. Our travel correspondent looks at the west coast town’s history, culture and amazing attractions.
N
egombo is a lively, vibrant town where the action that begins with dawn can be pursued throughout the day until well after midnight. Incredibly, it is also a holiday resort where guests can enjoy total selfindulgence in doing nothing all day but lazing around a seaside swimming pool and dining off glorious seafood.
Negombo is one of those special holiday destinations that have evolved to cater for tourist demands alongside a traditional coastal culture and lifestyle. The visitor isn’t isolated from local life, even though hotels wall off most of the beach, and can enjoy every minute of interacting with Sri Lankans. There is nothing artificial about Negombo; it is real Sri Lanka and its regular guests who return year after year hope it will never change. It probably never will, having survived for nearly 50 years, keeping its identity as a thriving fishing town, since first being discovered by modern tourists after an international airport was built on the nearby site of the former British Royal Air Force airstrip that opened in 1944. Negombo’s hotels and guesthouses sprang up from 1967
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to cater for the demand by passengers stopping for a break during long haul propeller flights between England and Australia. But foreign travellers discovered Negombo long before that, many in search of the cinnamon that grew there. The shallow waters of the lagoon provided a natural harbour for seafaring vessels calling in to provision. The lagoon has an area of 2,883ha and a mean depth of only 1.5m. It was used as a base by the Singhalese kingdoms to conduct external trade. When Muslim Arabs began to arrive in the country in the 7th & 8th centuries, they dominated the eastwest trade routes, monopolising the cinnamon trade and using Negombo as a base. The Sri Lankan Moors are their descendants and today are the largest minority group in Negombo. In the early 16th century, the Portuguese, attracted by trade, ousted the Moors and constructed a fort in Negombo, taking over the cinnamon trade for themselves. During the time of the Portuguese occupation, the Karawa, the traditional fishing clan of Negombo, embraced Catholicism. The result is that today almost two thirds of the population are Catholics. Having restructured the traditional production and management of cinnamon to their advantage, the influ-
ence of the Portuguese began to decline in 1630 as an on-going war between the Portuguese occupiers and the Kingdom of Kandy reached a stalemate. The King of Kandy turned to the Dutch for help and they were happy to oblige, taking over the settlement in 1646 and enforcing their presence with the building of a fort in Negombo in 1672. When the British conquered the Kingdom of Kandy in 1815, Negombo’s importance changed from being the prime outlet for cinnamon exports, to prosperity gained from its energetic fishery industry. The tourist industry, which began informally soon after the international airport opened, added to the expansion of the town with beachside hotels and tourist shops.
There is not much evidence today of the original Portuguese and Dutch buildings, although old (and, alas, dilapidated) houses can still be glimpsed in the town. The Lagoon View Old Rest House is said to date from Dutch days, and the prison began life as the Dutch Fort. However, the concentration of ornate and brightly painted churches is testimony to the influence of the religion of the Portuguese and Dutch.
Because of its geography, stretching along the coast from the tip of the lagoon in the south to the touristic environs of the town’s northern boundary, Negombo is an easy place to explore. Visitors usually stay in one of the independent guesthouses at the
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southern end of the town or in the more refined, boutique-aspiring hotels of Ethukula, to the town’s north. Others venture inland to bungalow properties whose the owners vigorously protect their exclusivity.
The layout of Negombo with its many bars, cafés and shops adds to the appeal of taking a stroll through the town. There are always plenty of three-wheeler taxis to ferry guests back to their hotels if the walking becomes too tiring or too hot. There are also freelance guides who are keen to help strangers. The official ones, who have been trained in courtesy and have passed a knowledge and aptitude test,
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carry an identity card and number, showing they are licensed by the Western Province Tourist Board.
However, Negombo is easy to experience without an escort, since the townsfolk are naturally hospitable and will readily answer any questions. It’s part of the charm of a holiday in Negombo that there is plenty to see and enjoy for guests inquisitive enough to leave the sometimes synthetic or sterile atmosphere of their hotels. The town is certainly not sterile. Although there are signs in Sinhala that the tourist won’t understand urging citizens to respect natural re-
sources and to keep the place clean, the cleanliness campaign still has a long way to go. If one appreciates that this is a working community, not an enclave cleaned especially and reserved for tourists, and that its fascination cannot be achieved without evidence of the detritus of modern, consumer-oriented civilisation, Negombo becomes a pleasure. Visitors in search of ecologically correct surroundings where inhabitants don’t live or discard their refuse, don’t have to go far from Negombo. To the south, and within a short boat ride, are the Muthurajawela Wet Lands.
Negombo’s day of intriguing vibrancy begins at dawn as huge, wooden catamarans powered by the wind in their sails, and fibre-glass fishing launches with outboard motors, make their way back to land with the night’s catch. The sight is repeated in reverse in the evening as they sail off to the horizon, a sight that could easily have inspired Bing Crosby’s 1935 song, Red Sails in the Sunset.
Negombo is synonymous for Sri Lankans with fresh fish of all sizes, prawns, crab and cuttle fish. To see the catch being landed at the beach and then auctioned to wholesalers means getting up with the sun rise. The fishing harbour and the beach fish markets are open to everyone, and everyone seems to gather there to chat, haggle and purchase fresh fish to carry home in a plastic bucket or slung across the carrier of a motorbike or bicycle. If getting up at dawn is too daunting, no need to worry; the clamour and commerce of the market and the beachside where fishermen pluck the catch from their nets, continues until mid-morning. Tourists generally don’t buy fish anyway, unless they have self-catering facilities or someone to cook; for them the market is to catch a good photograph, not a fish.
The fishermen and the fish vendors are extraordinary characters. They are dressed for business, with sarongs hoicked up above their knees, bandanas wrapped around their heads, and a rapid repartee. Their gruff exterior is softened by a roguish twinkle in their eyes as they answer a visitor’s questions. Photograph? No problem, they say, but don’t ask them to pose; they don’t have time for that.
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It’s not just the characters that are so inspiring for a photographer; it’s the colours of the fishing vessels, the shades of light and dark (even on a gloomy day the fish market seems bright and jolly), and the movement. There are odd sights, too, such as the wooden shed amidst the fishing boats, where fresh pork is butchered with cutlasses and offered for sale alongside the fish and prawns.
Fishing boats are moored along the banks of the lagoon, and people cleaning and coiling nets for the next fishing expedition throng the shore, or sit in the shade of trees and watch others at work. There is a sense of camaraderie, of shared hardships and triumphs, that communicates itself to the observer. Aside from the romantic side of the scene is the unseen lifestyle of Negombo’s fishing folk. They use the beach that visitors like to enjoy so the strand of sand that stretches northwards from the lagoon, is not the preserve of pampered tourists. For privacy, holidaymakers have lavish swimming pools created by their hotels, and that’s where they spend the day relaxing. The town itself, after the hustle and bustle of the fish markets, seems to
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start late. Shops and cafés are clearly unused to people arriving early in the morning, since both guests and shopkeepers, and café owners, invariably sleep late after the night before. For the visitor, the day can also be passed in exploration. There is a chance to try a trip out to sea in one of the narrow canoe-like catamarans that are perched on the beach with a parallel outrigger float and huge sail. A catamaran and helpful crew can be chartered by the hour offering an opportunity to fish and, perhaps, catch prawns.
While the beach in front of the major hotels is kept as clean as possible, locals have their own beach area created by the local government, where the cars of day visitors can park. The handcarts of snack vendors are also parked there during the day, making a colourful sight. Lovers and friends happily enjoy the area protected by huge boulders from the sea, or stroll together along the beach. For visitors, there is an opportunity to take a boat trip on the Dutch legacy to Negombo: the canal. With fishing boats tied up on both banks, and houses on both sides, this is an experience of Sri Lankan canal-based life that can only be enjoyed in Negombo. The
canal itself extends southwards from the Negombo Lagoon to the Kelani River on the northern outskirts of Colombo. If the tourist strip of Negombo takes a long time to wake up in the morning, it makes up for it in the evening. Out of Colombo there is nowhere in Sri Lanka (not even the old hippy haunt of Hikkaduwa) that has as many bars, restaurants, and endless nightlife as Negombo has.
This is not downmarket and off limits to visitors, but a strip of eclectic restaurants and lively bars that could put popular Spanish resorts to shame for high jinks. There are pubs for holiday boozers, bars for genteelly sipping cocktails, and discos for the young at heart. Restaurants offer fast food, seafood, and local cuisine refined for foreign palates. The delight of all this is that it is in walking distance of most hotels, adding to the boundless charm of Negombo, whether as a base for a Sri Lanka holiday or just in transit for a day or two while awaiting an onward flight. Just 25 minutes from the airport, Negombo is a surprising encapsulation of all that’s fun in Sri Lanka.
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Tamarind Tree Hotel
Katunayake - Sri Lanka
T
Mr. Neville Rogers The General Manager Tamarind Tree Hotel
amarind Tree Hotel is strategically located within close proximity to the Bandaranaike International Airport. Upon arrival at the hotel, guests immediately feel the warmth of hospitality at our garden resort, with its amazing landscaping of greenery. The hotel has enhanced its reputation over the last three years in terms of business and standard, having benefitted from a refurbishment costing more than Rs60m. In support of the refurbishments, there is to be upgrading of the lobby in 2013. The Italian owner, Mr P Bertarelli, has put in a lot of his time and investment to ensure a worthy return. With the boom of tourism in Sri Lanka he is optimistic about the future, confident it will grow and bring in more foreign exchange to the country. Neville Rogers, the General Manager of the hotel, has brilliant ideas for the development of The Tamarind Hotel. He projects high standards and better returns over the years ahead. Completing three years in office, Rogers has complemented the promotional activities of the Sri Lanka tourism authorities with events and hospitality to attract holiday makers and travellers. He sees this as the key to pave the way for increased tourism.
Neville Rogers was educated at Trinity College, Kandy, and
is a professional product of the Confifi Group and has also been involved in Hotel Management Training in the Netherlands. In addition he has the experience of overseas exposure in leading, star-class hotels across the globe.
The Tamarind Tree Hotel consists of 59 rooms nestled amidst acres of lush green lawns and swaying palm fringed gardens, with a category of 36 Bungalows and 24 standard rooms all air-conditioned and equipped with a
range of guest facilities. The bungalows are furnished with king sized beds or twin beds for plush comfort. Among are two lavishly furnished suites with two bed rooms , Living room on each fully with A/C, and dining area making it a perfect choice for families . Enjoy your stay at our cozy rooms decorated with traditional wall hangings and portraits, opening out to the emerald lawns. The Tamarind Tree offers a selection of holiday packages converted as you desire.
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No. 39
What Negombo & Tastees Banana means
Enjoy the romance of live Seafood, a tables set right on the beach facing the ocean, candle lightings, warm ocean breeze and the surf breaking softly just a few feet away with the many catamarans at sea. Watch the flickering illumination of hurricane lamps throw shadows of history on the soft sand under youe bear feet. Designed to make your heart softly beat, shades you from the sun and shelters you from the rain, perched on the pristine sands of the paradise beach overlooking the Indian Ocean.
It is a quaint yet stylish venue with the signifying natural aesthetic beauty, a setting that is nothing short from your expected deam. The cool night breeze will caress you while waiters at island style attire cosset you. Freshly caught seafood straight from the Indian Ocean is on displayed at your very eyes to be cooked just the way you want it, grilled, deviled, poached, fried or any other style that you prefer that would leave you with great satisfaction.
