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People and Events
Border villages a misnomer

by Nan
We learn all the time and thank goodness for that! I stood corrected by a young man, and I am grateful to him because we need to speak correct and look into jargon we imbibe and mindlessly spew out.

Tending a public border

I saw this young man on Sunday evening, trimming the grass outside Royal College with a small yet powerful grass cutter. I wondered at the sight. Was he a school person or a loyal old boy? Was he at the tail end of a shramadana campaign, the others working within the gates of the school while his assignment was outside?

Returning from my walk to Independence Square I saw him still busy with his electric mower. I walked past him and then, picking up courage to speak, retraced my steps. I voiced my conjectures about his excellent job of trimming the grass. Not minding my intrusion at all he replied that he lived on his family estate and during weekends at home, his home being right opposite Royal College, he took it upon himself to keep tidy the front entrance and stretch of pavement beside the senior and junior schools. "We planted the palm trees you see along this road", he said, "to make the old college look good." He was an old boy of Royal. I asked him whether the college authorities had noted his good work and perhaps thanked him that, he said, mattered not one bit.

Rajakeeya Mawata deserves to look good with its majestic, lichen and parasite covered maara trees forming a huge canopy overhead. This road and a few others are so old-Colombo; the hoary trees showing their age and earning grateful thanks to those who had the trees planted in the first place.

I commented on the social service he does with no expectations and no need for recognition as the doer. He said they worked up north too. "In the border villages?" I queried.

"There are no border villages really", he said.

"Then what are those villages that get overrun by marauding terrorists?"

"They are threatened villages", he replied gently. How true, how apt a term. And how incorrect to use the term border villages since there are no inland borders in the country. Boundaries yes, between provinces, but no borders except the coastline and the sea that surrounds us. The country is one so how have borders in a unitary state?

I asked him who the 'we' were he spoke of. He said he belonged to a voluntary sangvidanaya that helps the people in the threatened villages. They repair irrigation wewas and channels because water is what they need, he said. At least I knew this truth and had promoted our Old Girls' Association to help the people of a selected village build themselves a well. Giving those precariously living people clothes and foodstuffs only made them beggars, said the young man. Yes, of course. "Help them to help themselves and give them protection, is what volunteer groups should do", he said.

This had me telling the young man about all the work done by the Dharmavijaya Foundation, and my friends who, belonging to this and other associations, visited the villages and tirelessly worked to help the unfortunates make something of their constantly threatened lives.

So if you, like me, somewhat mindlessly used the term border villages, please switch over to the more correct term: threatened villages. Not only is the term correct but it also conveys the immediacy of the problem and the dire condition in which the people in the northern and eastern villages live.

A New Year for the Sinhalese and Hindus

The koha was heard and the imminence of new year announced. I did not wish those who read Nan, last Sunday, which I should have done. I do so now with added fervency. We all hope for a better year to come. There is a glimmer of hope, at least I feel so. Let us pray it soon becomes a beam and that we will have peace and decency, a respite from fighting to keep the body nourished and the spirit unflagging.

Nan wishes each and everyone of you a very good year with hope for a better Sri Lanka.

It was so heartening to see places like Lakpahana displaying very attractively the traditional Sinhala sweets. Mrs. Siva Obeyesekera herself was present, seeing that customers were well served. Kavuns with their proud kondes, aasmis generously laced with jaggery, aluwa looking and tasting richly treacled and crisp kokis were there on sale on out-of-doors placed tables. Rush baskets and kullas were used to hold the sweets. Orders were placed with Mrs. Obeyesekera's sister, the sweet lady who runs the sweet shop at Lakpahana, and we got our monies' worth.

Remembering

We remember the wonderful handloom sarees Mrs. Obeyesekera used to get done by the Department of Small Industries. Not only were they fine in design and colour combination, but they also lasted long and survived constant washing, in those days by the dhobi.

New Year is a time of remembering. The family and new clothes and new year in the village with the swings and the jambu tree red with fruit. The nonagatha periods were so long and mother never allowed any cooking in the house. We stuffed ourselves with unduvel especially and so spent the time stupored by too much treacle and oil. Ganudenu was exciting because we got newly minted coins from Mother and Grandmother. They both did their exchanging at Suppiah Pillai's in town, believing that exchanging money with a prosperous Indian trader would confer prosperity on them too.

The Here and Now

Children have departed and death has visited too often, too suddenly, too devastatingly. But there's hope and things to look forward to like introducing a grandson to the cry of the koha and the raban playing and sweets to make him sick with sweetness.

There's also nature's show to enjoy and be thankful for. Look up and you see the delicate pinks, the startling oranges, the vibrant reds and the sparse purples. The rain of the last few days spoilt the shy pinks but the araliya in their various colours and shapes and sizes put on a bold front. They bravely bloomed and clung onto their stalks in spite of the sheets of water falling down.

This is the time to enjoy nature's gift to us. The flowers will continue to bloom with greater abundance until Wesak and then will come the fruits. So there is rejuvenation all the time and there definitely is a strong hint of hope. Maybe Sri Lanka will once more become paradisial, not only in its flower show but in its condition.

