Birds of feather flock together

Birds of feather flock together

I have still not recovered from the demise (five years ago) of our dog (not really mine but my daughter's).
I believe he is in heaven and is acting as a guardian angle for many if not for us.
It is said all dogs go to heaven and all politician of Ceylon go to hell (even there they keep on fighting)!

His departure has made some unexpected dividends for me.
I left the roof top garden to wilderness and quickly all the birds took over the administration of it by default.
Initially to quench the thirst but later to control the number of spiders and still later build nests.
I am not a welcome visitor when the  munia is active.

 


The birds come in flocks and I can identify only five or six birds songs over 20 chirps!
The Mynah, Ceylon Oriole, munia (Butticchas) Kingfisher, Eagles and magpie are the on I can identify.
The rest  are early birds or nocturnal visitors.
There are lot of plants I never planted including pipal tress (Bo Trees), three in number, I potted in.
They are my weather indicators.
Leaves fall with dry season and the new ones come with the first fall of rain.
Its roots are the longest of all and sturdy.
My latest interest is water lilies and with rain there is always a flower to greet us.
This interest I borrowed from water garden concept of current president in waters edge in Battaramulla.
There is a guy there expert in growing lilies, even from seeds not yams.

Can a Tamil walk freely in Sinhalese dominated parts of Sri Lanka without getting attacked in some form?

Racism is a political narrative in Ceylon. 

It is in its peak currently with monks putting weight instead of following the Message of Lord Budhha. 

They are politicians in saffron garb.

More than 50% of Tamils live in majority Sinhala areas with successful business especially in pharmaceuticals.

I never go to a Sinhala Pharmacies (except state pharmaceutical corporation) since their prices are high and dispense wrong drugs or often outdated ones (personal experience with family members not anecdotal).

Bottom line is one can trust a Tamil pharmacist better than a Sinhala one.

Reproduction

Can a Tamil walk freely in Sinhalese dominated parts of Sri Lanka without getting attacked in some form?

Naren Selvaratnam, 

Lecturer of Psychology

Updated Feb 1-2019

I am mixed and I went to school in Galle during the wartime. 

I was fine.

My dad is from the north and he has worked in Galle, Hambantota, Badulla, and Kandy.

Even now we live in Kandy where all our neighbors are Sinhala. We are great and get along really well.

Edit 1:

Since some people do not agree with what I have mentioned, I decided to add some more of my experience here. This will help you to decide the accuracy of my claims.

During the 90s and early 20s, we lived in Karapitiya, Galle. Every person in the town knew my parents. We lived in a street where all our neighbors were Sinhalese and Buddhists. All of them visit our home very often and we did visit them too.

You know in the new year, usually, we invite someone to come to our homes first and try the food and make some monetary exchanges right? This is a Sinhalese tradition and is known as “Gey aleya kireema.” One of the known Sinhalese gentleman used to always invite my dad to “aley” his home every new year. This gentleman is a very close friend and also he used to work in the Navy.

This gentleman is Sinhalese and Buddhists. Three of his friends are Tamil, and during Christmas time, all of us get together in another uncle’s home in Galle town. He was a Tamil Christian, died two years back. All the kids play from morning to evening. Some folks are Sinhala, some of us are Tamil. Some gentleman worked in the police, some in the hospital, some in other forces. Also, when we play in this uncle’s house, there were many Muslim families around, and their kids would come and play with us as well. We were a very happy small community.

This uncle who worked in Navy even took us to show the Navy camp in Galle. This uncle worked during the wartime, and he is a good friend of my dad. See these relationships are made of trust with each other. One of my best friend’s dad worked in Navy too, and I went to Math tuition at his place.

Let me tell you this. When I was in school, our Sinhala teacher in grade 6 asked, is there anyone in the class whose mother tongue is not Sinhala. Some students pointed at me. To be honest, Sinhala is my mother tongue and I was not very conversant in Tamil. Our Sinhala teacher told me, “oh why cannot you speak such a beautiful language?” That was his reaction. He got upset that I cannot speak Tamil.

The same happened in grade 11 where our Sinhala teacher said everyone should master the Sinhalese language. Then he paused for like two seconds and had this look at me. Then he smiled and said, “Putha (son), it is not mandatory for you, but I would be very happy if you could master it well.” During this time, I was a very weak student. Just before my O/L, I went to meet him. After I am done worshiping him, he casually touched my head and said, “son, you will be great, and you will do really well I am sure.” Turned out, I did really well academically once I left school.