No. 39B, Poruthota Road, Eththukala, Negombo, Sri Lanka. Tel: +94 31 2275866
BUSY
BANDARAWELA B
Visitors touring Sri Lanka often overlook Bandarawela in the tea growing hill country, but it has a bustling personality combining the business of daily life with memories of the past. Richard Tresillian visits Bandarawela for a taste of the colonial past and dynamic present.
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andarawela is not on the usual list of places to see in Sri Lanka, which is a shame because it has so much to offer the visitor who wants to venture beyond the usual tourists towns. While Kandy and Nuwara Eliya attract thousands of tourists a year, and specifically pander to them, Bandarawela gives the impression that it has other things to do.
beyond the boxlike concrete buildings of the town centre.
In 1908, H W Cave writing in his Book of Ceylon described Bandarawela as “devoid of all attractions in the way of amusement.” He also commented, “We look around in surprise at the desolate appearance of the place that possesses so fine a climate, and is moreover the terminus of the mountain railway. Three or four bungalows and a very nice hotel comprise the entire European portion of the place... we wonder that so few people find their way [to Bandarawela].”
And it has. It is at the heart of Uva tea country; a tea that has a special (and much in demand) quality imparted by the caressing of seasonal breezes. The undulating landscape is dedicated to tea, not tourism, and dominated by tall tin factories that never manage to blend into the shorn hillsides. Although tea planters cut down the forest, wooded ravines remain. Valleys harbour
paddy fields and vegetable plots.
Bandarawela is 257km by rail from Colombo (think 160 miles and a journey of between eight and ten hours) or 119km by road, via Ratnapura and Haputale. It is superbly situated at 1,230m (4,036 ft) above sea level. With an excellent climate year round (but sometimes sweaters are needed at night) and inspiring mountain scenery
It was tea that helped Bandarawela grow into the thriving town of today. The forging of the railway line through the hills from Nanu Oya to Bandarawela in 1894 brought speculators and businesses to the area. It had taken nine years to extend the line that stirred entrepreneurs to see the potential in the then little known hamlet.
Rail passengers, it was reasoned, would need somewhere to stay, which is how the Bandarawela Hotel came into existence in 1893, as recorded in the foundation stone dated 1893 that can be seen at the corner of the present grand hotel building. In fact in the 1920s, the hotel was known as The Grand Hotel, Bandarawela, being part
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shunting engine is permanently parked in a siding.
The upper road leading from the intersection is Main Street and the main shopping area. Triple storey buildings are bright with bunting, which is actually an array of textiles fluttering in the breeze to attract shoppers’ attention. The shops are a fascinating reflection of rural life, although plastic buckets and brooms now have pride of place over stone spice grinders and wooden coconut scrapers.
of the group that ran the Grand Hotel, Anuradhapura, the St Andrew’s Hotel in Nuwara Eliya, and the Mount Lavinia Hotel outside Colombo.
The hotel was designed like an extended plantation bungalow and was much frequented by tea planters, later becoming popular with Europeans fleeing the humid climate on the coast. It became known as a sanatorium for the enervated and even today some bedrooms still have wind-up, hospital-like beds with brass knobs. A British woman, Mrs Barber, was the Grand Hotel’s manager in the 1930s, at a time when the hotel was advertised as “recently enlarged and renovated” and having “many improvements” including “own electric lighting.” Also provided were “own excellent cuisine, high class wines and spirits, tennis, golf and billiards.”
Curiously, while other hotels today revamp themselves, the Bandarawela Hotel prospers because it seems never to have changed, reassuringly locked in a time warp somewhere between 1930 and 1950. The hotel has managed to preserve its style as it is located above the town and even today its lawn serves as a perfect spot to take afternoon tea, fresh from the surrounding Uva highlands. From the hotel, though, it is only two minutes walk to the hustle and bustle of busy Bandarawela. By the hotel’s entrance gates is the town’s old
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post office, now painted an engaging pink. Outside it are three letterboxes, blue for airmail, green for local and red for Colombo. Opposite is the town’s department store with pigeons nestling on its colonial edges although the interior has been ruthlessly modernised with marble and timber counters replaced by supermarket shelves.
At the intersection of roads, in the centre of the town where a policeman energetically directs the surging traffic, the road to the right is for the railway station. There is a tunnel under the tracks for quicker access, and now a gentle pathway has been constructed along the road for pedestrians to walk without danger. Until 1924, the station was the terminus of the hill country line, which was then extended to reach Badulla. There are three main up and down trains a day linking Bandarawela with the rest of Sri Lanka. An old Hunslet
Down the road parallel to Main Street is the Commercial Centre on the site of the earlier market compound. Market stalls are behind it and whereas Sunday is the quietest day in most towns, for Bandarawela it is Market Day, the busiest day of the week with the market in full voice as vendors yell litanies of their wares. Spiritual needs are catered for generously in Bandarawela, proof of the multi-religious nature of the town. Within walking distance of each other, and of the Bandarawela Hotel, are the town’s main mosque, a Hindu kovil as well as some traditional neo-gothic Christian churches, Buddhist temples and even a Japanese Peace Pagoda.
The hills around Bandarawela are delightful to explore. The Dowa Rock temple, five kilometres away, has murals and a great carving of Lord Buddha on the sheer rock face. Picnics and hikes can be organised to tea estate landmarks like Pilkington Point at Poonegala, and Lipton’s Seat beyond Haputale. The site of the former Boer War prisoners of war camp, now devoted to naval and military encampments
in the valley at Diyatalawa is just six kilometres from the town. A road through it goes on to Haputale, from where Sri Lanka’s only stately home, Adisham Hall, now a novitiate, can be visited at weekends. If Bandarawela is a strategic base for exploring the nearby hill country, it is also a pleasant place to learn more about country lifestyle. During the day, the town always seems busy and the variety of shops packed with people buying textiles, gadgets and foodstuffs while traffic throngs the oneway Main Street and the lower road back to the town centre. At night, all is quiet; the town’s charisma dulled. For night enchantment, guests need to stay at the Bandarawela Hotel or in one of the guesthouses converted out of colonial cottages that have opened up in recent years, complementing the Bandarawela Hotel in style and quirkiness.
Saffron Hill House is one guesthouse where the past can be experienced in reality. Overlooking Bandarawela, a short drive up a road beside the bus station, it was built in the 1930s as a holiday bungalow. Incredibly, it retains its art deco furniture and glassware in tact. The formal, rectangular shape of the bungalow has been softened by swirls of saffron-coloured paint. It stands proudly as an antidote to the cacophony of commerce in the town, whose frenzy can be glimpsed while sipping tea at a teak table on the plateau of lawn fronting the bungalow. Just 5km northwest of Bandarawela, at 1,219m (4,000 ft) above sea level is another type of bungalow; newly built and furnished in plantation style, it overlooks the 30 acres of tea and fertile valleys that form its estate. Called MF Bungalow (after the initials of its two owner-brothers) it has six bedrooms and can be rented in its entirety or by the room. Its charm is its homeliness, matching Bandarawela in its appeal to visitors who want to sample the real, rural Sri Lanka, away from the traditional tourist traps.
ALUTHGAMA
GATEWAY TO THE SOUTH
L
ook up Aluthgama (it means New Town) in a guidebook and, if it is mentioned at all, the remarks will be disparaging. One book comments: “Aluthgama is not a pretty town but it does mark the end of the built-up area before the road crosses the Bentota River and the scenery brightens. It is 61km from Colombo and exists as the place you go through on the way to somewhere else.” Its location seems to have decreed Aluthgama’s fate. Although so near to the sea, it is actually built on the bank of the wide lagoon that has formed at the mouth of the Bentota River. So it is not a town that tourists would normally head for. When the railway line was built down the coast from Colombo to Galle it arrived at Aluthgama in 1890 (laying of the track from Colombo having begun in 1875). For five years Aluthgama was the terminus for steam trains from Colombo. It was during that period that the small fishing settlement expanded to a new town. It would have remained a small, modest town, serving the needs of its fisher folk and agricultural worker residents
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had tourism not come to the surrounding areas, bringing development to its neighbouring villages of Beruwela and Bentota. Beruwela is an “old town.” It began as a Moorish settlement and has a 1,000 year-old tomb of a Muslim saint overlooking its busy fishing harbour. Bentota was much smaller, known only for its colonial resthouse with panoramic view over the ocean and Bentota River. The resthouse has gone, replaced by the Bentota Beach Hotel. When Bentota became a National Tourist resort in the early 1970s as government encouraged the
development of tourism among the coconut groves beside its long, pristine beach, Aluthgama expanded rapidly. It became the source of sup-
The southernmost coastal town in the Western Province is Aluthgama, at the gateway to the south. It may not seem very interesting to tourists in transit but, as Sasindu Balage suggests, it has some fascinating aspects to discover.
plies and staff and accommodation for the newcomers attracted to the area by the tourist dollar. Its function as a dormitory and market town for Bentota, just two minutes walk across the road bridge spanning the Bentota River, helped preserve the tranquil quality of the tourist resort. Even today, Bentota only has a few small stores and shops. It is to Aluthgama that the tourist staying in Bentota looks for “local life.� That is provided aplenty by the Monday market, whose site on the northern bank of the Bentota River was, in November 2012, undergoing major renovation. Permanent terraced stalls have been built with a transparent blue arched roof to protect shoppers from sun and rain. 41 | ASL
Street-side, however, vendors still crouch on the pavement offering assorted wares like fruit and spices. The road inland past the market links Aluthgama, via Dharga Town, with the Southern Express Highway between Colombo and Galle. A reminder of slower, more gracious days is the pink gingerbread style mansion behind a high wall just outside the town. In Aluthgama, surprisingly, there remains a building defiantly resisting the modern world. It is over 106 years old and is distinguished by its wooden lattice screen at eye-height concealing its interior. Clay pots can be glimpsed on its veranda beside bundles of mysterious looking dried leaves. Visitors are warmly welcome to step inside this store, which has become an anachronism in the new era of development that is engulfing Aluthgama. Inside the store, Wijedasa, who has worked there for 66 years, is happy to show visitors what’s on sale. Nothing much, the tourist might think. But those sacks contain pure tobacco leaves and the store is the wholesaler of tobacco, usually bought for chewing, for the entire district. The shop opened in the year Wijedasa was born, 76 years ago. It remains almost as it has been from the beginning because of the respect the owner (a gem dealer) has for the old staff and the old traditions. Close to it a new kind of enterprise is flourishing, an independent supermarket stocked with goods sourced in Germany. Behind it is a beer garden and restaurant
with a sweeping view of the river and a regular clientele of expatriates living in the area. It has become popular with tourists who venture out of Bentota and across the bridge to investigate Aluthgama’s attractions. Above it, the demand for independent accommodation by long-staying tourists has been met by the addition of some self-catering apartments. The new prosperity of Aluthgama can be seen by the number of banks that have opened there during the past decade. Traditionally, as elsewhere, it was only the nationalised banks, Bank of Ceylon and People’s Bank, which served the town. Now the Bank of Ceylon has two branches and half-a-dozen other local banks have opened up, together with branches of Co-
lombo’s finance companies. There is even a place called “Tiny Tots,” a Montessori school where the prosperous of the town send their kids for pre-education in English medium. Some shop signs are even in Russian and German as well as English. A new bus station has been built and the opening of a
branch of a major supermarket resulted in the collapse and closure of small grocery stores. Those have been replaced by shops selling mobile phones, computers, kitchen appliances and the latest fashions. The town’s fish market is no longer “raucous” as it used to be described in guidebooks, but rather modest. Another sign of Aluthgama’s advancement in the world is the recent opening of a proper pub with draught beer, snacks cooked on demand, and a garden. Tourists are beginning to find their way there to relax with locals. Strangers visiting Aluthgama need have no concern about finding what-
ever they want to see or do. The town has a tradition of touts on hand promoting various attractions. Now, however, they have transformed themselves into freelance guides, many being helped by a Western Province Tourist Board training programme to educate freelance workers on the periphery of tourism to offer a genuine, courteous service to foreign visitors. These guides can arrange a boat trip either by motor launch or tradi43 | ASL
small gardens each leading to another, whether by paths, steps or vista. There are over 105 different types of trees, countless plants and bushes, but only a few varieties of flowers in the 2h area. The ramble through the garden finishes with a tour of the house where Bawa, who died in 1992, lived. It contains many relics of colonial days, including a gallery of photographs of Bawa who was ADC to four governors. Brief is 9km from Aluthgama but is far away from the reality of today’s burgeoning prosperity of Aluthgama, gateway to the beach resorts of Bentota and the south.