A Heartening Tale

A letter placed in a bottle and thrown into the sea 85 years ago has been fished out in the Thames estuary by fisherman Steve Gowan. The letter was written by Private Thomas Hughes to his wife Elizabeth and said: "Ta Ta sweet for the present - your hubby."

Thomas Hughes was a soldier in the British Army in World War I. Travelling to France he wrote the letter and threw the bottle overboard. He was killed twelve days later. Hughes' daughter, Emily Crowhurst, living in Auckland, has claimed the letter. She remembers her father kissing her goodbye, two at the time and now 85.

Why I write this story is because it too gives us hope and consequently a pleasant feeling, a feeling to counteract despondency and pessimism. The written word lives long, even in a bottle, storm tossed and at the mercy of the capricious elements.

"So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this givens life to thee."

Ashley Halpe retires - Joins British School

Dr. Ashley Halpe who retired from the University of Peradeniya last December, joined the staff of the Department of English in the University of Ceylon (now the University of Peradeniya) in 1957 after gaining First class honours in English and winning the University and Government Scholarships in Arts and the Leigh Smith Prize for English. He had been placed first in the Ceylon Civil Service Examination and served a few months in the Colombo Kachcheri but opted to join the university service. He gained a Ph.D. from the University of Bristol for research into poetic drama in 1962 and returned to teach in Peradeniya. He was selected Professor of English in 1965 at the age of 31 and continued in that position until his retirement. Concurrently, he was elected Dean of the Faculty of Arts twice and has served the university as Director of Welfare, University Proctor and Chairman of the Arts Council, while he has also lectured and taught courses at over twenty universities in Australia, the United States, Germany and India. He has contributed to upgrading the training of teachers of English and was instrumental in having a special channel for admission to universities opened for them.

While he has inspired generations of students of English as a charismatic teacher and guide he has also reached out to the larger student community as a counsellor, director of welfare, university proctor monitoring discipline and promoter of the arts. He has been very active in theatre directing university students and young performers of Kandy.

Besides his numerous academic publications Ashley Halpe is the author of three collections of poetry and has translated several works of Sinhala Literature into English, among them Martin Wickramasinghe's Viragava and Madol Doova and a collection of Sigiri poems. He has given readings from his poetry in the USA, Australia, Germany, India, Malaysia and in this country. His creativity has also found expression in painting and his work has been included in exhibitions in Sao Paolo, London, Bristol, Colombo and Kandy. He has been a member of a choral group, the Peradeniya Singers, since 1953. He initiated the teaching of Fine Arts in Peradeniya and Kelaniya, was the founding chairman and founding Editor of the English Association of Sri Lanka and the Sri Lanka Association for Commonwealth Literature and Language Studies, and president of the Alliance Francaise de Kandy for several years. Several times a member of the Arts Council of Sri Lanka, he is regularly invited to adjudicate for national film and drama awards, frequently as chairman of the panel of judges.

His services to education and the arts have been recognized by the Sri Lankan government by the award of the National Titles of Kalakeerthi and Vishvaprasadini, and by the French government of the title of Chevalier dans l'ordre des Palmes Academiques.

Dr. Halpe has entered a new field of educational activity. He has accepted the invitation of the directorates of the British School in Colombo to join the school's Board of Governors as Executive Governor. He will be actively involved in shaping the policies of the British School. He feels that particular attention needs to be paid to communication skills and the command of English at appropriate levels while the use of up-to-date methods of accessing information and aesthetic activities will receive his personal encouragement. He will himself participate in teaching literature. He is deeply committed to a dynamically interactive approach to teaching, and believes that children of all ages need to be given the fullest scope to enjoy the process of making discoveries, developing their special aptitudes and growing into many-faceted yet well-integrated personalities.

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Capital punishment - should it be reintroduced?

by Nanda Udugama
From age-old times to the present, crime has played a significant part in society. There has been a proportion of people who have failed to fit into the pattern of society. Their anti-social behaviour has always proved a problem, and various peoples at various times have had different ways of dealing with crime and punishment. In the past the penalties for crime were brutal and savage. Offenders were tortured, crucified, boiled alive or burnt to death. Traitors were hanged, drawn and quartered; and even for small offences men have had their noses slit and their hands chopped off. They were often whipped, branded with red-hot irons, or had their eyes gouged out and the man who died in punishment was sometimes better off than the man who survived the tortures.

As nations advanced and people became more civilised, treacherous deeds became less and penal laws more human until today even the 'cat' has been abolished in many parts of the world. Most of us nowadays are repelled by cruel sights and shudder when we hear of the atrocities of war and the inhuman methods used by certain races to exterminate others.

We are horrified when we read of public hangings in Baghdad or of brutal mutilations and murders by "Red Rose" death squads in Rio; but somehow we have come to accept silently and unfeelingly the fate of the man who sits in his prison cell, in solitary confinement brooding anxiously over his impending death. If we should hear of someone who kept a fellow-man in captivity, who informed his victim of the day he was to be exterminated and who watched his victim's increasing fears and anxiety, would we not be horrified?