I do not understand how much I want to write, but nobody every attacked. There were some oddballs here and there. Also, it does not mean that every Tamil guy that we have met were always welcoming. A person’s ethnicity has nothing to do with the mannerism and values.

Karapitiya used to be a very small town when I was a kid. Everyone in the town knew me and everyone was very friendly and they embraced me as their own.

Just because some people do bad stuff, it does not mean everyone is bad. In my opinion, Sinhalese people are a jovial bunch of people. The people you meet in South are far more welcoming and awesome than Sinhalese of any other area. Also, do not have this false belief just because some racists type stuff on FaceBook.

Impeachment

In this country we had an impeachment and the SPEAKER of the house said to have taken a large BRIBE and aborted its progress.

This was related to extra-judicial killing by the Army in 1989.

Extra-judicial killing had gone on ad nauseatum by both major parties from 1970s (when I was in the University).

Students were rounded up and were disposed.

We do not have a "Third Force".

Last year similar bribery took place but the political shady deal was not upheld by the judiciary but lot of money exchanged in bewildering scales.

In this country we do not have parliamentary members but Deal Dasas (most of them are attorneys at law) in plenty.

We have a truncated Democracy with "Deal Dasa and "Athana Methana Rathanas" having shoddy deals!

Impeachment

Reproduction

In new Yahoo News/YouGov poll, most voters think Trump committed abuses — but are split on impeachment

As two weeks of televised impeachment hearings and wall-to-wall coverage came to a close, a new Yahoo News/YouGov poll showed that a majority of registered voters believe Donald Trump abused his powers as president of the United States. But the country remained divided over the question of whether he should be impeached as a result.
The poll was conducted Nov. 20 to Nov. 22. There were five days of televised House Intelligence Committee hearings, ending Thursday, Nov. 21.
When asked to say whether they believe Trump did or did not commit specific acts in connection with Ukraine — the subject of the House impeachment inquiry — 58 percent of registered voters said they believe the president “asked a foreign leader to investigate a political opponent”; 51 percent said they believe he “withheld military aid to Ukraine until they agreed to conduct the investigations he wanted”; and 51 percent said they believe he “abused his powers as president.” (Respondents were not asked about any other allegations against Trump.)
These results suggest that a majority of registered voters have been largely convinced by the case House Democrats are making in Washington: that Trump pressured Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to investigate former Vice President Joe Biden and his son by using nearly $400 million in military assistance as a quid pro quo — and that he overstepped the bounds of the presidency in the process.
Yet only 48 percent of registered voters said they favor impeaching Trump or removing him from office — slightly more than the 45 percent who opposed impeaching or removing him, but less than a majority.
 
The remaining 7 percent were undecided whether Trump should be impeached or removed, a sign that some registered voters may still be persuadable. And while Republicans and Democrats have largely made up their minds about removal — 83 percent of Republicans oppose it; the same percentage of Democrats are in favor — independents are less certain: A slight plurality of them (40 percent) said Trump should be removed, while another 23 percent said they’re still not sure.
Americans are even divided by party over what they believe the likely outcome of the impeachment inquiry will be. Overall, only 11 percent believed that Trump will be removed from office; a plurality (41 percent) expected impeachment in the House followed by acquittal in the GOP-controlled Senate. That’s a view shared by a majority (54 percent) of Democrats. Yet a majority of Republicans (56 percent) believe that Trump won’t be impeached at all.
These disparities may reflect the fact that Republicans are paying less attention to the impeachment inquiry than Democrats. Fifty-six percent of Democrats said they have been following the congressional hearings “very closely” or “somewhat closely”; among Republicans, that number was 11 percentage points lower.
Regardless, Americans say impeachment will play a big role in how they vote in next November’s congressional elections. Asked to rate how important their current representative’s impeachment vote will be when deciding how to cast their own vote for Congress, Democrats and Republicans were in rare agreement, with 74 percent in both parties saying it will be either “very important” or “somewhat important.”
The survey was conducted by YouGov for Yahoo News. A representative sample of 1,500 adults from YouGov’s research panel were interviewed online. The sample was weighted by age, race, gender, education, voter registration and 2016 presidential vote. The margin of error (MOE) for the full sample was 2.8 percent. The sample included 1,002 registered voters, and the MOE for percentages of registered voters is 3.4%.