tional log canoe, or even a fishing safari, on the Bentota River. A popular outing from Aluthgama is to Brief, a private house with a landscaped garden open to the public. This combines a European layout with a tropical wilderness. It was original an 8h rubber estate when it was acquired in the 1920s by a barrister, using funds made from a legal brief. His son, Bewis Bawa, decided to make his home and garden there in 1929, gradually selling off rubber lands to reduce it to manageable proportions. As he did so he created a landscaped collection of several
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A Niche For Quality
There are over 100 inbound travel agents and tour operators in Sri Lanka but only one has attained the enviable niche of consistent high quality as guaranteed by LSR.
LSR
is short for Lanka Sportreizen, the name under which a company was begun by its young founder, Thilak Weerasinghe, in 1982 to cater for the European market. LSR has since grown to being the tour operator to go to for a personalised, top quality holiday in Sri Lanka.
“One of the reasons for our success as a Destination Management Company,” said D K R Dharmapala, the CEO of LSR, “is our employees. We have 153 of them and they all are experienced, dedicated, capable and reliable, whether they are ‘on the ground’ or in administration.”
During a recent interview for Amazing Sri Lanka, Dharmapala gestured across the office to the desk
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where the company founder and owner, Thilak Weerasinghe, was discussing a tour programme with one of his guides, and other members of staff were at computers dealing with the hundreds of email enquiries the company receives every day. “Our structure enables us to make decisions quickly, based on our ‘open office’ principle,” he said. “LSR prides itself on a quick response to dealing with inquiries for individual niche-style holiday requests.”
Niche for LSR embraces everything an individual or group might want to do in Sri Lanka, from arranging mini or major conferences and tours for MICE (Meetings, Incentives, Conferences and Exhibitions) groups, to putting together a cycling trip around Sri
Mr. Thilak Weerasinghe Chairman - LSR
Mr. D.K.R. Dharmapala CEO - LSR
rafting, deep sea fishing and sailing; and tours of Sri Lanka for competitive players and spectators of golf, cricket and rugby.
LSR possesses one of the largest fleets of vehicles in Sri Lanka, consisting of luxury limousines, cars, micro vans, mini coaches, large luxury coaches and adventure backup vehicles. It has more than a score of vehicles based at the airport, where LSR operates its own transport desk. At its water sports centres LSR has its own boats and all the equipment needed for windsurfing, water skiing, canoeing, deep sea fishing and scuba diving, and lots of fun equipment such as banana boats, ringos and jet scooters.
Lanka for a couple of friends.
From its start promoting Sri Lanka for scuba diving enthusiasts, and running diving centres that are both PADI and CMAS certified (for which organisations LSR is the Authorised Partner in Sri Lanka), the company has branched out into the niche markets of Adventure and Sports Tourism.
The activities that can be arranged by LSR include agro and nature tours, home stays, cave exploration, tours by air and rail, traditional Sri Lankan weddings and folk dances; culture, ayurveda and eco tours; individualised tours to clients’ own itinerary of ancient cities, hill country, wild life, hiking, mountain biking, canoeing, kayaking, rafting, camping, wind surfing, surfing, water skiing, white water
LSR through its enthusiastic team takes an active part in all its guests’ interests. The efficient way LSR looks after guests and promotes Sri Lanka has been recognised with Presidential Awards in the past three years.
LSR is the innovator and sponsor of the Colombo marathon, which had over 200 participants in its first attempt. For the 12th marathon held in October 2012, 3,670 runners, many of them from overseas representing 25 countries from all continents took part.
LSR collaborates with leading travel agencies around the world and has expanded to having its own offices in China, France, Germany and India. The company’s resources include a multi-storied office, foreign and local branch offices, travel centres in two of Colombo’s star-class hotels and at the airport, water sports centres on the east and west coasts; a cottage site in
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Uwa Kuda Oya; the Catamaran Beach Hotel in Negombo, the Water Garden Hotel in Belihul Oya, the seaside Marina Hotel in Bentota and a new Marina and Luxury Villa property being built at the emerging east coast resort of Passikudah. LSR is the sole ground handling, layover agent for Sri Lankan Airlines and Mihin Air. This entails arranging accommodation at short notice for an average of more than 100,000 enforced transit passengers a year. LSR
also handles the Air Taxi operations at the Bandaranaike International Airport, Dandugama, Peliyagoda and Bentota.
“We conduct vigorous training programmes with special sessions for young people in the areas where we have a presence,” said CEO Dharmapala. “We actively encourage young people to become qualified in the various aspects of the tourist industry, so we can serve our clients with pride and professionalism. Our aim is to remain
the best outfit for the adventure tourist.”
Dharmapala said that the majority of guests LSR welcomes come from Europe. “Business is increasing daily. None of our guests were put off by the difficult situation in Sri Lanka during the past few years. They seemed to regard it as part of the adventure of coming to Sri Lanka.” Recognising a new niche demand at the upper end of the market for boutique style accommodation offering luxury as well as adventure, LSR has started a subsidiary company called Tropical Destination. Its mission is to ensure “a consistent and quality service of all products to our customers.” The vision is “to continue being the market leader in adventure and sports travel in Sri Lanka, and to diversify into other leisure activities within the country and internationally.”
Thanks to the inspired idea of one young Sri Lankan 30 years ago, LSR has grown into a secure and dependable operation, designed to help visitors discover Sri Lanka and its diverse attractions as part of a memorable holiday of activity and fulfilment.
Th as t d atta chil
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We Airp
Po cho fa
The Palace Hotel A Retreat for Everyone
The Palace Hotel welcomes the holiday maker as well as the MICE traveler with amenities such as single and double bedrooms, hot and cold water, safety vault, attached bathroom as well as extra beds on request for children and offers airport pickups and travel solutions from arrival to departure. Ours is a homely hotel with plenty of reasons to take it easy. The main one would be of course the private rooftop and swimming pool where guests can soak up the sun, view the Indian Ocean or have a quiet dip.
A specialist inbound tour operator, Airwing Tours is your gateway to the paradise island of Sri Lanka. Our services range from Special Interest Tours, Sports Tours, Nature Based Tours, Eco Holidays, Adventure Tours, Study Tours, Cultural Tours, Beach Holidays, Wellness Holidays, Incentive Tours, to Tailor Made Holidays for Luxury to Standard clientele. Established 15 years ago, we possess years of experience in organizing comprehensive travel packages for groups, individuals as well as families, bringing you the best tour packages in the island. With the knowledge of your special needs and requirements in mind, we offer complete holiday packages to suit every budget.
We are just 15 Km from the Bandaranaike International Airport. Negombo makes a convenient location for the leisure as well as the MICE traveler. Postal, courier and internet facilities; vehicle hiring, a choice of retail outlets, places of worship and banking facilities are all within close proximity to the Palace Hotel.
Please contact us for any inquiry. We can customise your holiday to your expectations. Head Office: Airwing Tours (Pvt) Ltd. No: 68, Colombo Road, Negombo, Sri Lanka.
The Palace Hotel 140, Lewis Place, Negombo, Sri Lanka. Te l : + 94 ( 0 ) 312227028 + 94 ( 0 ) 314873301 Fax : + 94 ( 0 ) 312238155 E-mail: sales@thepalacehotel.net Web: http://thepalacehotel.net
Sub Office: At the Colombo international airport arrival lobby. Tel: +94(0)31 2236620, +94(0)31 2238376 , +94(0)31 2238377, +94(0) 31 3338116 Fax: +94(0)31 2238155 E-mail: sales@airwingtours.com, info@airwingtours.com Web: www.airwingtours.com
Magical
Creations of
COIR
Coir has been produced in Sri Lanka for hundreds of years as one of nature’s by-products, and coir making still provides employment and income for rural folk. Sasindu Balage investigates and learns some coir lessons.
C
oir is not produced in a coir factory, it is a cottage industry,” the woman said firmly as she welcomed a tourist to a grove of coconut palms by a creek off a river in the lowland, Western Province of Sri Lanka. She proudly informed her visitor that she is the third generation of her family to be involved in coir production. “This is family land,” she said, indicating the cluster of coconut trees that are the source of coir. Coir is the term used for the fibres harvested from the protective casing around a coconut’s shell. This casing is a fibrous husk 5-8cm thick and is usually peeled off and discarded. In Sri Lanka, where the annual production of coconuts amounts to around 2.5 billion, less than a quarter of the coconut husks are utilised for coir. Nevertheless, according to a study by Oxfam International, Sri Lanka is the single largest supplier of brown
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coconut fibre - coir - to the world market and, with India, accounts for 90 per cent of global coir exports. There is an estimated 350,000 metric tons of coir produced worldwide each year. Processing coir is a lot older than three generations. About 2,000 years ago, boats made with planks sewn together with coconut fibre rope were trading along Africa’s east coast. By the 11th century, Arab traders (whose route stretched from China to Madagascar) were teaching residents of the countries that are now Sri Lanka and India how to extract and process coconut fibres. Marco Polo visiting the port of Hormuz on the Persian Gulf in the 13th century discovered Arab sea-
men built their ships without nails, sewing them together with coconut fibre.
In 1859, former colonial secretary of the then Ceylon, Sir James Emerson Tennant, wrote that coir had been produced in the Maldives and used for cord for over a thousand years in islands known as Diva-Kanbar. He claimed coir was a corruption of kanbar. He stated that cayer is also the Tamil name for rope, while dictionaries say the term comes from the Malayalam (also spoken in southern India) word for cord, kayar. He recorded seeing in Ceylon pits by the roadside where ‘the husks of the nut are steeped to convert the fibre into coir.’
The processing of coir has changed little over the centuries although in many of the 300 coir mills in Sri Lanka, gradual modernisation is speeding up the process. While 85 per cent of the coir mills are in the northwest and western provinces, where coconuts are grown commercially on large plantations, 10 per cent of the fibre is produced by traditional methods using coconut husks sourced from smallholdings in the south. This coir, known as white fibre, is softer than the brown variety, and is used for rope, upholstery stuffing and fertilizer.