Yet this is exactly what happens in those societies where capital punishment is retained. A man has been tried for murder, found guilty and sentenced to death. He has been told the date of his execution and placed in solitary confinement to brood over his fate. There day after day he awaits the fatal hour in fear and terror. He has sufficient time to contemplate on the events that led to his present predicament, to wish that he could live his life all over again and so avoid what has happened now. He is depressed and afraid; he startles at the least noise and has all the signs of nervous anxiety but he also has hope - hope, that quality in man which keeps him going even in the most desperate of situations and the prisoner in his death-cell lives hoping until the very last moment that by some small chance of fate he will be saved.

Sometimes, his hopes are realised momentarily; the evil day is postponed and he feels he has gained freedom from death, but soon realises that it is only the date of death that has been postponed. As the day draws near he begins to tremble with fear again. What is it like to be hanged by the neck until you are dead? Up and down the prison cell he paces. He cannot eat, he cannot read or think. He cannot repent or pray even though that is what he has been asked to do. Soon he is a mental and physical wreck.

Huddled in a corner of his prison cell he sits depressed and brooding, a wretched victim of mental torture. He has given up his soul to the priests of religion who visit him, pray with him and promise him salvation in the life hereafter. When the day arrives for his execution he has sometimes to be dragged bodily to the gallows where eventually with popping eyes and coiling tongue to leaves this life ever.

A life for a life! Justice has been done! A miserable wretch has been put away. Christians, M-uslims, Bud-dhists and all other religionalists are satisfied, and there is no one to sit in judgement on those responsible for yet another murder.

To use vengeance on a murderer by hanging him by the neck is an easy way to get rid of him, but is it the most human or civilised way of dealing with the problem? Today, where the emphasis on prevention of crime and treatment to suit the offender rather than punishment to fit the crime, is there not an argument for the complete abolition of capital punishment? In countries when there is a high incident of murder crimes there is fear that the abolition of the death sentence may cause a further increase in crime. But in those countries where it has already been abolished figures have not shown an increase. Even those in favour of retaining the death sentence will agree however, that there are certain drawbacks in retaining it. There is, for instance, the occasional risk that an innocent man can be hanged if the evidence happens to be against him. Less rare, however, is the case of the man suffering from mental illness, who, sometimes, in spite of psychiatric evidence can be found guilty of murder.

Today when dealing with crime, the emphasis should be on the cause and prevention of crime and the aim to give treatment to suit the offender, not punishment to fit the crime. What causes a man to indulge in crime and make himself a nuisance to society? Is it something in his own constitution? Is it his environmental circumstances? Is it the fault of society itself or is it a sum - total of all these facts combined? These should be some of the leading questions that should arise in the minds of those responsible for the making and unmaking of penal laws.

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Are you ready to be taken for another ride!

by Mahinda Weerasinghe
The natives were ecstatic I am sure, by the recognition accorded to them by the visiting Deputy Foreign Minister of Norway, concerning their "vibrant economy". They should also have been perplexed by Norway's offer of help to settle their conflict, as reported by the 24th January issue of the Sunday Observer. In fact they should be amazed and puzzled, considering the unfair one-sided propaganda which has been going on in the Norwegian media through the years, directed at them.

One would have believed that the mediator should have a semblance of neutrality, so those partners of the conflict have some faith in such a broker of peace. In Norway's case, its partisan status in this conflict, and its shadowy sympathy to the terrorist, is not a difficult task to document.

Just consider the booklet called "Tamils of Sri Lanka" (ISBN 82-427-0149-0) issued by Utlandings Directorate (UDI), being a subordinate section of Norway's Foreign office. This officially issued document is laden with distorted truths and subtle mix-information in order to deceive the public.

Among other matters it informs that, "25% of the people speak different Tamil dialects in the country". The man in the street would naturally assume that 25% of the Sri Lankans are Jaffna Tamils. Another one of the article explains that before the invasion of the Island in 500 BC by the Sinhalese the country was settled by Dravidian people. In other words it would mean that the Sinhalese invaders eliminated the original Dravidian Tamils and took over the country forcibly. Such off the cuff statements without any historical under pinning set the standard of this work. The book consists of 10 chapters, each written by a single author, 5 of whom are Norwegians, 4 Tamils, One article is taken from the " Eelam Tamil Perspective" Nr 2 1985 and I by an Indian.

Naturally one tends to assume that a person from the majority people would also have been invited to contribute an opinion concerning their homeland. Perhaps the Foreign office must be under the impression that the Sinhalese are either "illiterate", "unschooled" or worse still, they have no opinion of their own worth including. Closer to the truth I suspect is, it must have been arduous to find a Sinhalese "uncle Tom" to contribute an article with misleading information, which would have harmonised with the rest of the distorted material.

Indeed the Language of Sri Lanka is Tamil, if going by "Hele Norges Lexikon", a reference lexicon for students. Year of its Publication; 1997. This is, but an isolated howler you are bound to believe. Yet pathetically it adheres to a pattern of continuing distortion and deception aimed purely at belittling the majority people of Sri Lanka . Or else, lacking such elementary knowledge of the country, how can one undertake this subtle business of conflict resolution?

