Dhamma and Science

Dhamma and Science

Writings of Nanavira Thera

Reproduced by Kingsley Heendeniya

I have not read this piece before but I feel it is appropriate to reproduce it.

My observation is very similar but I would tend to disagree with his analysis of Relativity and Quantum Physics (there is no relevance in Dhamma).

The reason being, (of lately) certain individuals (mostly after retirement) posing as erudite, making his/her own interpretation of Dhamma and rendering meanings out of context.

One of them has published a book locally in English on Suttas and has said there is no Rebirth concept or Kamma in Buddhism.

I just had a peep of this book in a local bookshop. 

I must state that there was a conspiracy in a certain sect of a religion that envisaged that best way to “Kill Dhamma” is to infiltrate (kill within and not from without).

In Secret Service (CIA, KGB terminology) this is called planting a mole. There are many moles planted already.

In another book in English from India one author from India (this was pointed out to me by a Christian friend) has said that Buddha as a young man raped a woman.

This is the level and intent of misinformation, with Internet in its Bubble State, this campaign would expand and intensify.

I need to pen few pieces before my digital hibernation.

I do not want to be a part of this sinister game plan.

I am afraid even Dalai Lama has succumbed to this plot.

Beginning of the Reproduction

It is very common these days to find educated professional indulge themselves in claiming able to forge links with scientific developments in quantum physics, astrophysics, biochemistry, neuroscience etc and the Dhamma.

There is for example a pre-occupation with ‘research’ into rebirth through records of anecdotes under hypnosis suggesting that neuroscience should one day reveal the secrets of memory and prove rebirth.

I cannot understand why anyone wants to prove rebirth?

After that What?

Many of these persons having misled themselves in the Dhamma are thus misleading others and additionally by that egregious habit of offering certificates to the Buddha by quoting from scientists and eminent persons and brow beating.

The Dhamma is about 2500 years (Buddha c 563-488 BC). If we agree to begin with Aristotle (c384-322 BC), science may be regarded as about the same age. But whereas one person, the Buddha taught Dhamma for 45 years,thousands of persons have been involved in the discovery and teaching of science, many contradicting each other. 

Their disputes, assumptions, running into blind alleys and mistakes have not ceased or are likely to ever cease,

Conversely there is nothing to add or take away from the teaching of Buddha. According to him, it will last for 5000 years after his death and disappear.

The bogus scientific discussion is evidence that this process of decay has begun.

Buddha said, ‘I divine (better term is Noble One) makes known the noble world Transcending Teaching as the business of man’.

The business of science is strictly worldly. 

And all worldly endeavours have no value in the Dhamma. 

They are obstructions to the realization of the purpose of the Dhamma. 

When speaking of akusala and kusala action (skillful and unskillful) the Buddha declared; ‘That action leads to arising of action and the action does not lead to cessation of action.

Skillful action not rooted in lust, hate and delusion leads to cessation of of action, not to arising of action.’

In an advance warning of ‘five fearful things,not arisen at present but which will arise in future leading to the death of Dhamma

Buddha said, “Again monks there will be monk in time to to come who will be undeveloped in body,virtue, mind and understanding. The being undeveloped in body, virtue, mind and understanding when these discourses uttered by the Thathagatha are preached,profound in meaning,beyond the world, concerned with voidness-they will not listen to them.

It is unthinkable that any scientist would make such declaration.

Science is thought to be progressive.

The Buddha taught the Dhamma is to one purpose Only- for its practice through reflection,to stop birth

he ends many discourses with the words: 

Bhikkus, ‘there are these roots of trees, the empty huts, meditate, do not delay lest you regret later’.

Dhamma is not taught in thousands and more modules for generating doubts,assumptions,debate, theorizing,analyzing, academic discussions, scholarship or speculation.

Also it matters little to to the scientist whether others find any use for his science.

The pompous self satisfaction of the scientist and scholar coincides.

Venerable Nanavira has written thus: “only a vertical view strait down to the abyss of his own personal existence,is a man capable of apprehending the perilous insecurity of his situation; and only a man who does this is prepared to listen to the Buddha’s teaching.

Why are we cast in this world to die?

Dhamma is the general nature of Things.

All determinations are impermanent (Anitta).

All determinations are suffering (Dukka).

All determinations are not self (Anatma).

Understanding this the Buddha says, is the Seeing.

It is private knowledge unlike science.

The material world is public and common to the sense experience of everyone.