The production process in rural areas is simple. In riverside gardens, women take coconuts freshly plucked from a tree and jab them swiftly on spikes stuck in the ground to remove the fibrous husk. With practice it would be possible for one woman to de-husk manually 2,000 coconuts a day; a machine can do 2,000 in an hour. The split husk is then tossed into a shallow gully of brackish water where it soaks for three months or longer, a process known as retting. This partly decomposes the husks and makes them pliable, allowing them to be separated into fibres and a residue of dust, called coir pith. The fractured husk is beaten with a mallet (made of palm wood) to shred the fibres. The residue that falls to the ground is swept up for compost; the fibres are braided into rope. This is done in village gardens using a recycled bicycle wheel lodged in a wooden frame as two women working in unison spin the yarn. In the west of Sri Lanka, inland from luxurious hotels lining the beaches, coir production is an important livelihood for many villagers. There are several small mills, some employing as many as 20 people, while about 40,000 are employed in the coir industry island-wide. In a mill a mangle-like roller of spikes tears and desiccates the coconut husks and spews out the fibre. An electric motor-powered conveyor belt shimmies and shakes as it winnows the fibre fed on to it by hand. Small particles of coir pith fall to the ground while the fi-
bre is conveyed on to a heap. Another machine ingeniously separates the fibres into separate strands that are fed, ten at a time, into a braiding machine that breaks down the strands and twines them into thin rope.
Excess dried fibre is piled into a mould where it is compacted into bales for shipment. These are sold as raw material or processed in Sri Lanka into value added products such as brooms, brushes, boot scrapers, twine, matting, woven and stitched geo-textiles, rubberised coir mattresses, and upholstery. An important byproduct is the pith sifted by the winnowing process. This is spread out on the ground to dry while women walk barefooted through it to stir it up and expose it to the sun.
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Villagers compress the pith into pastry-sized moulds where it hardens and produces coir cake or briquettes. These are exported as an eco-friendly, natural soil treatment and hydroponic (without soil) growth medium that is much in demand by horticulturists as a peat substitute. Although it is bio-degradable, coir pith takes 20 years to decompose. An Australian company has begun turning this pith into an absorbent product to remediate oil spills. Coir is the only natural fibre resistant to salt water; it is strong and nearly impervious to the weather. While a lot of Sri Lanka’s coir production is informal, the Ceylon Coir Fibre Exporters’ Association was set up in colonial times to enhance the product’s appeal. This was followed by the formation in 2004 of the Coir Council International established to promote the growth and development of the Sri Lanka coir industry. Both Oxfam International and the US Agency for International Development (USAID) have sponsored initiatives in the past to improve methods of production, productivity and demand.
Two new market trends that have emerged in recent years have been the positioning of China as a principal buyer of Sri Lankan coir fibre for use in its rapidly expanding domestic mattress market, and the demand from German automotive manufacturers for twisted fibre for use in high-end car seats. The Sri Lankan coir industry has also benefited from the demand for coir-based geotextile erosion control products such as blankets of coir laid out on bare soil to control erosion and stimulate the growth of protective ground cover.
Coir may have been manufactured for thousands of years; in Sri Lanka it is contributing to the development of the modern world. 54 | ASL
ELLA
HIGHLIGHTED
T
o the delight of lovers of legend, Ella features in the Ramanya, the great Indian epic dating to more than 1,000 years before the birth of Christ. Sita, the beautiful wife of Rama, is said to have been hidden in the caves at Ella by Ravana, King of Lanka.
This legend, and the magnificent view through Ella Gap, has attracted many visitors, especially from India, to the small town as they trace places mentioned in the Ramanaya. Ella’s popularity, however, owes much to independent travellers passing through on their way to the beaches of the East Coast, as well as to pilgrims. Ella is 240km from Colombo and makes the perfect transit stop on the way to and from Arugam Bay on the east coast, or for travellers heading down through Wellawaya to Kataragama, Yala and Tissamaharama in the south. It became an important transit point for government officials in the days of the British regime, which resulted in a rest house being built in Ella to accommodate travelling officials. As
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usual with government bungalows, this one was placed in the most scenic position, commanding a view of the famous Ella Gap.
Even as recently as 25 years ago, the Ella Rest House (then renovated) was the main place for foreigners to stay, supported by a few neighbouring rustic establishments that let rooms to passing hippies. In 2000, the rest house was transformed into a more upmarket property and given the name Grand Ella Motel, helping to stimulate the awakening of Ella as a convenient upcountry halt.
The increase in visitors wanting to stay in Ella inspired the opening of purpose-designed guesthouses in the hills overlooking the village, although none could match the former rest house for views. The success of the rest house as a motel and the demand for better accommodation resulted in the transformation of the property in 2011 to become The Heritage, Ella. At 1,041m above sea level, the hotel is poised at the edge of a view that seems to go on forever. Meals can
be taken on the lawn against a breathtaking backdrop. To the left of the Gap view is a mountain known as Small Adam’s Peak, while to the right is Rawana Kandha (Ella Rock).
The hills stretching to the far horizon include the Maha Galbokka Rock, the Hambegamuwa Mountain Range, the Kotawehara Gala Mountain Range, the Bubula Kandha and the Bambaragama Kandha Mountain Ranges. Beyond the mountains the southern seacoast twinkles in the distance.
Naturally the area affords many opportunities for trekking. Even in the mid-19th century, it was known for its stunning beauty, as recorded by Sri James Emerson Tennent in his seminal 1859 book, Ceylon. He wrote: “Perhaps there is not a scene in the world which combines sublimity and beauty in a more extraordinary degree than that which is presented at the Pass of Ella, where, through an opening in the chain of mountains, the road from Badulla descends rapidly to the lowlands...for more than sixty miles, the prospect extends, unbroken by a single eminence, till, far in the distance, the
A small hamlet with the pretty name of Ella has become a highlight of Sri Lanka’s hill country for the independent traveller. Our special correspondent finds out why.
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the engine driver, it assures the train can only proceed when the single-track railway is clear.
It is a walk of only a few metres from the station to the A23 road that leads to the village junction with the B97 Passara road. At the junction there is a large signboard with illustrations of the area’s attractions. These include the Rawana Cave and Temple (3km), the Mini Adam’s Peak (2km) and, at Demodara (8km), the Nine Arches Railway Bridge and the unbelievable Loop where the railway line tunnels under itself outside Demodara Station.
The joy of Ella is the way it has developed in response to the modern independent traveller. In addition to the neatly furnished guesthouses, a range of restaurants selling fast food as well as local dishes has opened up, creating a convivial atmosphere in the evenings as visitors stroll up and down the sole street. There is even a local bar that has embraced the influx of foreigners as customers, and opened a roadside terrace with steward service.
eye discerns a line of light, which marks where the sunbeams are flashing on the waters of the Indian ocean.”
Travellers today reach Ella either by bus or train; train is the most popular way as the journey from Colombo or Kandy passes through staggering mountain scenery. The railway station at Ella reflects the nature of the place; ignoring the modern steel girder and galvanise tin platform shelter, the station building resembles a granite cottage from the British shires.
Inside the stationmaster’s office is a “Tyers Patent Train Tablet Apparatus” that has been in use since the railway line opened in the 1920s. Through the use of a token released by the machine and issued by the stationmaster to
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Perhaps because its expansion has been so unexpected, Ella manages to retain an unpretentious, laidback friendliness, with prices to match. Some visitors who are enchanted by its informality, say Ella has become like Hikkaduwa in the hills. Now it has over 35 guesthouses catering not just for the adventurous young but also for the middle-aged and reasonably prosperous couples travelling independently on a holiday whim. About 11km south of Ella, overlooking the A23 where it winds downhill to Wellawaya, is a bungalow originally built in the 19th century and now taking paying guests. Aptly named Planter’s Bungalow, it was the home until 1948 of Scottish planter Malcolm George. Now it is owned by a British couple who have restored it and added their own idiosyncrasies. This has resulted in a charming retreat, so typical of Ella, in an exotic tropical garden 1,000m above sea level. Whether visitors choose The Heritage Hotel, a plantation bungalow or a village guesthouse, it is well worth staying for a few nights to enjoy the views, the salubrious climate, and the calm, evening atmosphere of the delightful Ella.
THE GALLE FORT
A tourist destination from the past
In contrast to the rapid modernisation of Colombo as a bright business and holiday destination with new hotels and green public spaces, gentrification is taking place at the Fort in the southern city of Galle. Our travel correspondent reports from the ramparts. 60 | ASL
G
alle Fort has always been a popular place for foreign residents and visitors. In the days of the Dutch, maritime pilots were forbidden to leave the Fort in retirement in case they divulged the secrets of navigating its harbour to invaders.
Its gentrification in the past three decades has come about almost by chance, and not without controversy. It began when a few foreigners, recognising the potential in the fort’s charming, albeit dilapidated, buildings, bought a few to convert into second homes. This set a trend that eventually resulted in the fort’s infrastructure, not just crumbling private houses, being improved. The result today is a compact residential area, like a gated community, with appropriate street lighting, modern cobbled roadways, and houses developed and preserved under strict building codes. This is to keep the very allure that attracted visitors to Galle Fort in the first place.
One attraction of Galle Fort for visitors is its easy-to-reach location. It
is within a few minutes by foot from the Galle train and bus stations, at 116km south of Colombo. Travel by special bus or private car down the Southern Expressway that emerges just east of Galle, and it is within an hour’s driving distance from Colombo.
Galle Fort invites exploration by day, perfect for strolling its neatly laid out streets, popping into its many easy-going cafés and restaurants, wandering around its museums, browsing in its antique shops and trend-setting boutiques, and taking in the sea breeze or watching cricket from its broad ramparts. Because people live and work in the Fort, it is not some kind of Disney theme fortress but a thriving community with schools, temples, churches and mosques and almost 500 buildings, some of which have become elite guesthouses. Although the city of Galle itself is a thriving metropolis (it is the capital of the Southern Province), its history lies in the Fort. In spite of its recent gentrification, the sombre grey walls of the Fort still exude an air of mystery.
Those brooding hulks of stone – shipped in as ballast and hauled into place by slaves imported from Africa – dominate the town, walling off a small peninsula and guarding the harbour. It has been there for more than four centuries. According to one travel writer: “It was the thin edge of the wedge driven by European invaders to open up their conquest of the island. Portuguese, Dutch and British – following the sea-lanes of Arab traders – lived and died in the fort. “Even when the fort’s battlements are brightly lit at night, there
hovers a sense of foreboding, as though ghosts of soldiers past are waiting only for the light to dim so they may march again along its ramparts. As dusk gathers, its narrow streets and cloistered inner courtyards of shuttered mansions echo softly with the murmurings of bygone evenings. The Fort is steeped in history; you will sense it from afar and feel its spell the moment you pass through its gates.” If the first sight of the fort’s huge, darkly satanic, granite walls, inspires flights of fancy, walking the streets yields enough visual evidence
to speculate on life in the past. It is the best-preserved colonial sea fortress in the whole of Asia.
Galle is believed by some scholars to be the Tarshish of Old Testament history, the great emporium of the East with which ships of Tyre and Phoenicia traded, to which King Solomon sent his merchant vessels and to where Jonah fled from the Lord. In 1344, the restless Arab traveller, Ibn Battuta, observed Moorish vessels in the harbour. The peninsula was then an entrenched settlement in the lowland territory of the Kandyan kings and remained so until
the Portuguese – who first saw Galle in 1505 – invaded in 1589.
