Sri Lanka News Updates with Discussions

Born and brought up in Colombo, I was a proud Sri Lankan. Royal College taught me respect, tolerance and friendship. I was always the first to be called to the stage to sing our national anthem on any occasion. Yes, I was a proud Sri Lankan who never wanted to leave the paradise on Earth. I had dreams of making my country one of the best in the world. Better than Singapore. Most of my best friends were Sinhalese (I still value and maintain their friendship).

Even though I had terrible experiences in school due to my ethnicity, I was taught to tolerate as I was taught that the bad people belonged to all communities. When I was assaulted by two students in school for racial reasons my Vice Principal Mr. Gunasekara gave the healing touch. I never understood why people behaved like that. I also never understood why one of my dear friends was arrested. He came back with a broken bone and a permanent psychological scar for doing no wrong but being a Tamil.

1983 communal riots shattered all hopes in me. By the way, the word communal riots means two communities fighting with each other. But what happened in 1983 was not that. Innocent Tamils were butchered by organised gangs with the government watching the act. Instead of giving a healing touch, the government tried to justify and cover-up everything. My house was burnt, my dear friends killed, entire families wiped out and I was kicked out of the country as a refugee.

Now I am in Canada a respected citizen of this country, which only looks at you as a fellow human being. I am proud to work for this great nation, for its development. Who cares whether you are a Tamil, Sinhalese, Muslim, Italian, white, black or any other damn thing. You are respected for the talents and hard work you put in.

I do not say that this is the perfect world but people here seem to have learned the lessons and the bitter truth of what racism could do to a country from places like Sri Lanka. Who is the loser? Definitely Sri Lanka. It has lost its former faithful citizens both Tamils and Sinhalese to many countries in the world.

I still love Sri Lanka. I still maintain great friendship with my Sinhalese brothers who share my thoughts. When two brothers in the family cannot live together and there is irreparable damage done by poisoning of innocent hearts permanently, with stupid history tellers of Dutugemunu, why not we live as good neighbours? It is time to part rather than live in misery as one family and kill each other.

Live and let live as neighbours of two countries than perish as one.