Natural Science writes Nanavira,’in taking this as its starting point and polishing it a little to remove irregularities,has no place for the individual and to sense experience (let alone mind experience or imagination) for the material world of science is by definition utterly a point of of view or reference.

In relativity theory,every point is a point of view,which comes to mean the same thing.

It is uniformly communal.

Science is essentially public.

Consciousness,intention,perception and feelings not being public are not part of the universe of science.

Science is inherently incapable of understanding the nature of material change due to conscious action(Kamma)- which is concisely reflexive exercise of preference for one available mode of behaviour (or set of them) at the expense of others (beings).

Quantum physics he says in hoping to reinstate the-observer- if only as a point of view-is merely locking the stable door after the horse has been stolen.

Rich Oral Tradition of Dhamma and Current Digital Outage

Rich Oral Tradition of Dhamma and Current Digital Outage

The erudite reader P. S. Mahawatte of Colombo 5 has done honours to Dhamma by summarizing the events in Buddhist Calender of Councils.

It is reproduced below.

I want to make few comments.

I differ commenting on Tibetian Traditions.

I think we need a Seventh Council to weed off the distortions!

I have many books on Buddhism and I am intrigued by the books on Abhidhamma.

Who was the author of Abhidhamma?

It looks like there were only Two instead of Three (Tipitaka) Baskets, Vinya and Sutta and ? 

Abhidhamma was added later (? when).

I have not found an answer who was the author of Abhidhamma and I do not wish to speculate or postulate.

Even Reverend Maha Thera Narada has an edition on Abhidhamma.

But I like his booklet “Buddhism in a Nutshell” the most.

His English translation of Dhammapada is a Gem!

Of course Buddhist writing was revived by Two German (Jewish) Monks Rev. Nanathiloka and Nanapoinika in the 1950s. 

They founded the BPS in Kandy with the help of a lawyer and a retired teacher from Kandy.

Rev. Bhikku Bodhi (he too was Jewish American) now in USA continued the rich tradition of the BPS (till he retired) as the Editor for 18 years.

His contribution (translating Pali to English) even without a laptop to begin with was enormous.

I quote a statement of him below;

What can be said unequivocally is that the scholarly knowledge without practical application is barren; Vigorous meditation practice without the guiding light of clear conceptual understanding is futile.

I recommend one to read the collected essays (written by him) compiled as "Dhamma Reflections".

Now there is an outage (mostly digital) by few writers who have not read in depth and few who actually with a will to distort (there is a hidden conspiracy to distort Dhamma).

There was a book published by the education department in Ceylon (Chandrika’s Regime) a decade ago that stated;

“Subbe Dhamma Anittiya”.

I went through the entire Dictionary of Pali and could not find a reference to “that phrase” and alerted the regime and the book was withdrawn.

I am currently scrutinizing a book on Meditation (Dummies series) which has many inaccuracies and I have no intention of writing to the editors.

The bottom line is not to become an erudite but to become a practicing Buddhist starting with “Metta”.

With President Trump am Mari La Pen in the forefront of aggression (and hate) it is time for us to send the Buddhist message to USA, France (French translators should work on this) and more importantly Africa and Philippines.

First Council was held three months after the Great Demise of Buddha by Maha Kasappa with other Maha Theras called the 1st Council to recite the Dhamma, to review and to rectify any irregularities so that nothing was lost or inadvertently included.

The Vinaya Pitaka was entrusted to Upali Thera and his pupils.

The Samyutta and Anguttara Nikaya to Ananda Maha Thera."

1. The First Great Council was held at Rajagaha under the patronage of King of Magadha"

2. The Second Great Council was held at Vesaki, 100 years after the Great Demise of the Buddha.

3. The Third Great Council was held at Pataliputra during the reign of Emperor Asoka.

The entire cannon was handed down in the oral tradition for the next 500 years until it was finally committed to writing at the fourth great council in 83 BCE in Ceylon.

Writing down of the Buddhist Cannon in 1st century BCE was the greatest contribution that the Sinhalese people had made to the intellectual heritage of Mankind"(Dr. Paranavitane in 1959).

4. The Fourth Great Council was held at Matale (Aluvihare) during the reign King Vattagamini Abhaya in 83 BCE.

5. The Fifth Great Council was held at Mandalay, Burma under the patronage of King Mindon.

6. The Sixth Great Council, the last council, was held in Rangoon to mark the 2500 years after the demise" of the Buddha.