They built bastions, embankments and a small fortress to guard the natural harbour. The Dutch took it after a fierce battle in 1640 and stayed for 156 years, adding ramparts and more bastions around the edges, and churches, houses and streets within the walls, together with a complex network of underground channels that enabled the sea to flow in and out, flushing away the sewerage. 62 | ASL
The Dutch ceded the Fort to
the British in 1796. Entrance then was by a drawbridge. Now the moat is filled in and the British coat of arms adorns the outer wall of the Old Gate, with the crest of the Dutch East India Company, dated 1669, on the inner side. The British reclaimed land (now the Cricket Stadium) to broaden the peninsula’s link with Galle town. In 1873, they tunnelled through the embankment that connects the Star, Moon and Sun bastions to create a road access. Although it is recognised as Number 200 on UNESCO’s World Heritage List, entry to the Fort costs nothing, and residents and visitors pass freely through its two gateways. All the buildings in the Fort have been counted by the staff of the
Archaeological Department, which maintains an office in a converted Dutch building opposite the Old Gate and which pursues a vigorous campaign to restore and preserve the Fort’s architectural heritage. Some 50 buildings predate the British occupation, with about 100 having been constructed pre-1850. A stroll along the streets reveals the varying styles of British and Dutch buildings, adapted by local builders to tropical living with colonnaded verandas and ornate gables, giving glimpses though open doorways of plant-filled courtyards and latticed screens. Styles of Art Deco from the 1930s and earlier Art Nouveau are represented too, together with the brash frontages of more modern houses, built
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before tight planning regulations were enforced.
Behind the traditional exteriors of older buildings some dramatic changes have taken place with courtyards being replaced by swimming pools and pastel colours brightening the patina of mahogany, ebony and teak. Foreign residents, though, are aghast at modernising their homes beyond a pool and better plumbing, as they try to replicate the gracious standards of the Fort when it was at its prime. Until Colombo became a major port, Galle was where arrivals landed from sailing vessels, and the Fort was the social centre, welcoming all newcomers. Today, Galle Fort is a treasure trove of discovery for visitors. Lighthouse Street and Church Street are the main thoroughfares, both different in character. The lighthouse, which used to stand at the end of the street to which it gave its name, was burned down in 1936, and a new one erected on the opposite bastion. Church Street (opposite the British built entrance where a map of directions is displayed) boasts some grand buildings, beginning with the Amangalla, formerly the New Oriental Hotel, and a squat 18th century post office building. A belfry tower, originally built in 1701, still has its bell. Opposite stands Queen’s House, which carries the date 1683 above its doorway.
The cobbled Square, now a car park but once a village green, separates the District Court on the seaside and the Magistrates Court on the other. Lawyers’ ancient, booklined chambers line one side of the square, the Maritime Museum on the other. A wall on the seaside carries a worn inscription: Aker Sloot 1759. Behind it grows the island’s oldest breadfruit tree, and cannons in the garden point out to sea.
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The ordnance and the ramparts are relics of the past; contemporary Galle Fort, forgetting the ghosts, with its quaint, mannered lifestyle has earned its status high on the list of Sri Lanka’s memorable destinations.
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PETTAH
COLOMBO’S
BIZARRE BAZAAR
I
began my exploration of Pettah at Colombo Fort railway station, crossing Olcott Mawatha by the overhead bridge, trying not to disturb the sleeping denizens sprawled beside empty plastic begging cups. From there it’s a short, but difficult walk due to the crowds, to the FOSE covered market near the Central Bus Stand.
Access to Pettah is also possible by walking down Sir Baron Jayatilaka Mawatha, from York Street, to link up with Pettah’s defining thoroughfare, Main Street. Walking is the best way to get around Pettah because of the traffic competing for the right of way with porters pulling loaded trolleys. It’s also advisable to start early in the morning before the commuter traffic hits town, but even so Pettah is abuzz before most people have had breakfast.
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Pettah is the haunt of Colombo’s streetwise and canny shoppers. It is a bizarre bazaar spreading over several city blocks where everything you have ever wanted, and most things you will never need, can be found. Originally a residential area for the Dutch colonists, Pettah had turned into “the native traders’ quarter” by 1900, according to a guidebook published then.
It hasn’t changed. A more recent guidebook states: “This area of six city blocks by four is the entrepôt for the whole of Sri Lanka where everything imaginable, and unimaginable, can be purchased from small shops stacked with goods spilling out onto the pavement. Its jungle of streets is packed during every working day with traders from outstations seeking goods to re-sell, families gawping and herds of trucks, cars and bullock carts, all accompanied by the klaxons of threewheelers and the shouts of porters telling you to move out of their way.” Olcott Mawatha, where I started my concrete jungle safari, is named after Henry Steel Olcott, an Americanborn Buddhist crusader whose statue stands aloof in the station forecourt. On the Pettah side, St Philip Neri Church (built in 1859) offers some sanctuary from the hubbub. The spectacular, candy-striped Jumi Ul Afar Jummah Mosque deeper in Pettah is more recent, dating from 1909.
There is a bizarre bazaar area within a short walk from Colombo’s hotels that promises all the colour, hustle and bustle, and excitement of tropical Asia. Our travel correspondent takes a look.
The Fose Market is an instant introduction to the glorious, colourful chaos that typifies Pettah. It is a recently covered area constructed to amalgamate the city’s street vendors and began life as the F.O.S.E. market. A new sign has changed its name to the more colloquial FOSE market, an acronym for Federation of Self-Employees.
It’s impossible to pass through the market without being beguiled by the hucksters praising their wares, and the curious items on display, alongside clothes, vegetables and plastic knickknacks, making it a kind of upmarket village market. Walking through it, I emerged into the street that leads to the old town hall, almost hidden from view by stalls and wayside vendors colonising the sidewalk. In a centre island where Pettah’s streets of stores selling gold and gems, spices and herbs, haberdashery and hardware merge, I saw a living relic from the past in full swing. A knife grinder and his forefathers have sharpened knives there for generations, using a homebuilt contraption of a wooden frame, a rotating wooden shaft operated by foot pedal power, and a bicycle wheel with belt attached to spin the grinding wheel.
People rush over with knives to be sharpened and, when I stood too close to study the machine’s working, someone nicked my hip pocket with an exposed blade. Perhaps I was lucky he didn’t nick my wallet too. Actually everyone I saw in Pettah seemed intent on minding their own business and even though it is such a crowded area, there is nothing threatening about it, as long as you keep your eyes open for the trundling trolleys, loaded to the gunwales.
It’s a walk of about 50m westwards from the old town hall to Kayman’s Gate, although you have to look carefully to see the belfry, complete with bell and crows nesting in it, that marks this historical point. Now advertising hoardings hide it. The bell is believed to have been salvaged from the ruins of a 16th century Portuguese church. It is all that remains of the ancient Kayman’s Gate, so named because it stands where crocodiles from the Beira Lake once scavenged for food.
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Public executions were held at its foot; now an electricity transformer blocks close access to it. The Cross streets linking Main Street with the parallel streets of Keyzer, Prince and Maliban with Olcott Mawatha, each have their own identity. One of them is devoted to electrical and electronic goods, another to textiles, a third to comestibles. To return to Colombo’s more placid commercial quarter, persevere along Main Street. It’s pointless tyring to hurry as everyone seems to be going in the opposite direction, or blocking the sidewalk while they inspect bargain offers. At the end, marking one of the boundaries of Pettah is the Khan Clock Tower, in the centre of a roundabout. This commemorates the life of one Framjee Bhikkajee Khan and was erected in 1923.
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From Pettah, across a bridge where ship’s masts peep over the roofs of shops hiding the harbour views, and the portside railway line, the road forks. To the right, it leads past the entrance to the harbour and on to the venerable Grand Oriental Hotel, distinguished by a statue of a rickshaw driver outside it. To the left it brings you to the centre of York Street.
Pettah is a strident introduction to a way of life it is easy for tourists to avoid when they browse the city’s boutique lifestyle emporiums and genteel antique stores. It’s well worth a morning’s ramble, though, even if it’s a boisterous one.
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A
business traveller writes: “I stay in Colombo often on business and am happy to say that I have at last found a hotel that suits me perfectly – so much so that it’s my new address in Colombo: Colombo Cortyard.
wash basins with a separate waterfall shower corner emphasising the hotel’s trendsetting, boutique character. An amenities tray is packed with useful items for forgetful travellers like me, such as a comb, razor and toothbrush.
“Each of the 14 suites not only has complimentary Wi-Fi but also a 21-inch iMac computer, so I don’t need to lug along my own laptop. There is also a separate cyber lounge to serve the hotel’s 12 deluxe rooms. This deftly designed hotel’s bedrooms are for living in, not just for sleeping, although they do feature large, plump, modern four-poster beds.
“In spite of the hotel’s busy location within easy reach of the embassy and classy residential enclaves, shopping malls and nightlife, its bedrooms exude an ambience of peace. With a wine lounge off the courtyard and a restaurant wing with Scarlet Room restaurant, and a long Loft Bar with signature cocktails and an alcove for smokers, and roof top Cloud Café there is no need to venture out to the city and I can happily entertain my visitors in those discreet and wellserviced outlets.
“Where is it? Smack in the centre of the action and within easy reach of all I need to see and do while in the city. Not only does it have a perfect location, at the corner of Albert House Avenue and R A De Mel Mawatha (Duplication Road), it has purpose built accommodation designed specifically for the business or discerning leisure visitor.
“There are plenty of plug points, a work desk a 42inch flat television screen with satellite feed, a mini-bar, a wine chiller, a cappuccino maker, and even a retro handoperated juicer (plus a bowl of oranges on the coffee table. Each landing has a lounge area and every suite has a parlour useful for private meetings.
“The bathrooms have cement bathtubs and twin
“The hotel’s décor is refreshingly different, making a stay at Colombo Courtyard a revitalising experience, and change from the tedious mediocrity of chain hotels. I loved the fascinating climbing sculpture made out of old bicycle parts, the walls of shaved railway sleepers and the cobbled entrance courtyard.
“I am telling my colleagues and friends about my new address, Colombo Courtyard so they will look forward to meeting me there whenever I have the pleasure of staying in Colombo again.”
Nestled in the heart of the city of Colombo, this urban boutique hotel perfectly captures a fusion of contemporary style with intrinsic elements of environmental design. Crafted around the concept of a series of open spaces, conscious lighting patterns and the use of recycled material in its unique sculptures and artistic décor, stepping in, you will leave the clutter behind. The discerning business traveller will appreciate the hotels proximity to key commercial locations and embassies. Colombo Courtyard is a quick stroll away to many of the city’s entertainment and shopping areas too.
Accommodation Courtyard
Colombo Courtyard offers a select choice of rooms & suites with your own private courtyard. Situated on the ground level this accommodation offers a heightened sense of space with a courtyard lined with tropical plants and pebbles.
Vibrant in ambience yet relaxed, this restaurant serves the finest European cuisine with an emphasis on Mediterranean specialties. The menu also offers variety with select Asian favourites too.
This rooftop cafe seats you under the stars with a view of the city’s skyline by night. The incredible setting with its breezy atmosphere lined by bamboo plants, and the soothing sounds will keep you completely chilled out.
An industrial-style bar with furnishing conceived of recycled material including creative tractor seats for bar stools, this bar has a spirit of its own.