In fact even before the 1983 debacle, the Tamil Catholic Church has sold to the Norwegian Christian brothers in faith, their sob story concerning the "despicable apartheid regime" back home.

Evidence indicates that, even prior to the 83 riots, the Christian organisations in Norway have been making loud noises concerning the discrimination of the Tamil minority. 26% of the Tamils are Christians and predominantly Catholic and the Norwegian Christians have extended their support, under an illusion that, in time the rest of the Tamil lost sheep would fall into their father's embrace.

Is that the reason for this set degratory description "Sinhalese Buddhist Chauvinist" in their media? All Sri Lankans agree whether he be Buddhist, Christian or Muslim that terrorism should be eradicated. Logic simply begs the question, is this insurrection a Catholic inspired one, and Prabhakaran simply a Catholic in disguise. Hindus, then becomes cannon fodder for a larger covert war? In other words can this be an undeclared war by the Christians against the Buddhist, who in this case simply happen to be Sinhalese. For indeed "Buddhist Chauvinism" has nothing what so ever to do with this Sinhalese Tamil conflict, for none of the partners were trying to convert the other, to their belief.

Starting in the 80s all major Norwegian papers, such as Berganske Tidene, Dagbladet, Afternposten etc., had only the version of their terrorist friends to offer. Whenever we responded to their terrorist client's claims, they never saw the light of print. Sad to say the average Norwegian accepted such bare faced lies as facts as no one was allowed to counter the terrorist propaganda.

Curiously enough in order to create this mis-information, there evolved in time a new species, commonly known as "experts". These new mutants are thriving in other people's conflicts. In fact, conflicts such as ours are their bread and butter. Obviously no conflicts means no well paid jobs, no playing the judge jury and God. No transversing the globe and giving cheap advice to economically weak and exposed nations.

The Norwegian government pays millions of Kroner to organisations such as PRIO International Alert etc., to be the watchdogs, inspectors and to help solve other people's problems. These experts sit on judgement and decide who are the "good guys" and who are the "villains".

The average Norwegian is totally ignorant of what's going on in Sri Lanka, and cares less. The media and these Christian experts have hijacked their opinion. The average Norwegian's good intentions and good heartiness, is exploited by a few "Christian know all experts" who, in time, would manage to dismantle their good name.

The experts, who had contributed to this foreign office booklet, are among those who are spreading such distorted material in their media. If these are the "experts" to our problems, then I am a professor Emeritus.

Sadly though there are no such experts to write about their own double standards. Historically what they did to the Same (Lap) minority, who lives in the North of the country, is a crime. Starting in the 17th century, the Same people were discouraged from practising their belief, which tends to venerate nature. The Christian priest banned even the "Joik", their way of singing, as they found it "the work of the devil".

By late 18 hundreds the missionaries had totally erased the old Same creed. It has been documented that from 1610 to 1688, 8 Same witches have been burned at the stake. As for the Samisk language, they were banned from using it even in their own homes. It was only in 1987 that Norway introduced a new law which gave Samisk equal status with Norwegian. But by then the original Same culture i.e. its language and creed, has hit rock bottom, never to rise again.

If the Sinhalese had done to the Tamils a small percentage of that what the Norwegians did to the Same minority, then we would not have been saddled with our current problems. In which case, we could also have gone round the world giving cheap advice and acting as brokers of peace. Sinhalese Buddhist tolerance is perhaps their undoing.

Presently the Christians also dominate the current government of Norway. The Prime Minister himself coming from the Christian People's party. The current regime has created a value commission. Certainly value here means "good Christian values", for these qualities are a monopoly of theirs. Indeed the last witch of Norway was burned just over a hundred years ago. The Christian Norwegians were in the forefront during the holy wars (crusades) in the medieval era. Jews were not allowed to enter Norway before the First World War. Wonder whether these are the good Christian values they are searching for now?

Sinhalese Buddhist "Chauvinist" on the other hand, had never burned a witch, never had an inquisition, never left their shore to plunder rape and colonise. Buddhist tolerance extended to man and beast alike. All and sundry were allowed to put up their churches, mosque, kovil, whatever, and feel free to be what they wish to be.

Currently they are warring a vicious racist group of terrorists who are keen to create a ghetto state called Eelam where only the purely bred Jaffna Tamils can reside. The Norwegian regime is aware that most of these jet asylum seekers in their midst are supporting the terrorist financially and morally. Norway under the circumstances has a "do nothing about it" policy. So it is appropriate to raise the question, is the Norwegian regime condoning terrorism in Sri Lanka?

Major countries such as USA, India and most other European countries have declared LTTE as a terrorist organisation. But not Norway, for they know better. LTTE murdered Rajiv Ghandi, the Prime Minister of a major democracy, and the whole world acknowledges this fact. But should this concern Norway, after all it is not a Norwegian Prime Minister or a Norwegian citizen who was bumped off.

Indeed whenever a terrorist attack is carried out by the LTTE terrorists, it is played down by the propaganda media of this country. Norway would be happy to see Yugoslavia's president Milosevic face an International Tribunal for crimes against humanity. Did we hear that sort of demand for this genocidal friend of theirs "Prabhakaran" who has murdered innocent temple worshipers, civilians, women, children and many innocent Tamils for simply disagreeing with him.