Who is more corrupt?

I disagree with the comment below.

In Sri-Lanka every child is trained to lie at year five.
 
It is 95% (in education department) which is 40% more than India.
 
Every principle or vice principle has taken a bribe sometime in his or her life.
 
I thought the Water Board was on top of the list but one of my friends corrected me and said, top in the list is not the Water Board but Cricket Board.
 
My Engineer Friends in the university and later in the public service were instrumental in getting the Nillambe Water Project (under Gaminie Dissanayake) completed. I was in the Public Service and did all what I could to help my friends. 
I told my friends that everybody in our neighborhood should get water not only UNPers.
Before completion of the project I went to UK.
 
There were 60 in my neighbourhood who could not get pipe borne water until the demise of R. Premadasa.
 
Then, D.B. Wijetunge (Doing Bloody Well- we used to call him) came into power (his neighbourhood did not have pipe borne water) and within a year (Nillambe was Completed) and everybody got Water Supply.
 
I gave a call from London (only three people in our neighborhood had land phones then) and in passing I asked my BIL who was only 16 years, how is the water supply?

He said OK but all 60 of them had to pay a bribe.
 
That means 100%.

Reason for penning this was to highlight water scarcity in Kandy and how Kandy Municipality steal water from (90%) Nillabe Project and pump the remaining water to us.

We were without ENOUGH water for three days.

This happened under Chandrika.
Worse when MR was in Kandy for his pilgrimages.
It is happenings under Maithree and Ra Nil.

When rouges tie the nuptials the outcome is visibly worse! 

I suppose late Minister Gaminie Dissanayake  must be turning in his grave.

Reproduction

Study Finds India Is Asia's Most Corrupt Country, While Japan Comes In Last

One of the main objective of the current Indian government led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi has been to make India corruption free. But it seems the country still has a long way to go. A recent survey by Transparency International (TI), an anti-corruption global civil society organization, states that India has the highest bribery rate among the 16 Asia Pacific countries surveyed. 
Nearly seven in 10 people who accessed public services in India had paid a bribe. 
In contrast, Japan has the lowest bribery rate, with 0.2% respondents paying a bribe.

Approximately 900 million -- or over one in four -- people across 16 countries in Asia Pacific, including some of its biggest economies like India and China, are estimated to have paid a bribe to access public services. For its report titled "People and Corruption: Asia Pacific", TI spoke to nearly 22,000 people in these countries about their recent experiences with corruption.

Even massive economic players like China aren't that far behind India. The biggest economy in the region has a lot to do in terms of fighting corruption. Nearly three quarters of the people surveyed in the country said corruption has increased over the past three years, suggesting people don’t see much work happening against corruption.

People in the survey were also asked to rate their government in terms of how it was performing in fighting public sector corruption. 
More than half the people living in India, Sri Lanka, Thailand and Indonesia felt that their government was doing a good job in fighting corruption. 
In contrast people in South Korea, Hong Kong, Japan, Malaysia didn’t think highly of their government in its fight against corruption.

Services people pay for

Across the region, nearly two in five said that they thought most or all police officers were corrupt. Unsurprisingly, just under a third of people in the region who had come into contact with a police officer in the past 12 months had paid a bribe. 
While citizens of Pakistan were the most likely of any country to be asked for bribes in law and order institutions (around seven in 10), for India the police bribery rate is 54% and for China a low 12%.

India had the highest bribery rates of all the countries surveyed for access to public schools (58%) and healthcare (59%), suggesting serious corruption risks when people try to access these basic services. In comparison these numbers for Pakistan and China for public schools are 9% and 29% respectively. In terms of healthcare, the rate for China is 18% and for Pakistan 11%.

Ilham Mohamed, regional coordinator for Asia at TI feels that people in these regions find it tough to access basic services. “People don’t pay bribes for quicker access to services,” says Mohamed. “The problem is most don’t have access to basic services like healthcare, school or law and order. What the data across Asia Pacific shows is that the poor are disproportionately affected by petty bribery,"" says Mohamed.

Mohamed says low civil service salaries coupled by systems that allows little or no access redress mechanisms are main reasons behind corruption. “In other words people with limited resources are further disempowered by an additional hurdle in accessing public services through having to pay bribes. This cycle continues when redress mechanisms are inaccessible,” she says.

Missing Points by Prof. ANI

Missing Points by Prof. ANI

This is in no sense a response to Prof. A.N.I’s remarks on our modern history.