COLOMBO COURT YARD, #32, Alfred House Ave, Colombo - 03, Sri Lanka. Reception: +94 114645333
E-mail:
info@colombocourtyard.com
Web:
www.colombocourtyard.com
COLOMBO’S
GREAT MUSEUMS
Hidden away in Colombo’s busy streets are three museums that visitors seldom see, but they are all worth a visit during a day out in Colombo, writes - Neel Jayantha.-
C
olombo’s flagship museum is the magnificent National Museum, the oldest and largest in the country. It was built specifically as a museum in 1877 at the behest of Governor (1872-1879) Sir William Gregory, whose statue gazes earnestly out over the building’s front lawn and the traffic sweeping along Sir Marcus Fernando Mawatha, Colombo 7. It is a splendid British renaissance building with Palladian flourishes. Its gleaming white exterior exudes a dignified calm. Inside the countless, priceless exhibits include the regalia of the King of Kandy, ancient and medieval jewellery, a collection of rare traditional masks, ivory and woodcarvings, Buddhist and Hindu bronzes, ancient stone sculptures and ornate brass and silver objects. For a look into Sri Lanka’s long and event-filled history, a visit to the National Museum is an eye-opener, as well as a respite from the city’s pandemonium.
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Conveniently located in the same premises is the Natural History Museum with a display of stuffed birds, mammals, reptiles and insects. It also has a collection of geological specimens and gives an account of Sri Lanka’s main agricultural crops of tea, rubber and coconuts. Opened in 1986, it has rather a utilitarian appearance. Both museums are open to visitors from 09.00hrs to 17.00hrs and close on Poya Day. For a more specialised insight into Sri Lanka’s rich past, there are three other museums – each one totally different - well worth a detour. It means heading, by three-wheeler taxi, deep into Pettah, the bazaar area inland from Colombo Fort Railway station. There, Prince Street runs parallel to Main Street and is reached by one of the Cross Streets from Olcott Mawatha. At Number 95 Prince Street is the Dutch Period Museum, a building steeped in history.
It was original a grand, colonnaded town house built by the Dutch
in the 17th century. It is difficult to understand how it managed to survive the gutting caused by modern progress around it. In its time, after the Dutch moved out, it has served as an orphanage, a private residence, a hospital, the headquarters of the Ceylon Volunteers, a police training school and a post office. It was restored with Dutch assistance in 1981 to become a museum depicting life in Sri Lanka under Dutch rule, together with a hint of the culture of the Kandyan Kingdom during that period (1656-1796). The building with its tall white columns and flagstone veranda was originally the residence of Thomas van Rhee, governor from 1693 to 1697.
Visitors can wander around the museum at leisure discovering the intricacies of the old house, or be escorted by a helpful guide who delights in showing off ornately carved Dutch oriental furniture on display and revealing their secret drawers and com-
partments.
The master bedroom has a high roof of clay tiles and a solid timber floor. It features a rickety, fourposter bed made of jak wood, almirahs (wardrobes) of calamander, and an important-looking official’s burgomaster chair of satinwood. There are Dutch plates, guns, coins and cannons, as well as a baby’s cot made of ebony, and a sturdy bell dated 1768. The room’s balcony gives a view of deep, columned cloisters and a well-kept, lush interior garden with an old well, adding a sense of tranquillity that defies the clatter of bustling Pettah beyond the walls. If there is an ambience of lethargy and decrepitude it seems entirely apt. The museum is closed on Sundays and Mondays.
It’s a walk of a few blocks northwards to Main Street, to the Old Town Hall Museum, a museum that even people in the area hardly know about. It’s housed in Colombo’s original town hall and is appropriately devoted to municipal items like street furniture and civic relics.
When it was built in 1873, the building was considered a masterful testimony to British oriental architecture, although today it is almost forgotten. Only two stories tall, it is lent authority by its slender spires that sprout from the frieze bordering the base of its peaked roof, in imitation of the minarets and stupas of Colombo’s then skyline.
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The building served as the centre of municipal government for 65 years until, in 1928, the city fathers abandoned it in favour of the classically designed New Town Hall at Cinnamon Gardens. Street traders turned its courtyard into a public market for many years, until it was restored and opened as a museum in 1984. The courtyard now is filled with reminders of the days gone by. There is a steam-driven council lorry with council crest, an old mobile library van, a huge steam roller, and a gas lamp, one of 2,000 that lit Colombo’s streets in the 19th century. A street signpost that used to stand at the crossroads outside the town hall has place of honour.
Here too is to be found the famous landmark that once graced the seaside of the Galle Face Green. This is the original stone slab on which is carved the inspired statement: “Galle Face Walk. Commenced by Sir Henry Ward, 1856, completed in 1859, and Recommended to his Successors in the Interest of the Ladies and Children of Colombo.” There are more eccentricities to discover within the building. Upstairs the old council chamber astonishes visitors with its recreation of a council meeting of 100 years ago. Dusty, fragile effigies representing 16 councillors sit around a long table and,
when a gust of wind through a broken window stirs the figures, they seem to be alive.
From the interior of Pettah, a three-wheeler taxi is useful for getting to another of Colombo’s little visited museums: the Railway Museum. It is in Olcott Mawatha, east of the Colombo Fort railway station. It is open daily, except public holidays and weekends, until 16.00hrs. (www.railwaymuseum. com)
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Colombo’s collection of steam locomotives used to be a source of amazement to steam and rail enthusiasts who were occasionally allowed to view them in the rail yard at Dematagoda. Now, after many years and various attempts, this small but fascinating railway museum has gathered some railway artefacts and opened them to public view.
The museum consists of a hall with some railway station furniture, including a Tyers Patent Train Tablet Apparatus over 100 year sold, and engines parked alongside a station platform called Colombo Terminus. An enormous narrow-gauge crane dominates the space, but the main attraction is the three locomotives at the platform.
The first is a cute saddle tank steam engine (Class 040ST); probably from the Oil & Fats Corporation, perhaps dating to 1864. The second steam engine is identified as Class 20601. The third, Number 727, is a remarkable diesel hydraulic Y1 Class Shunting locomotive – remarkable because it was designed and built in Sri Lanka. It long lay abandoned until rescued and rehabilitated for display. After a day exploring the past, it’s a shock to emerge into today’s Colombo where smart new office blocks and tall hotel buildings have replaced the mansions of the past, and the gracious way of life recalled by Colombo’s great little museums, has gone.
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Chinese Acupuncture & Pressure Point Massaging Techniques
I
t is a question why ladies take so much of effort to Preserve Beauty. They tend to spend considerable time, money and pay lot of concern over the issue. But the fact is that, it is not always the ladies who bother very much over the topic. The entrepreneurs who invest on Beauty Culture industry share one common secret. That is that they are aware even poorest of poor will even lavishly spend considerable share of their income on Beauty.
One vender will try to prove that their product is highly scientific while other will claim that their product is natural. Yet a anther will declare it as the latest trend. There is always pros and cons on all this. In the quest to look younger, there are many modern options available. For example, some people take the medical approach of surgery, injections, or topical creams. Of course, such approaches focus entirely on outward appearance, without taking into account how the inner health of the person contributes to his looks. Chinese Acupuncture (CA) refuses this competition. CA continues three thousand year old tradition and
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By Dr. Prasad Deshapriya Kalubowila Acupunture Clinic, De Silva Road, Kalubovila. M: +94 (0) 714 299 777 E: vpdeshapriya@gmail.com W: www.kalubovilaacupunture.com
time tested theoretic approach of Cosmetic or Facial Acupuncture.
Let’s look at this magnificent life art of stimulating specific points for healing energy, and improved health.
Basic concept of Chinese Acupuncture is to take the human body as whole as far as treatment is concern. What is beauty of Face or skin? It is merely the reflection of smooth functioning of the internal organs. Therefore Secret of Beauty is well balanced whole body hygiene. Consequently, Asian Ladies shared the legend of Prettiness, Skin Color and Long life. Various herbal preparations, individual selfcare techniques, and in ancient China specific Acupuncture procedures developed and were tested extensively. The ancient emperors were particularly interested in learning ways to keep themselves going and constantly sought out experts who knew how to achieve this. As a result it developed Cosmetic acupuncture which is a natural anti-aging treatment that’s intended to stimulate the body’s healing energies. This has evolved over thousands of years due to the interest of women.
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com
To Stop Aging, Improve Body Strength and Preserve Beauty. What Benefits could you get from Anti-Aging Acupuncture? It is interesting to know results of this special approach.
• Soft Shape up of Attractiveness
• It fills in wrinkles
• Tune up your skin
• Bring back that youthful glow to your cheeks • The color and texture of the skin brightens, moisten and smoothes • Reduce Acne (Pimples) • Bring back liveliness
In addition Cosmetic Acupuncture could gift you,
• A powerful treatment for depression and anxiety
• Improve body strength and immunity
• Stops sweating in midnights • Grants a peaceful sleep
• Better Digestion and metabolism
Self applied Pressure Points massaging techniques: If you are to get Acupuncture treatments obviously you need to have a proper training. Now we will enlighten you over healing technique which could be self applied.
1. Leg three miles pressure point is pressure point off the Knee joint. By massaging the exact point it will result in reducing fatigue. This is also referred to as Stomach 36 or St 36. This was used by old Chinese hill climbers to regain the body strength after excessive climbing. This could befit you as well. Pressuring of the point has to be done using three of the fingers. Patient should be kept at the seated position. Exact location is depicted. 2. Sea of Blood point – This was known by ancient Chinese as pressure point which gives Long life and multiple health benefits. Located just above two finger distance from the center of the knee joint. Massaging this point will improve liveliness. Sometimes we feel immense tiredness. There will be no liveliness at all. Then you may massage said pressure point of both legs 21 times respectively. Body will pick up energy and bring back liveliness.
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Sri Lankans will often try to curry favour with visitors by offering them the country’s traditional national dish, rice and curry. It takes many forms and the preparation of authentic curries requires careful planning, reveals Dora De Lile.
C
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URRYING FLAVOUR
ice and curry is to be found on practically every buffet table that tourists encounter while travelling anywhere in Sri Lanka. Not only is it the symbol of the country’s unique cuisine, rice and curry is ideal for a selfservice buffet because the curries waiting to be enjoyed gain more flavour as they simmer for hours over a low flame in clay pots or chafing dishes.
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‘Rice and curry’ will probably seem a misnomer to visitors to describe this staple midday meal. When they are confronted with curries (sometimes more than a dozen of them) in pots alongside containers of rice of various kinds, visitors from overseas can be forgiven for thinking it should be named ‘curries and rice.’
Rice and curry is perfect for serving oneself from a buffet counter because each curry is designed to complement each other. Piling the rice in the centre of the plate and mixing up all the curries around the rice is the way to savour the exoticism of this healthy, flavourful cuisine. Do that with western buffet fare, combining, say, apple sauce with chicken stew, and chefs would be
trampling on their toques with disgust at the ruining of their fine cooking.
To appreciate the finer points of rice and curry, one needs first to understand its provenance for it is derived from many cultures. The preparation of Sri Lankan curries has evolved over centuries, from the ancient rural dishes prepared with locally grown ingredients and hunted meat or fish to the input of Oriental and Arab travellers and the meals created with a considerable dash of influence from
Portuguese settlers in the 16th century.