So then, what is this great concern now for a high-ranking official of Norway to come all the way to Colombo and dazzle the natives with their newfound dollars? The Norwegian deputy Foreign Minister gives a hint when he declares that, when the conflict is at an end "The amount (of dollars) will go up". So is Norway aiming to buy peace, or a piece of property for its terrorist friends? Or is there some other hidden motive, which we yet have been unable to decipher.

While the said Norwegian media is lambasting the majority people of Sri Lanka and promoting its Tamil terrorist clients, Norway's leaders are in Sri Lanka, soft peddling and offering "milk and honey" to the inhabitants. Can this be an attempt to gain leverage in the policy making in Colombo? Can we possibly square this circle?

All these questions become clearer when we remember the current military status of the terrorist.

At the moment Tamil terrorists are bogged down in the jungles of Mulaitivu, and finding it difficult to extricate themselves and show progress to their Tamil financial backers in the west. So they have placed a call to their good friends the Norwegians, to lend a helping hand. For indeed they need a lull to regroup and re-establish their communications line, before their next onslaught. What they badly need now is a breathing space.

Now the pieces begin to fall into place. This visit by the Norwegian Dy. Foreign Minister with his entourage is not one of goodwill and felicitation, but yet another "red herring". He was here on an important mission. It was to lend a helping hand to their Tiger friends and take the Sri Lankans for another ride.

Owning a history of partisanship to this conflict; asking Norway to negotiate is like asking "a fox to mind the chicken coop".

Norway's grandiose dreams of solving our problems is a hoax. This while singing one tune at home and harping a different one in Sri Lanka. Or do the Sri Lankans really want a repetition of history?

Indeed the language of Sri Lanka is Tamil, if going by "Hele Norges Lexikon", a reference lexicon for students. Year of its Publication: 1997. This is, but an isolated howler you are bound to believe. Yet pathetically it adheres to a pattern of continuing distortion and deception aimed purely at belittling the majority people of Sri Lanka . Or else, lacking such elementary knowledge of the country, how can one undertake this subtle business of conflict resolution?

Just let it be

by Kingsley Heendeniya
I want to share with persons who may not have the opportunity to study and practice the teaching of the late Achaan Chah of Thailand, regarded as a monk who attained nirvana. He was a world renowned master of meditation and his discourses have been translated into English in the book "A Still Forest Pool" by the American meditation Master Jack Kornfield & Paul Breiter. I have taken excerpts from it, selecting, highlighting and re-arranging, to bring out the central theme of his teaching, arising from his own experience: Just let it be.

Excerpts

Let us talk about the difference between studying Dharma and applying them in practice. True Dharma study has only one purpose - to find a way out of the unsatisfactoriness of our lives...Our suffering has causes for its arising and a place to abide...Therefore the Buddha taught us to contemplate the movements of the mind. Watching the mind move, we can see its basic characteristics: endless flux, unsatisfactoriness, and emptiness...This is the process of dependent origination...But when the process is actually occurring within us, those who have only read about it cannot follow fast enough. Like a fruit falling from a tree, each link in the chain falls so fast that such people cannot tell what branches it has passed...Study does not tell you that this is the experience of ignorance arising, this is how volition feels... When you let go of a tree limb and fall to the ground...you just hit the ground and experience the pain. No book can describe that...the Buddha did not want us to become attached to words. He just wanted us to see that all is impermanent, unsatisfactory, empty of self. He taught only to let go...Just let them be, the good as well as the bad.

The Buddha said simply, "Give them up". But for us it is necessary to study our own minds to know how it is possible to give them up...We can discover this through meditation. Meditation is like a single log of wood. Insight and investigation are at one end of the log; calm and concentration are at the other end. If you lift up the whole log both sides come up at once...Which is concentration and which is insight? Just this mind...Such terms are only conventions for teaching.

We should not be attached to the language. The only source of true knowledge is to see what is within ourself...Therefore, develop samadhi, calm and insight; learn to make them arise in your mind and really use them. Otherwise, you will know only the words of Buddhism...

I did not practice using textbook terms; I just looked at this one who knows. If it hates someone, question why. If it loves someone, question why. Probing all arising back to its origin, you can solve the problem of clinging and hating and get them to leave you alone. Everything comes back to and arises from the one who knows. But repeated practice is crucial. If someone curses us and we have no feelings of self, the incident ends with the spoken words, and we do not suffer...If we do not stand in the line of fire, we do not get shot...Moving gracefully through the world not caught in evaluating each event, a Bikkhu becomes serene...Investigate the five aggregates...You will be a different person. Those who understand emptiness and practice accordingly are few, but they know the greatest joy. Why not try it?

Many people who have studied on a university level and attained graduate degrees and worldly success find that their lives are till lacking...The vulture flies high, but what does it feed on?

Dharma is understanding that goes beyond the conditioned, compounded, limited understanding of worldly science...progress in worldly wisdom can cause deterioration in religion and moral values...It is necessary to teach the basics first - basic morality, seeing the transitoriness of life, the facts of aging and death...Outward, scriptural study is not important.

