Fish Tanks from Cement to Glass of My Own

Cement was very cheap when I was a kid.

Cost only few cents per pound.

This is a bit of a reflection of my Childhood from Kites to Sputnik to Spacecrafts.

I was a science guy but not a creative guy.

We were evicted illegally from our house we occupied by simple Verbal Thuggary.

My fathar who was working under British rule and after never uttered a single vulgar word. Me coming from Ampitiya College did not know there are vulgar words until I entered a Buddhist schools in the city. 

Of course, in the University with the JVP rule getting established the vulgar vernacular was the norm in rhe Arts Faculty in the early 1970s.

In the Medical Faculty vulgar words were the bane.

Coming to my story of cement and things my father decided to leave our original dwellings and moved to a rented house but delapidated by the side of the road.

The next to our house was a land where long satnding Tuberculosis patients were kept for recuperation. Tuberculosis was endemic in CEYLON. Only two in our class of over 50 were Tubeculin Neagative. One was me and other was Donald Williams my Tamil friend from Jaffna. We were tested and given BCG. 

A topic on Tuberculosis is due soon, here. Robert Koch would be included in it.

Coming back to our rented house and living in utter squalor was normal to us as a family of 6. My father used to do all the handy work including pavementing and cememt work. 

Rent was cheap and would have been under Rs. 5/= for a month.

Later of course, we moved to a better house and being the youngest I was given the worst and the most cramped room leading to the toilet. I was disturbed every minute of my life and I still wonder how I ended up as the only Medical student from my class. 

But Sumanaratne and Abayaratne my classmates knew I would oneday but never said that to my face. 

They were more jealous that Malanie Teacher had special affection for me. 

They were Ferdinandos and had a burgher mix.

When we moved to the next house the first attraction was a fish tank. We were introduced to fish by anothet burgher gentlman in Kurunagla. That was also a rented house but much bigger, a boutique converterd to a house with front wooden panels and no door. 

We also had an orchid which bloomed called Catalia.

We also had Orchid House and a few bee boxes (Hive Body).

Orchids was my last attraction in CEYLON.

The glass fish tank is a killer when kids are around and my father had the natural sense to move to cement tanks with a glass front. We had an assortment of tanks and I never touched cement but made it a point to go to the nearby stream and catch beautiful Guppy fish. 

Guppy fish is not native to CEYLON but brought from Caribbeans by the British to mitigate Malaria spread in CEYLON.

Once, I entered the University of Peradeniya as Seconded Officer from the Ministry of Health, I had lot of free time. 

I started making all types of fish tanks both blass and cement. It is a matter of making cement blocks and tying or fixing them up to make a tank with glass front. 

I used to wear gloves and my understanding of physics and chemistry was a bonus.

The last effort was a big tank. 

The idea was to have the the glass to face the inside of the house. That was not my idea but my wife's. She got the cements Bass to the jobs and our cements Basses are the worst. It started leaking water to the inside of the house and she gave it up. 

Then, I sealed it myself and took over the construction of the front with an elaborate design. 

Cyril Bass who used to do our odd jobs in our house would make a constructive comments, saying that "Premadasa Cement Blocks" on the bottom would not hold but would sag.

This comment I took with serious notice.

If it sags the front glass would crack, (if not the smalker side glass) on a sunny day.

I layed adequate iron reinforcements on the bottom and the sides. Gunarstne was my assistant and his understanding of cement was next to nothing. He has to mix them under my instructions. By this time, I got to know, that there is a leak proof cement additive which I mixed in adequate amount.

It was built in two parts.

Rear was completely cement based.

The fish would be transferred there when the front portion is cleaned by me.

Algae was a big problem.

Rear was in shade and practically no algae.

Front portion and inner side portion had glass. The rest was all reinforced concrete. It took nearly one momth to finish and another six months to season it for fish keeping. 

There were no hicoughs.

All sort of fish except Gold fish attracted it. My interst was Green Sword Tails and Red Sword Tails.  

This in addition to the ornamental fish and Zebra fish inside the house and lot of water buckets with fish and water plants.

We had Zimba during the early stages and only fish on later stages.

By the way, the top part of the glass cracked after one year. Fearing major catastrophe, I got Cyrul Bass to cover the front with reinforced cement leaving the top cracked portion open.

Two reaon.

For sunrays to penetrate the bottom.

Water to leak so that on a rainy day fish who come to the surface won't get washed away.

The real problem was Magpies who used to feast on my guppy fish. I had to have a wooden cum metal frame on top.

Then, I bought a Gotabaya  "cement lillie pond" and transferred the beautiful fish there with lillie leaves to covering the top. Still the magpies visited that tank too. 

I gave up saying, they are there to prevent overpopulation of fish.

I hate all magpies.

One day, I had a severe backache related to some outdoor work. Backache was something I had from the age of 18, related to long jump and hop step and jump from thr University time. 

It simply aggravated the old injury. 

Then, I realized if I exceeded fetching certain amount of buckets of water from the surface well nearby, I get a backache. 

Of course, I used to leave the wedding ring at the well and remember it the next day. Fearing losing the ring, I gave up fetching water from the well but I fixed that problem with a ARPICO overhead tank only for fish with a running connection to my outdoor fish tank.

Of course, I did some finger twisting of my mother in law and took charge of her medicinal tank for fish keeping.

Of course, she had smaller granite mortar and pestle for her medicine.

Indoor tanks were decommissioned or disposed with altogether.

All activity related to fish except Guppy fish was done with it.

I became a water lillies enthusiast.

I had 7 to 9 types of flowering lillies.

Only one type did not have flower for 15 years. 

I changed to orchids and that was a big success except Wesak Orchids which flowered only thrice in 35 years. 

All this were left high and dry on the rooftop garden with a video camera monitoring.

My guess is the nextdoor neighbour would have stolen what was left after 6 months of our absence.

This is the Reality of CEYLON.

There is nobody who utter TRUTH and stealing public and private property is the done thing.