Next came the Dutch contribution, based on both European and learned cuisine from the Dutch East Indies countries. The British contribution in the 19th century to rice and curry was slighter, although the British did adopt many items they found appealing for their own cuisine. They also introduced new vegetables like potato and cauliflower grown in hill country climates that lent themselves beautifully to be prepared as curries.
The abundance of fresh vegetables as well as forest roots and locally grown spices like cardamom, cinnamon, cloves and the unique ingredient called curry leaves – known as karapincha in Sinhala – produced what was historically organic and wholesome dishes.
Through trial and error over centuries, household cooks discovered what ingredients were best for really spicy curries, and what for milder versions. Meat and fish and vegetables
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like eggplant, cabbage, beans and even pineapple lend themselves to hot curries. Root vegetables and cashew nuts work better as mild curries.
Even modern day cooks have realised that curries cooked in the traditional way, in a clay pot over a wood fire take on a more spicy flavour, due to the slow cooking method as well as the seasonings used. Even the wood used for the fire makes a difference, with the favoured firewood being cinnamon for the best rural rice and curry. One boutique guesthouse in southern Sri Lanka offers ‘organic Sri Lankan cuisine prepared on cinnamon firewood stoves by the family cook.’ In the 120-year-old kitchen retained alongside the modernised property, guests can watch the cook at work.
Many are the kinds of rice used, grown in neighbouring paddy fields or bought in quantity from the local market. While an assistant sifts the rice to remove any impurities, the cook pounds spices in a pestle and mor-
tar and sets them aside for blending with the ingredients. She adds onions, curry leaves and rampe – pandan leaf – together with hand-ground spices, to sliced lotus stems, or whatever vegetables are in season, setting them aside to be cooked.
The ingredients are gently simmered in coconut milk squeezed from the freshly grated flesh of the nut. The amount of coconut milk is adjusted so that the dish has an exquisite flavour to balance the more demanding heat of richly curried meat. Curry aficionados crave even more challenging dishes, such as curried garlic or hot, red dry prawn curry as prepared in Jaffna. It is said that the hottest curries in Sri Lanka are to be found in Jaffna, Galle, and the hill country, as well as in Colombo where all strengths of curry are available. Rice and curry lunch packets are even sold by the wayside to office workers and travellers. These are neatly wrapped parcels containing rice and three or four curries, selling
for about Rs. 120 each.
At The Tea Castle tea centre overlooking the St Clair Waterfall beside the A7 in Sri Lanka’s hill country, the rice and curry has been gussied up to look as good as it tastes. Set out on a dining table (no tired buffet meals there) for each party of guests are to be seen curries made of plantain blossoms, radishes, lentils, beef, fish, beans and egg plant, accompanied by bitter gourd sambol (a relish), gotakola medun (a leaf salad), devilled potatoes, spicy mango chutney, and poppadum served with fried red chillies and chunks of sun-dried fish. A veritable feast of sensations served with rice infused with green tea leaves. Boutique hotels like to give a twist to rice and curry, recognising that their sophisticated guests might not, at first, be able to stomach the onslaught of such bold, raunchy flavours all at
once. Some dishes seems to have been created by an interior designer rather than a cook, with curries all dolled up in banana leaf doilies. Fortunately, the natural exuberance of curries resists such trendy gentrification.
with rice flour and with a fried egg nestling in the middle) or string hoppers (a nest of rice flour noodles).
Vegetable and lentil curries, together with seeni sambol (a sweet onion relish) are served alongside beef, chicken or fish curries. As well as bread fresh from the wood fired oven of the village baker, the ideal accompaniment is egg hoppers (a kind of crepe made
Whether for breakfast, lunch or dinner, Sri Lanka’s rice and curry is a unique and freshly prepared wholesome meal to savour, even for the squeamish weaned on mass produced fast food.
Curries are not confined to lunch in Sri Lanka. The Sri Lanka breakfast is also traditionally a spicy one, enough for the heartiest appetite. While tourist hotels may have a token fish or lentil curry on their breakfast buffets, real Sri Lankan breakfasts are best prepared in the home or hill country bungalow when the cook rises before dawn to begin preparations.
Laid out in buffet style, or a sumptuous a’ la carte menu, patrons are welcomed to the restaurant by the mouth-watering aromas of Sri Lankan specialities.
To prove the heat of the local breakfast served at the Tea Factory Hotel at the highest elevation of any hotel in Sri Lanka (2,070m) the chef takes its temperature for interested guests with food thermometer. For a breakfast beef curry he uses coriander, chilli, cardamom, cinnamon, rampe, curry leaves, cloves, pepper, nutmeg and ground sautéed rice, plus onions, garlic, ginger and lemon grass. The subtle combination of spices revives the palate rather than scorching it.
Sri Lankan meals, drawn from the soil & oceans of this tropical island are always well-balanced & healthy. At Raja bojun, we strive to maintain this healthy tradition, by making sure we put no synthetic flavouring or additives, no trans-fats & that our ingredients are always home-grown & authentic. A truly Sri Lankan food experience. Laid out in buffet style, or a sumptuous a’ la carte menu, patrons are welcomed to the restaurant by the mouth-watering aromas of Sri Lankan specialities.
The view of the ocean tantalises the taste buds with stories of spicy seafood. Preparations of crab meat & squid, succulent shrimp & tangy fish curry-open secrets of this tiny tropical island-are laid out before the discerning diner.
Raja Bojun, Ceylinco Hotels Ltd, Seylan Towers, No. 90, Galle Road, Colombo 03. T: +94 (0) 11 4716171 W: www.rajabojun.lk
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Seven Wonders of the World is definitely in the priority list of any traveler but Sigiriya by no means is second to any of those seven under any criteria. Its history dates back to the great Pyramid era and the technological wonders are unimaginable even at the modern day.
Sigiriya the Wonder of the World By Asitha G. Punchihewa
T
o provide a glimpse of what Sigiriya has on offer at present, it rises 370 metres above sea level, high above the surrounding plain, visible for miles in all directions, many remains of the fortress are still preserved, perfect urban planning, natural fountains, water gardens, terrace gardens, moated palaces and well preserved branded paintings are to name a few. Sigiriya has been a research lab for scholars in an array of disciplines and the on site museum provides an array of pieces that depicts Sigiriya’s history that dates back as far as 20,000 years and its transformation from prehistoric human civilisations to hydraulic civilisations to episodes of monarchic and monastic habitation and eventual abandonment.
Mirror Wall Branded Paintings Sigiriya paintings of Apsaras are unique and have been used for tourism promotional purposes but giving less emphasis on the aesthetic value. It is surprising how paintings can be preserved in this manner for well over 2500 years. What chemicals they used for colouring and fixing that could withstand weathering for so long is still a mystery.
Natural Fountains Though it is not yet certain how water is pumped naturally to the top of the rock, it could be passive capillary movement, active pumping using natural ventilation and air compression or none of the above. However due to diminishing ground water levels at recent times, there have been instances where these fountains have been dried up. 88 | ASL
Located just below the paintings, the surface of this wall is well polished and covered with the writing known as ‘Sigiri graffiti’. These writings consist of poems written by visitors to the site since the 7th century.
Terrace Gardens Terrace gardens are unique and these can also be interpreted as hanging gardens of Sigiriya resting 370 metres above sea level.
The Lion staircase At the entrance to the summit one encounters the Lion staircase, one of the most visually stunning features of Sigiriya. Here, the architects have carved two massive Lion Paws into the rock face, perhaps intending to convey Kashyapa’s dominance over the Sinhalese (the race of lions). The brick wall is still preserved in its original form.
Water Gardens Urban Planning Urban planning cannot expect any more perfection using perfect symmetry and asymmetry where relevant, placing the administrative hierarchy at the top of the rock while leaving ample room for residences with wide roadways and farming with ample water resources.
Its fountains still in operational state surprises as to how a water column over 300 metres high is pumped naturally. It again reiterates that the hydraulic civilisation that Sri Lanka could boast of comprised of many wonders. Yes, it was a hydraulic civilisation and the ancient Lankans have used water in every aspect. There are a number of ponds, tanks in various shapes and sizes, most of them purposely placed to maintain symmetry. 89 | ASL
Fortress It is believed that two kings Ravana and Kashyapa who have used this site as a fortress which is still preserved Among the unusual features of the garden are the impluvium of the Cistern Rock, taking its name from a large cistern formed out of massive slabs of granite, and the Audience Hall Rock which has a flattened summit and a large 5-metre long throne carved out of the living rock. The honeycomb of postholes and flattened ledges of the Preaching Rock are others. While considerable excavation will have to be done before we can recover the original pathways of the boulder garden, at least two distinct markers are provided by two boulder arches and limestone staircases, as well as various flights of steps and passageways constructed of polished marble blocks and slabs.
Audience Hall Mahawansa, the greatest historic piece of literature that any country could boast of explains how King Kashyapa built it somewhere in 477-495CE. However, recent discoveries have taken its history way back to the King Ravana era which is said to be 2554-2517BC. It’s not at all a surprise for someone like King Ravana to come up with a masterpiece of this nature considering that it was in his era that the mercury vortex engine was first used for flying machines indicating highest possible technological advancements. A busy traveler would have a glance at everything, take a few photographs and go on to the next site, but for my reckoning, it is only a most unfortunate and ignorant traveler that would not consider spending at least a full day at Sigiriya.
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“Balangoda anthrop has anatomical resemblance to the Veddas of Sri Lanka. There is no doubt that the Veddas are descendants of the Balangoda Anthrop”. By Asitha G. Punchihewa
The Veddas of Sri Lanka ccording to this justification, the lengthy period from 11000BC to 500BC consisted of Balangoda descendants, and they are distant relations of the modern day Veddas. Similarly, the Veddas are also identified as descendants of the Yakkas when analysing their rituals, beliefs and myths. One such example is that they believe that the Veddas are a result of the King Vijaya’s engagement with Kuveni who is a Yakkaorigin lady according to the Mahavamsa.