Of course, the Dharma books are correct, but they are not right. They cannot give you right understanding. To see the word hatred in print is not the same as experiencing anger...Only experiencing for yourself can give you true faith. There are two kinds of faith. One is a kind of blind trust in the Buddha, the teachings, the master, which often leads to begin practice or to ordain. The second is true faith - certain, unshakable - which arises from knowing within oneself...seeing clearly all things within oneself makes it possible to put an end to doubt, to attain this certainty in one's practice.

You must go beyond all words, all symbols, all plans for your practice...If you do not turn inward, you will never know reality...If you are interested in Dharma, just give up, just let go. Merely thinking about practice is like pouncing on the shadow and missing the substance. You need not study much...you will see the Dharma for yourself.

There must be more than merely hearing the words. Speak with yourself, observe your own mind. If you cut off this verbal, thinking mind, you will have a true standard for judging. Practice in this way and the rest will follow...

Traditionally, the Eightfold Path is taught with eight steps such as Right understanding, Right Speech, Right Concentration, and so forth. But the true Eightfold path is within us - two eyes, two ears, two nostrils, a tongue, and a body. These eight doors are our entire path and the mind is the one that walks on the Path. Know these doors, examine them, and all the dharmas will be revealed. The heart of the path is so simple. No need for long explanations. Give up clinging to love and hate, just rest with things as they are. That is all I do in my own practice.

Do not try to become anything. Do not make yourself into anything . Do not be a meditator. Do not become enlightened. When you sit, let it be. When you walk, let it be. Grasp at nothing. Resist nothing...there are dozens of meditation techniques to develop samadhi and many kinds of vipassana. But it all comes back to this - just let it all be.

You will see that when the heart/mind is unattached, it is abiding in its normal state. When it stirs from the normal because of various thoughts and feelings, the process of thought construction takes place, in which illusions are created. Learn to see through this process. When the mind has stirred from normal, it leads away from right practice to one of extremes of indulgence or aversion, thereby creating more illusion, more thought construction. Good or bad only arises in your mind. If you keep a watch on your mind, studying this one topic your whole life, I guarantee you will never be bored.

For the most part, our thinking follows sense objects, and wherever our thoughts lead us, we follow. However, thinking and wisdom are different, in wisdom, the mind becomes still, unmoving, and we are simply aware, simply acknowledging. Normally, when sense object come, we think about, dwell on...and worry about them. Yet none of those sense objects is substantial, all are impermanent, unsatisfactory, and empty...Mind is one, but who is that observes it? Mind is one thing, the one who knows is another...

The Buddha taught us to lay everything down, not like a cow or buffalo but knowingly. From the beginning I have practised like this...We want to see the truth not in a book or as an ideal but in our own minds...As the mind becomes attached again, examine each new situation - do not stop keep looking, keep at it...Then attachment will find nowhere to rest.

This is the way I myself have practiced. If you practice like this, true tranquillity is found in activity, in the midst of sense objects...When you make contact with sense objects, contemplate: impermanent, unsatisfactory, not self...file everything under these three categories, and keep contemplating.

Everywhere you look is the Dharma;...there is nothing in the world that is not Dharma. But you must understand. Happiness and unhappiness, pleasure and pain are always with us. When you understand their nature, the Buddha and the Dharma are right there...It is so simple and direct once you understand. When pleasant things arise, understand that they are empty. When unpleasant things arise, understand that they are not you, not yours; they pass away. If you don't relate to phenomena as being you or see yourself as their owner, the mind comes into balance. This balance is the correct path, the correct teaching of the Buddha which leads to liberation.

When you understand this balance, then the path becomes clear. As you grow in understanding, when things come that are pleasant, you will realize that they are empty...Finally, as you travel further along the path, you will come to see that nothing in the world has any essential value. There is nothing to hold on to. Everything is like an old banana peel or a coconut husk - you have no use for it, no fascination with it. When you see that things in the world are like banana peels...then you are free to walk in the world without being bothered or hurt in any way. This is the path that brings you to freedom.

The very desire to be free or to be enlightened will be the desire that prevents your freedom. You can try hard as you wish, practice ardently night and day, but if you still have the desire to achieve, you will never find the peace. The energy from this desire will cause doubt and restlessness. No matter how long and hard you practice, wisdom will not arise from desire, Simply let go. Watch the mind and body mindfully, but don't try to achieve anything.

The practice is to sit and let your heart become still and concentrated and then to use that concentration to examine the nature of the mind and body. Otherwise, if you simply make the heart/mind quiet, it will be peaceful and free of defilement only as long as you sit. This is like using a stone to cover a garbage pit; when you take away the stone, the pit is still infested and full of garbage...Examining the mind and body most directly does not involve the use of thought. There are two levels of examination. One is thoughtful and discursive...The other is a silent, concentrated, inner listening. Only when the heart is concentrated and still can real wisdom naturally arise...It is this seeing that leads you to learn about change, about emptiness, and about the selflessness of body and mind.