Just to put a historical perspective (not comprehensive), I would try to summarize some salient points.

1. 5000 years and before, Elephants and Ceylon Prehistoric Man

2. From 2500 to 5000 years Elephant traders from India

3. From around 2500 Indian migrants.

4. Genocidal destruction of prehistorical man and his belonging including caves, strongly aided by our ancient monks.

5. Cooked up and bloated history of ours.

6. Destruction of Mahayana Tradition by Hinayana Tradition and institution of an alternative and exclusive tradition of Theravada

7. Baminitya Saya, the famine over 11 or so years.

Death of traditional monks and destruction of formal Buddhist teaching by natural disaster.

8. Attempt at Revival of Buddhism

9. Complete destruction of Buddhist ways and Teaching.

10. Arrival of Western traders and alienation (names, religion, dress and other cultural changes) of coastline residents.

11. Retrieval of kings to hinterland and hills

12. Further destruction of Buddhism

13. Attempt by British to insinuate Christianity into the ruling class

14. Scholars coming from England and embracing Buddhism and formation of the Pali Text Society.

It is the British who should be credited for continued survival of Dhamma (not Hindu Dharma) not our monks but except a few.

15. Arrival of colonel Henry Olcott and modern revival of Buddhism and institution of indigenous colleges.

16. Arrival of SWRD and further destruction and politicization of Dhamma.

If you look at the above scenario emergence (no justification) of Thug Monks (Ma Ra and Gota supporting them) is a natural evolution or the real decadence.

The President pardoning them (in plural ) was the Final Nail in the coffin and an injustice to the natural justice system of Dhamma.

Religion, the vanishing threads

Religion, the vanishing threads

I am one who believes that all religions will vanish from this planet in about another fifty years.

There will be lot of pain and suffering before that happens.

Current symptoms are the beginning of the end.

The open question is whether the humanity has the resilience for the change and look at the inherent change or the final outcome, objectively and scientifically.

The role of the religious hierarchy is to manage the change without counting numbers under the belt but with basic human needs which include freedom and safety.

Do the mankind need a religion for its progress?

What people say and what they really mean

 The Writer is a senior colleague of mine,retired, who likes to call a spade a spade.
I wonder, why he never wanted to migrate to UK or Australia.
My gut feeling is he still, loves living in this country even with adversity (belonging to a different faith).
He missed two points.
How we treat wild elephants and the rampant Ganja (hashish) trade in the jungles by politicians.
The elephants love grass and that is why they kill them (nearly 200 a year).

What people say and what they really mean 

By Prof. A.N.I. Ekanayaka

There is something intrinsically meaningless in the bare assertion "Sri Lanka is a Sinhala Buddhist country" where the denial that it is a "Buddhist country" is obviously the most contentious part provoking bitter controversy. However, on any detached analysis the debate whether Sri Lanka is or is not a Buddhist country seems a useless anti-intellectual exercise in futility, over an emotive line in which words are strung together axiomatically without proper definition. Indeed, from a linguistic perspective the plain statement "Sri Lanka is a Buddhist country" sounds just as absurd and simplistic as saying that "Sri Lanka is a UNP country" just because, say a UNP government is in power, or that Sri Lanka is a Sinhala country just because a majority speak Sinhala, or a dark skinned country just because a majority happen to be dark skinned, or even that it is a naïve country just because most people seem to vote naively at elections!

There are, of course, numerous statements one could make about Sri Lanka that are objectively true. For example it would be entirely factual to state that Sri Lanka is a country where Buddhism IS the most popular religion. Equally and to put it differently it would be perfectly correct to state that Sri Lanka is a country where the vast majority of people identify thousand as Buddhists. It would also be a true statement of fact that Sri Lanka is a country that gives the foremost place to Buddhism in its Constitution. One can go on and say things like Sri Lanka is a tropical country, Sri Lanka is an Asian country, Sri Lanka is a beautiful country, Sri Lanka is a small country, and so on and so forth. Such affirmations and many more besides can be made without fear of contradiction. Indeed their validity is self-evident.