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The Veddas of Sri Lanka are the descendants of the pioneers of the island. Their descent spans well over 30,000 years 92 | ASL
whereas some believe that the Veddas pre-date the
decendance the King Vijaya’s arrival in the country 2,500 years ago. However, there is sufficient evidence to confirm that the Vedda heritage dates back 34,000 years. There have been studies conducted
on the Balangoda Manavaya (Balangoda anthrop or the Homo sapian balangodensis sub species) and the pre-Vijaya era civilisations of Sri Lanka who could be ancestors of the present day Veddas. At the global level, research findings on other indigenous communities in India, Australia, South and North America and other parts of the globe further justify the existence of the indigenous aboriginal natives like the Veddas in Sri Lanka for a significantly prolonged period of time, spanning well over twenty or even thirty thousand years. Veddas had associations with the monarchs of the country in the past and kings recognised their existence and had
mutually advantageous relationships with the Veddas. While the Veddas provided the Sinhalese with dada mas (meat of wild animals), bee honey, and wild fruits, they were given metal utensils and rice in return. Unlike the tribal communities in other parts of the world, the Veddas have throughout history interacted with the mainstream community. They were just different in their lifestyle and costume. However, in recent times, mainly within the past century, during the last period of the British regime and the postindependence era, the Veddas as well as the indigenous communities throughout the world have sailed turbulent waters. Opening up of land masses and forest covers for commercial crops, estates, urbanisation, and infrastructure development were among the many issues that resulted in the fragmentation of Vedda territory. This also resulted on new settlements being established in the fringes making possible modernisation to trickle into the most rural communities includ-
ing the Veddas. Veddas whose culture was based on forest and the rituals based on “Ne Yakku” or worshipping the spirits of dead relatives, were gradually influenced by the Sinhalese, Tamils and also by the Muslims. While the Veddas in the country’s interior were experiencing a turbulent period
of their history, the ‘sea Veddas’ (who are believed to be descendants of the same group of Veddas in the interior, or indigenous Sri Lankans with Yakka origins who have migrated over an unknown period of time from the central highlands towards the east coast along the Mahaveli plains) have ‘self-evolved’. The most senior generation of the Veddas could converse in Sinhala and still recollect the traditional songs and lullabies that have
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mostly Sinhala words and some typical Vedi language words. Unlike the Veddas in other parts of the country, the coastal Veddas were less influenced by the mainstream culture that was also influenced by the recent modernisation and westernisation processes. They were thus unable to penetrate through to the far eastern province due to the unsettled security situation prevailing for the past thirty years. The present state of the existence of the Veddas in a nutshell could be described
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as “a group of people in Sri Lanka with indigenous ancestry, confined to isolated pockets extending from the eastern and north eastern slopes of the hill country to the Eastern and North central parts of the country”. Their cultural identity is rapidly diminishing and the Veddas are increasingly embracing Sinhalisation and Tamilisation within the respective geographical localities in which they live in, acquiring Buddhist, Hindu and more recently Christian values rather than their own, they are following the footpath directing towards accelerated modernisation that leaves little room for cultural diversity. This in fact could be the last generation of Veddas that will ever exist. It is highly likely that the Vedda’s way of life and its culture will become to extinct within a span of a few decades.
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The Western Province
W
hile tour operators train their own professional staff to their company standards, until recently there has been no responsible training programme for the freelance sector. This has sometimes resulted in tourists being misinformed and even harassed by people purporting to be guides. Recognising the value of these freelance service providers, programmes have been devised to give them training so they have the correct knowledge and attitude to be of service to visitors. For the first time in its history, the Western Province Tourist Board (WPTB) in collaboration with the Sri Lanka Institute of Tourism and Hotel Management, and the Sri Lanka Tourism Development Authority, recently conducted an Area Guides Training Programme.
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Of the 40 participants in the first course, 30 were successful in obtaining credit passes at the end of the course. This is encouraging in view of the need to cater properly for the increased number of visitors arriving as part of the programme for Sri Lanka to host 2.5 million tourists by 2016.
The Western Province Tourist Board is also conducting training programmes for drivers who transport tourists. After a thorough training and passing a final exam, drivers are awarded a special identification card. The objective is to bring them into the formal sector of disciplined and trained service providers.
This number will be in addition to the National Guides and Chauffeur Drivers trained by the Sri Lanka Institute of Tourism and Hotel Management.
The Chairman of the Western Province Tourist Board Claude Thomasz with all support extended by the Hon Minister of Tourism for the Western Province, Nimal Lanza, is dedicated
The WPTB has made plans to conduct two or three Tourist Guide programmes annually with a target of adding 350 certified area guides trained through the Western Province. Should the other provinces follow the example of the Western Province we can expect an additional 2,500 qualified Tourist Area Guides within a short period.
Training programmes are also to be introduced by the WPTB for three-wheeler (tuk-tuk) drivers and also for leisure transportation boatmen and vendors. As a result, Sri Lanka will be offering some of the best trained and most courteous service providers for tourists of any country.
Helps Service Providers
Area Guides Batch 01
Tourist Taxi Drivers Batch 04
to giving this opportunity to freelance service providers to be of help to tourists and the community, and to maintain good discipline under a well-monitored system. The aim is to convert them to the formal sector so that every tourist arriving in Sri Lanka will be able to receive a professional standard of service. The first training course for tourist drivers in Sri Lanka was held under the auspices of the Western Province Tourist Board and the Sri Lanka Tourism Development Authority in Kalutara in March 2012. It took place at the A-Prima Tourist Hotel in Katukurunda, South Kalutara, which generously provided additional facilities for the participants.
Tourist Drivers will be monitored on their performance. Should tourists have any complaints about a driver, they can quote the driver’s identity number and report them to the Western Province Tourist Board for appropriate action.
The second training programme for tourist drivers was conducted in Colombo in June 2012, with 100 participants. Applications are being invited from all freelance service providers to take part in the courses planned during 2013 in tourist resorts throughout the Western Province.
There were 93 participants in the four-day course, which focused on training licensed drivers in ways to improve the tourist experience. Drivers were taught about tourist expectations and how each driver could personally contribute to the success of the tourist industry by treating their tourist passengers with respect and understanding.
The drivers were presented with certificates of participation by the WPTB as well as being given an identity card issued by the Sri Lanka Tourism Development Authority stating the holder is an Authorised Tourist Driver. It is valid for one year. They were also issued with a sticker to display on their vehicles and a name badge. Tourists are being recommended to travel with the officially licensed drivers. These Authorised
Tourist Taxi Drivers Batch 03 98 | ASL
WESTERN PROVINCE The Development Front The Western Province (in Sinhala: Basnahira Palatha and in Tamil: Mael Maakaanam) is home to Colombo - the dominant city in Sri Lanka. This is because Colombo is the Commercial Capital as well as Administrative Capital and Sri Jayawardenepura-Kotte a suburb of Colombo where the Parliament is housed, is now the Legislative Capital of the Islands. Also the International Air Port (Bandaranaike International Airport – Colombo) is located in this Province as well as the Air Port for Domestic Flights at Ratmalana. The three districts of the Western Province taken together comprise a land mass of 3,834.6 sq. kilometre as follows: • Colombo District 692 km² • Gampaha District 1,386.6 km² • Kalutara District 1,606 km² These three districts of Western Province (the Colombo District, Kalutara District to South of Colombo and Gampaha District to the North and North East) is the most densely populated province in Sri Lanka. In accordance with the policy of developing powers of the Government of Sri Lanka the Provincial Council of the Western Province was one of the 8 Provincial Councils of Island that was established in terms of the 13th Amendment to the Constitution of the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka and the provisions of the Provincial Councils Act No. 42 of 1987. The Provincial Council encompasses the administrative districts of Colombo, Gampaha and Kalutara and include 45 Local Authority Institutions covering an area of 3684 square Km and a population of 5,622,274 which comprise 84.2% Sinhalese, 7.2% Tamils, and 7.1% Muslims and the rest belonging to other races.
99 | ASL
100 | ASL Koggala 222 442 269
74 119 122 306
Hikkaduwa 320 494 381
56 215 184
79 157
72 331 183
25 298 247 248 248 133 191
72 318 176
61 226 183 52 236 174
55 203 212 64 212 204
9
66 157 376 206 96 52
60
56 243 190
34 253
82 220 72
312 335 309 210 238
96
45 121 156 306 121 85 112 280 218 236
74 240 82 138 373 355
198 220 195 206 149
106 166 53 296 39
53 290
37 281
138 31 237 179 228 292 186 309 56 233 123 262 129 230 398 175 112 277 167 312
47 250 138 253 98 221 388 159 58 364 304 277 195 168 249 138 377 337 121 111 113 367 218 170 216 101 304
89 177 175 112 209 158 260 336 222 103
29 288 109 132 106 237 86
284 178 312
373 381 370 203 299
99 244 280 321 195 100 236 406 131 200 322 344 318 219 247
90 235 271 329 186 108 227 395 140 209
24 256 230 134 273 128 454 170 206 134 134 241 175 370 159 211 242 222
A'pussa 154 177 168 243 122 115
80 358 85 112 100 264 90
367 259 404
93 312 142 160 12 35 180 216 322 131 101 169 340 195 264 257 280 254 222 183 75 148 367 197 105 43
32 167 229 237 230 206 66 272 322
88 47 309 160 129 150 68 270 140 174 24 192 307 296
56 242 129 262 106 230 397 151
80 148
34 346 187 260 366 217 295 212 336 315 286 224 95 106 270 296 162 322 301 238
21 180 219 80 378
35 325 460 346
Batticoloa 367 358 303 163 175 380 142 261 397
12 171 228
44 333 451 337
55 164
27 63 174 43 250 132 198 24 182 332 322 13 209 428 257 45 104 151 290 332 303 248 150 288 455
97 345 301 72 232 167
Ella 232 230 109 245 133 452 180 179 133 110 216 175 370 159 187 220 222
17 307 512 383
Habarana 323 272 223 222 115 215
43
96 165 356 379 353 216 282
74 333 225 242 402 226 164 219 111 317 104 308 31 191 410 241 61 87 133 278 315 316 230 133 271 438
Inginiyagala 459 114 302 204 185 291 246 375 220 262 332 355 184 175
Galle 289 122
108
Jaffna 348 439 320 565 524 303 218 295 557 408 375 398 283 486 269 422 262 246 555 543 237 348 142 484 234
Kalutara 159 240
8 240 222 117 253 141 445 188 171 124 118 224 168 361 150 195 212 213
Badulla
182 203 179 164 157
65
6 210 182 199
77 140 264 129 142 92 264 275 223
81 399
(Pasekudah) - Kalkudah 325 196 262 370 190 266 182 339 294 262 227 65 142 242 298 132 291 304 241
26 276 128 99
19 367 260 425
65 134 385 367 382 187 313 175
300 322 298 198 226
42 237
87 136 355 185 117 31
174 264 77 402 150 507
156 179 153 192 133 297 87 119 79 246 253 270 164 187 161 206 115 311
30 118 164 278 246 287 261 164 302 470
68 254 105
27 471 461
Matale 303 154 127 103 114 292 154 167 71 238 314 251
Kataragama 153 288 483 273 123 271 318 168 324 181 376 169 342 511 86
Colombo 148 205 116 172 238 99 320 396 282 43 116 283 130
Anuradapura 272 163 196 270 261 206
269 292 266 234 195 293
Matara 148 195 245 377 258 293 169 331 501 35 104 418 336 414 158 343 145
Mt-Lavinia 47 192 228 334 143 106 181 352 183 252
96 136 153 308 230 299 237 261 235 257 148 340
87 234 192
129 64 142 243 134 348
Nueara Eliya 217 187 206 148 174 341 210 146 259 224 256
Polonnaruwa 202 175 241 67 227 365 302
Hambantota 140 184 546 262 193 245 45 108 243 462 270 77 226 273 167 323 180 330 124 322 489
Dambulla 206 264
180 240 127 295 51 400
78 192 259 298 174 77 215 383 152 221
Beruwela
Bentota
109 131 124 255 100 358
Sigiriya 206 331 314
Ratnapura 198 365 133 151 283 296 280 121 234 191 (Arugam Bay) Pottuvil 377 221 268 430 222 159 246 138 344 100 355 205
Bandarawela 183 198 205 197 197
Kilo Meters (KM)
43
69 408 301 412 122 369 110
59 380
201 291 105 430 177 535
Tangalla
345 238 403
Trincomalee 108 97 286 146 391 Tissamaharama Talaimannar 496 489
Mannar 211 473 324 281 314 200 401 185 338 185
Kandy 245 246
Wellawaya 321 105 Vavuniya 344 86 449 Valaichchennai 206 179 197 284
Puttalam 206 156 212 326 354
(Colombo Airport) - Negombo 166 196 357
Kurunegala 219
Yala Wilpattu 426