Buddha talked about two styles of practice: liberation through wisdom and liberation through concentration. People whose style is liberation through wisdom hear the Dharma and immediately begin to understand it. Since the entire teaching is simply to let go of things, to let things be, they begin the practice of letting go in a very natural way, without a great deal of effort or concentration...Some people on the other hand, depending on their background, need a lot more concentration. They have to sit and practice in a very disciplined way over a long period of time. For them, this concentration, if it is used properly, becomes the basis for deep, penetrating insight. Any of the tools of our practice can bring us to liberation. Even the precepts - whether five precepts for householders, the ten precepts for novices, or the 227 precepts for monks - can be used in the same way. Because these are disciplines that require mindfulness and surrender, there is no limit to their usefulness.

The Dharma of the Buddha is not found in books. If you want to really see for yourself what the Buddha was talking about, you don't need to bother with books. Watch your own mind. Examine to see how feelings and thoughts come and go. Don't be attached to anything, just be mindful of whatever there is to see. This is the way to the truths of the Buddha. Be natural. Everything you do in your life (here) is a chance to practice. It is all Dharma. When you do your chores, try to be mindful...There is Dharma in emptying spittoons.

The Dharma belongs to no one; it has no owner. It arises in the world when the world manifests, yet stands alone as the truth. It is always here, unmoving, limitless, for all who seek it. It is like water underground - whoever digs a well finds it. Yet whether or not you dig, it is always here, underlying all things...

What is this Buddha? When we see with the eye of wisdom, we know that the Buddha is timeless, unborn, unrelated to any body, any history, any image. Buddha is the ground of all being, the realization of the truth of the unmoving mind. So the Buddha was not enlightened in India. In fact he was never enlightened, was never born, and never died. This timeless Buddha is our true home, our abiding place. When we take refuge in the Buddha, Dharma and Sangha, all things in the world are free for us. They become our teacher, proclaiming the one true nature of life...Truth is hidden in untruth, permanence is hidden in impermanence.

Buddha made a distinction between ultimate truth and conventional truth. The idea of a self is merely a concept, a convention...To understand not-self, you have to meditate. If you only intellectualize, your head will explode...When you see beyond self, you no longer cling to happiness, and when you no longer cling to happiness, you can begin to be truly happy.

The language of the Dharma isn't English or Thai or Sanskrit. It has its own language, which is the same for all people - the language of experience. There is a great difference between concepts and direct experience. Whosoever puts a finger into a glass of hot water will have the same experience of hot, but it is called by many words in different languages.

In the Christian religion, for example, one of the most important holidays is Christmas...if Christmas is an occasion where people make a particular effort to do what is good and kind and helpful to others in some way, that's important and wonderful, no matter what system you use to describe it...I teach this way to enable people to let go of their attachments to various concepts and to see what is happening in a straightforward and natural way. Anything that inspires us to see what is true and do what is good is proper practice. You may call it anything you like...Greed and hatred are the same in an Eastern or a Western mind. Suffering and the cessation of suffering are the same for all people.

The defilements are like a tiger. We should imprison the tiger in a good strong cage made of mindfulness, energy, patience, and endurance. Then we can let it starve to death by not feeding its habitual desires...Or defilements are like a cat. If you feed it, it will keep coming around...our suffering comes from our own wrong understanding, our attachment to various mental activities. We must train our mind like a bufflo: the buffalo is our thinking, the owner is the meditator...Gradually we have to change our habitual ways of thinking and feeling. We must see how we suffer when we think in terms of me and mine. Then we can let go...Right understanding ultimately means nondiscrimination - seeing all people the same, neither good nor bad...our discrimination colors everything.

This is the world we create...two persons are watching a flag; one says it is the wind that moves, the other says it is the flag. They can argue for ever...for it is the mind that moves...Why is sugar sweet and water tasteless? It is just their nature. So too with thinking and stillness, pain and pleasure - it is wrong understanding to want thinking to cease...Ultimately, things are just as they are - only comparisons cause us to suffer...It is just like a monkey jumping about senselessly...Its behaviour is driven not by dispassion but by different forms of aversion and fear, You have to learn to control...

We can see the minds as a lotus. Some lotuses are still stuck in the mud, some have climbed above the mud but are still under water, some have reached the surface, while others are open in the sun, stainfree. Which lotus do you choose to be?

As you grow in Dharma, you should have a teacher to instruct and advise you...Respect the teacher and follow the rules and system of practice...True teachers speak only of the difficult practice of giving up or getting rid of the self. Whatever may happen, do not abandon the teacher...Alas, only a few who study Buddhism really want to practice...But some people can only study in a logical way. Few are willing to die and be born again free. I feel sorry for the rest...

The lure of the detour

by W. J. Samuel
What is a detour? It is a by pass, byway, circuitous route, deviation diversion, indirect course, round about way.

Normally a main highway is used to reach one's destination but at times a detour through a rural landscape with a scenic mountain backdrop and the sight of lovely, lissom, lasses, laden with heavy vegetable and fruit baskets lumbering along on their way to the village fair can be a soothing balm to the harried city motorist.

A classic example of a detour in the Low Country is how the Portuguese were taken for a beautiful ride to Kotte! (Parangiya Kotte giyawage).