By contrast the statement "Sri Lanka is a Buddhist country" has the connotation of a universal all-encompassing core characteristic that defines the nation. To see Buddhism in that sense as an ingrained attribute that somehow envelopes underlies and permeates everything and everybody is irrational. A country as commonly understood is more than its inhabitants. Consequently, affirming that Sri Lanka is a Buddhist country (if one takes the words at their face value) logically carries the implication that there is something intrinsically Buddhist about even the fields, rivers, forests, mountains, valleys, and beaches surrounding the island – which of course would be plainly absurd. So, where words mean nothing without a clarification of terms the issue is what do people really mean when they insist that "Sri Lanka is a Buddhist country"? What underlying ideas assumptions and attitudes make people claim that "Sri Lanka is a Buddhist country"? What are people really saying when they make such a claim?

There may be several possibilities. Firstly, it is possible that when people say that Sri Lanka is a Buddhist country it is just another way of saying that a large majority of the Sri Lankan population identify themselves as Buddhist- a simple demographic reality that no one in his right mind would deny. However, if that is all what is meant, those who insist that Sri Lanka is a Buddhist country for that reason might not be so vehement and bitterly condemn those who would agree but put it differently, when the difference between them was purely semantic!

The second possibility underlying the statement that Sri Lanka is a Sinhala Buddhist country is the notion that there is a distinctly precious Buddhist culture which characterises and pervades society, underlies the Sri Lankan way of life and in some sense defines Sri Lanka. There might be some justification for saying that if only it were true. But it isn’t. What passes for Buddhist culture in Sri Lanka as epitomized by the lifestyle, attitudes, and mindset of its politicians priests, professionals, business classes and proletariat is the very antithesis of an authentic Buddhist culture inspired by the Dharma. On the contrary, it is a brutal dehumanized culture characterized by selfishness, greed, intolerance, lawlessness cronyism, and corruption pervading all echelons of society from top to bottom. Sri Lanka is a violent society where people have become mercenary and materialistic, where crime is covered up and justice is frequently denied, where petty jealousy and patronage rule, where mediocrity is exalted over excellence discouraging the best and rewarding the third rate, and where in public life the outward show is consistently at variance with the inward reality in countless ways. Is this the Sinhala Buddhist culture people have in mind when they say that Sri Lanka is a Buddhist country? Indeed, to say that there is anything Buddhist in the Sinhala Buddhist culture of the day is to insult Buddhism.

The so-called island of Sinhala Buddhist culture is where doctors go on strike and make their patients suffer when they are not making millions in the medical expressway of the private sector, where lawyers rip off their clients in cases that may drag on for years, where the sordid culture of campus torture that destroys young lives has polluted universities for generations, where militant Buddhist monks are a law unto themselves, and where school teachers turned rapacious business tycoons trap millions of students in a bastard culture of mass tuition running parallel to formal school education. Such is the ground reality of the much-vaunted Sinhala Buddhist culture that people might mean when they say that "Sri Lanka is a Buddhist country". Those who are old enough will remember the historical expression of that culture in the universally acclaimed 1956 revolution which drove the Burghers as far as Australia, and at one stroke alienated the Tamil community with its narrow linguistic nationalism setting the stage for the 1958 anti-Tamil riots, the 1983 pogrom, two bloody badly botched Marxist revolutions and the 30-year war.

So, when people maintain that "Sri Lanka is a Buddhist country", assuming a distinctive Buddhist culture that pervades society, they make a mockery of the pristine culture of true Buddhism, which if it ever existed in Sri Lanka disappeared a long time ago being replaced by a grotesque dangerous distortion that is better designated as "militant Sinhala Buddhist nationalism". The hard reality is that what passes for a distinctive Sinhala Buddhist culture today is nothing more than the widespread sanctimonious humbug of false religion epitomized by manifold superstitions, interminable empty rituals, pantheistic worship, and all the vain ceremonial trappings and symbolism of religious formalism the chief beneficiaries of which are clergy who are enabled to lead a pampered, comfortable existence revered by high and low alike.

One is, therefore, left with the third and arguably most plausible underlying reason why most people might insist that Sri Lanka is a Buddhist country. What they might actually mean is that Sri Lanka ‘belongs’ to the Sinhala Buddhists! When put like that the implications are alarming and it is no surprise that such an outrageous suggestion should be disguised in the more benign language of "Sri Lanka is a Buddhist country". However the underlying perception in the depths of the heart is that Sri Lanka belongs to the Sinhala Buddhists. Of course, religious and ethnic minorities are welcome to peacefully live and work as Sri Lankans provided they know their limits. They may even be treated with every kindness and consideration like the way we lavish attention on our pet cats and dogs provided they know their place in the overall scheme of things. But if they were to ever step out of line and resist submitting to the overarching paternalistic hegemony of Sinhala Buddhism they would need to be sharply chastised and brought to heel. Those are the terms. Indeed, the sting in the controversial Article 9 of the Constitution that guarantees the foremost place to Buddhism is that for all the guarantees in Articles 10 and 14(1)(e) it will be naturally perceived by many as a way of saying that Sri Lanka belongs to the Sinhala Buddhists.

