From: muttiah@thistle.ecn.purdue.edu (Ranjan S Muttiah)
Subject: Re: Forwarded article
Organization: Purdue University Engineering Computer Network
Date: Sun, 27 Dec 1992 23:30:33 GMT

In article <92Dec27.200235.17915@acs.ucalgary.ca> eknchan@acs.ucalgary.ca (Sarath) writes:
>In article <1992Dec25.194853.26138@cunews.carleton.ca> cs304001@scs.carleton.ca (Chulaka Ailapperuma) writes:
>>>2) Remember what they did in 1971. They  put Aliya bottle
>>>(CCS pepsi) into anal or vaginal opening and break it inside.
>>>This was one of the famous torturing technique and it was
>>>done in public. As a little kid I had the golden oportunity
>>>to witness it.
>>
>>I guess that's why you are one messed up dude eh ?

I can imagine how that could impact a person.  For those who don't
remember :-), 1971 was a time when the SLFP govt. went on the war
path against the JVP youth (~20,000 dead).  In fact, this was part of 
the rallying cry of the UNP in '77, which was a contributing factor to its
election victory.  Anyone remember the stupidity about wearing black
buttons ?

>>thing for the tamils it would have been great.
>>huh ?
>>>Could you write  good point about our culture? I believe the
>>>stupid talks about SL culture was created just to exploit poor people.
>>>(are you familiar with the saying IHATHA ATHME PINKARALA
>>>THIYENAWANAM MAY ATHME SAPAWIDINNA PULUWAN)
>>If you can't think of any, I guess it good you don't live in SL. Who
>>needs fools like you. we have more the enough already !
>I can't think any good points about SL culture so would you mind
>telling me those. But please don't repeat the wealth of info you have
>given in the previous sentence. 

I think there are a lot of good points about SL cuture that have lately 
(the last 50 years -- ignoring the oppression of the 400-500 years before 
then) been so completely demented as so make it look as though there isn't
a decent culture.  First, let's define culture in terms of a peoples
language and history (I hate the part about throwing religion in there
as well; I'm not going to give a lecture on the languages and history since
I don't know both Sinhalese and Tamil well enough, nor history:-).  There 
are people with the rich tradition of the sinhalese and Tamil languages behind 
(or in front of:-) them (let's not forget the Veddas either), there are people 
who have a very long historical tradition intitially tied in with those of India.
Since ancient Serendip was an important sea route, that affected the local culture
as well.  That there is a lot of study (devoid of political demagoguery) still 
to be done about our various historical roots should be a source of interest.  
We should take pride in the fact that there are two quite distinct but still 
compatible cultures that can potentially coexist together.  So what went wrong 
in the last couple of decades ? I think it is quite simply that successive 
governments have continued the tradition of oppression left behind by the 
colonialist.  For culture to flourish, there needs to be more individualism; 
government sponsored cultural programs are Marxist in nature and worst yet are 
not spontaneous.  Culture has to flow from the people and not from some 
government "cultural ministry".  True, the ancient kings and queens of the SL 
Tamils and Sinhalese were no friends of individuality, but at least if you were 
creative enough, you could move onto the next closest kingdom nearby (it is 
better to have many kingdoms than just one :-).  The problems in schools is 
that in the social studies classes things are taught with some ulterior 
political motivation in mind i.e, we the mass public should be happy that those 
who are in power are really power and not someone else.  Last of all, let's
not forget the various forms of rice and curry, katta sambol, and other delicious
foods, and the beaches.

----------
A tangential point: does anyone know where the name yaalpanam (Jaffna) comes
from ?  I was having debate with someone without conclusion.
Newsgroups: soc.culture.sri-lanka