So make use of the March/ April dry spell and head for the hills before the onset of the south west monsoon.

I list below four minor roads suitable for detours but please obtain information about the present condition of these roads from a reliable source and the type of vehicle that could be used.

(1) Colombo/ Kandy road

Detour at Mawanella 56 miles to Aranayake 81/4 miles and then to Ambalakanda - Dotal Oya, Dolosbage and Nawalapitiya and return to Colombo on the main highway via Ginigathena/ Kitulgala. I would suggest that you reconnoitre or as some would prefer study the lie of the land in the Mawanella area and have a chat with the locals and the police about your intended trip. I remember that many an unwary planter has been robbed off his payroll in the Dotal Oya area and so you can ask as to how safe this road is now.

When you reconnoitre the Mawanella area before your actual trip you could visit the following places of interest.

(a) Utuwankanda (1410 ft.)

Affords an excellent view, 2 miles from Mawanella. Left of the Kandy road. Also called Sentry Rock or Castle Rock famous haunt of Sardiel who was known to have used the vantage point of Utuwankanda to watch the movements of carriages doing the Colombo/ Kandy run. Swooping down from the hill he and his golayas would pounce on the hapless rich passengers and it is claimed distribute a good part of the spoils to the poor. There stands a monument in the Manawella bazaar to one of the victims and to the final captors of Sri Lanka's "Robin Hood".

(b) Bible Rock or Batgala (2618 ft.)

Young bucks could try to scale this rock with the assistance of a local guide. It is close to Aranayake - 81/4 miles from Mawanella. There should be a good view from this flat topped rock.

(c) There used to be a natural swimming pool near Hinwerella Estate Factory close to Mawanella which was ideal for picnics.

(2) Colombo/ Bandarawela Road

Detour - Turn left at Kalupahana (102 miles) through west Haputale Estate Udaveriya, Ohiya, Boralanda, Gurutalawa and Welimada - 28 miles from Kalupahana.

Sri Lanka's highest waterfall (790 ft.) and one of exquisite beauty is about four miles off the main road from Colombo. Dr. Eberhard Kautzch of Germany author of the Guide to the Waterfalls of Sri Lanka (page 35) describes this waterfall as I quote, "Within a majestic basin shaped valley bordered by huge steep rocks and dark green forests of pines and tropic trees the highest waterfall of Sri Lanka (263 mn) plunges with two silver ropes over a vertical dark grey wall from the green saddle between Mt. Welihena (1375 m NN) and Mt. Bambaragala (1470m nn) into a deep pool only 150 m. walking distance from a small motorable road off A4 at Kalupahana - Ganwasangoda to Dultota (3 km). The lower part of this road is bordered by farm houses under jak trees, palm trees and other useful plantations. This road climbs up a narrow valley which opens suddenly after a bend to the beautiful scenery around the waterfall (1000 m NN). The pool is surrounded by paddy fields. You'll park the car opposite to the fall by a small well (Sinhalese called 'pilla' under an oleander bush!)"

Horton Plains can be reached on this road via Ohiya.

Istripura Caverns and Fort MacDonald

Istripura "City of Women" a few miles north of Welimada are the longest underground caves in the island. Legend has it that a huge monster maintained an enormous harem by having a wife in each cave! Nearby are the ruins of Fort MacDonald of Uva Rebellion fame.

(3) Colombo/ Hatton Road

Detour at Yatiyantota _ 41 miles from Colombo. Turn left on to the Bulathkohupitiya road and at the junction near the causeway 21/2 miles away proceed straight to Poonugalla, Kandaloya, Rambukpitiya and return to Colombo on the main Ginigathena road. This road goes up the We Oya Valley a river flowing down from the Dolosbage area.

The following waterfalls could be approached from this road according to a guide to the waterfalls of Sri Lanka" by Dr. E. Kautzch of Germany.

(a) Windsor Forest Fall on the way to Kelvin Estate

Height 10m.

Source of the stream - A tributary of the We Oya rising from the mountain forests of this valley.

(b) Kelvin Fall

Kelvin is a tea estate - west of Dolosbage between the valleys of the Ritigaha Oya in the north and the We Oya in the south.

Fed by brooks from forests in the east.

(c) We Oya Fall - On the Yatiyantota/ Malalpola road (13 km).

Height 20 m.

The water use from the Bombepola forest.

(d) Kitul fall - On the Yatiyantota/ Malalpola road.

Height 15 m.

The brook rises from the Halgolla hills.

(e) Ohi Fall (Lotus Fall) - On the Yatiyantota/ Malalpola road - 16 km. This waterfall plunges with several cascades into the We Oya".

Height 200m.

(4) Colombo/ Bandarawela road

Detour - Turn right at Haputale 112 miles from Colombo to Dambatenne 51/2 miles ending in a cul-de-sac on the other side of the Poonagala - Ampettiakanda range. This road is hardly traversed except by persons bound for one of the three or four estates it serves. A more scenic road with a breath taking view will be hard to find in Sri Lanka.

So happy holiday dear friends remember to get police advice before you venture on these roads.

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