A perfect example of that unstated assumption is the way it is generally taken for granted that notwithstanding constitutional guarantees of equality it is unthinkable that anybody but a Sinhala Buddhist should be the President or Prime Minister. Not even the distinguished Lakshman Kadiragamar, who having rendered unique service to the nation’s war effort as foreign minister finally paid with his own life! Neither did he stand a chance in a society where what the vast majority of monks and millions who pay homage to them actually mean by saying that "Sri Lanka is a Buddhist Country" is that "Sri Lanka belongs to the Sinhala Buddhists"! What somebody who provoked the recent controversy by having the guts to question this popular axiom did, was to touch the raw nerve of the frightening interface between what people say and what they really mean.

Saturday  May 25th 2019

Theoretical Boundaries not Absolute Events

Theoretical Boundaries not Absolute Events

I read an article in a Sinhala Daily, Aniddha and I have a feeling that my piece of expanding universe, loosely written may have contributed to some theoretically erroneous expansion of scientific thinking.

He is free to do so, that is how science is meant be for an open inquirer, unlike religions.

All these are theoretical concepts in physics to explain the unexplainable extent of the universe.

As I said earlier we have human and equipment limitations.

Within those limitations we have to formulate plausible theories.

Expanding universe and redshift are generally acceptable scientific notions but my point is we never see the present and only see a past event in record and make conjectures based on those records.

Black holes can be used to explain how a contracting universe would behave. 

Everything at its event horizon including particle of matter disappears and become energy forms (not destroyed but converted to another form).

Photographing a black hole is a misnomer.

What we observe is some bounced up or scattering of light energy around it.

If the gravitational force of the black hole is uncontrolled and unlimited, and that will be the end of our universe.

So, Do not kill the Universe Please.

In other words scientific thinking is not infallible.

I have given below some explanations and even Stephen Hawkin was very careful not to give absolute values but approximate assumptions.

Wikipedia Reproductions

Stephen Hawking has supposed an apparent horizon to be used.

The particle horizon differs from the cosmic event horizon, in that the particle horizon represents the largest comoving distance from which light could have reached the observer by a specific time, while the event horizon is the largest comoving distance from which light emitted now can ever reach the observer in the future.

The current distance to our cosmic event horizon is about 5 Gpc (16 billion light years), well within our observable range given by the particle horizon.

While not technically "horizons" in the sense of an impossibility for observations due to relativity or cosmological solutions, there are practical horizons which include the optical horizon, set at the surface of last scattering. This is the farthest distance that any photon can freely stream. Similarly, there is a "neutrino horizon" set for the farthest distance a neutrino can freely stream and a gravitational wave horizon at the farthest distance that gravitational waves can freely stream. The latter is predicted to be a direct probe of the end of cosmic inflation.

Beautiful Dream

Beautiful Dream

Let me start with my current predicament.

Financially, I am not getting a red sent from this country.

In British parlance I am in subsistence existence!

The University Provident Fund I finished in nine months.

That was to buy two new computers and few accessories (a digital microscope which children in America uses, included) for academic work for the next five years which the University could not provide me, while working there.

Just like my children, I am cursing myself for coming back to work in this country.

I am going to mingle real life stories within the dream (state).

From the time of the terrorist attack, I get up at 3 to 4 a.m with a very bad dream, on daily basis.

I dream a lot but rarely wake up in the dream state or remember them.

After one month and two days, I had a lovely dream.

In a sketch it went like this.

There was a lot of commotion in a place near a tiny enclave where a rudimentary church / mosque was built for three kids of the priest.

The land next was vacant and a few villages had gathered around to built a temple for the five or six children who were refused by the priest mentioned above.

I got involved and said no more religious schools but common school for all!

The commotion could not be dulled and the higher priest of the above priest visited the place and relieved the underling of his duties and appointed another priest in charge.

By that time gathering was in hot tempo and was about to manhandle the new priest.

I was looking for a way out of the mess and for my luck army personnel with few trucks came in and dumped building equipments for the proposed new school.

In the thick of it, I proposed the new name of the school as Nation Building College (NBC).

Everybody including the army accepted the name but that did not let me off the hook of the mob.

For my luck a guy with money was trying to build a private sport complex nearby.

He was an outsider.

I hit a bright idea and told the commander of the team we will takeover that land and make it a sport unit for our NBC and the Army, Navy and the Air Force.

Presto!

In few seconds we were confronting the rich guy.

Army let me put the proposals.

Land should be divided into four units.

1. Number one for the owner for his bar and accessories.

2. Number two for the NBC Sports.

3. Number three for the Force’s Recreation.

4. Number four for me, the exclusive unit for playing billiards and snooker.

One table for me the other for the forces.

There was a little caveat.

I had to fund my table.

I woke up with a heart pain.

Now the life like incidents during the J.V.P 1989 insurrection.

I worked for a foreign agency at Digana and it decided to wind up its operation by knee jerk reaction to terrorist threats.

The decision was taken secretly with the connivance of the Auditor a Ceylonese crook. I was in the executive committee but I was not privy to the decision and I opposed it.

There was no redundancy protocol and I was clueless of both redundancy payments and any form of negotiations with the foreign agency.

Mind you the boss was Robert McNamara!

The decision was to move the Head Office to Colombo Hilton Hotel.

Fearing any mishaps to foreigners yes was my response.

We were to launch a satellite worth millions and the satellite was in my care.

It was safely moved to Colombo.

The computers and cars were moved to the hotel.

Fridge Freezers were given free to the pharmacists.

Furniture were left to idle and I picked a computer tables but not a computer.

Mind you my computer then was better than the unit computers they had for financial transactions.

We were detailed to look after the premise or the Digana Village.

I packed the family home and called all the others to my house with all the liqueur bottles.

We had plenty in the pharmacy with labels of medical terms (attached to hoodwink the auditor) tagged but none in my house.

Then the “Deasapremis” with over 80 guys visited me in the middle of the night.

One of my minor staff members who was a Deshapremi recruit to spy on me forewarned me of the impending scenario.

They collected our IDs.

I was asked to come to Colombo hotel.

I refused.

I called a round table meeting and said we have to negotiate with the big boss Robert McNamara, nobody else.

He came in double quick time from America.

I told the guys to contact young Dinesh Gunawardena and to prepare local protocols.

Dinesh never obliged (he was hiding in fear) and I had to fish through all the previous government negotiations and picked the best (mediocre) to put on the negotiation table.

Day came we had a lovely Kandyan ceremony with dances to greet the big boss.

No harthal or any unwelcome reaction from the minor staff.

No display boards of discontent.

I was the sole negotiator with two senior civil servants with me (one was a family friend) to keep records.

I prepared the best tea service I could muster.

After introduction and little chit chat we sat down to business.

As an opener, I asked him how much the cost of the plane trip.

He did not answer. I told him if he did not come, the money saved could have been put as a bonus for the redundancy payments.

Little Premadasa was giving (he never lived to achieve that objective)

Rs. 25,000/= was an offer for the poor.

Minimum for the minor employees should touch above Rs.100,000/=.

Rest should depend on the service contract and if possible double it.

What for you he asked?

Keep the rest of my contract as working but pay it in Dollars and Pounds.

In ten minutes negotiation was over and he was relieved.

He expected hard bargain (wouldn’t have come to Ceylon if it was easy)!

I said I am sorry we could not launch the satellite and told him probably Sonia Ghandhi was helping the local Sinhala Rebels to abort the satellite launch.

That was how Indira contributed including LTTE 

terror.

She hated of us of having a satellite before India.

That was the contribution of the Dehapremis who were rounded up and killed by Premadasa goons.

We could have had a satellite 30 years ago but Dephapremies ruined it.

Now after 30 years China is looking at the ground structure (30 years old) which was built by US AID for resurrection.

Can you believe it?

I immediately went to UK and was waiting for an interview and the day before the interview, I got a call that my son was ill.

I returned by the earliest plane and since then, never went to UK but to New Zealand subsequently.

One think I learned there was Unix in New Zealand.

The entire hospital systems in the two islands were linked during my time with the Unix System.

Before a patient arrives all the life history including criminal acts were laid free for inspection for the doctor.

As a habit I restrained all the criminals on their medical (drunk, drug abuse) conditions and handed them over to the police.

Can our system identify the potential terrorists using a computer technology?

I guess not.

I started leaning Linux at about the same time as a hobby.