KAMALIKA PIERIS

Visitors from the South” started to arrive in the North” soon after Eelam War IV ended.  The Northern theatre of war, where the bloodiest battles between the Sri Lankan forces and the LTTE took place, is today a popular destination for Sinhalese tourists, observed commentators.

Visitors have been coming in busloads to experience the newly opened North   and explore the former warzone, they said.

After decades of civil war, the Sinhalese were finally free to visit the previously inaccessible northeast.  But they did not visit out of simple curiosity. They came with a sense of ownership, the right to visit a part of their country which had been closed to them till now, said perceptive critics.

Commentators assumed that the visitors from the south came to look at the war sites, with a morbid curiosity in the defeated enemy”.  It is far more likely that they came to worship at Nagadeepa, one of the solosmastana , on long deferred pilgrimage,  and took in the war sites as well. One Eelamist  observing this trend, thought it was wrong of the travelers to visit both Nagadipa as a solosmastana visit and also the battle sites in the same trip.

The battle zones were transformed  into tourist sites, by the army . These tourist sites were visited primarily by locals  and the information at memorial sites was  in Sinhala and English .There were no Tamil language explanations in any of the plaques, complained Eelamists.

The army used these visits to disseminate information on the war. Visitors were  given a map with the main military battles, also  an itinerary.

Visitors were shown the wreckage of the  train that operated on the Yaldevi line bound for Jaffna in the North. The train was bombed by the Tigers in 1985 leaving 11 civilians dead. After this incident the line was discontinued. There is  a sign that reads in Sinhala: This is the place where the Yaldevi train was destroyed by the terrorists.”

Visitors were shown the Water tower in Kilinochchi blasted by the LTTE, lying on its side by the main road. This has become a full-fledged tourist site, it even has a souvenir store manned by military personnel, commented Eelamists, crossly.  Open-air sites displayed an armored vehicle, a submarine, and Farah, a Jordanian ship that was seized by the LTTE in 2006.

Visitors were  shown Prabhakaran’s bunker. The bunker had four floors. It had been specifically constructed for Prabha and his family. It was  under ground, with air conditioning,  exhaust system,  soundproof self contained power generation, surveillance cameras, satellite technology, weapons storage. There was also a conference room,  bathrooms, underground vehicle park, bullet proof sentry post, a shooting range,  armor plated doors within the bunker.  . Army  had labeled the different sections to help visitors.  

Visitors were  shown the war monuments at Kilinochchi, Elephant Pass, and Puthukkudiyiruppu. The Sri Lankan army maintains the monuments and runs the kiosks that sell snacks and soft drinks there, said Eelamists.

 At the Elephant Pass, visitors were met by a soldier who explained the significance of the various battles of Elephant Pass. At the war museum in Puthukkudiyiruppu, tourists were  given a guided tour by   soldiers.  Youth were told, you should remember this history well. You are too young to understand it all, but  you should not forget. Many of our people died trying to make this place safe.’

It is unavoidable that such explanations would emphasize the Sri Lankan military victory whilst de-emphasizing the personal tragedy associated with the lost Tamil Tiger cadets, said Eelamists. But they diminish and even cancel out the significance of the Tamil struggle for ethnic parity. The government’s discourse around the war puts forward the image of triumphant Sinhala nationalism. The only image of the Tigers permitted is one of a defeated terrorist.

Visitors were not shown  refugee camps and bombed-out ruins. Houses without roofs, with bullet holes in walls, some houses had only the foundation left. What the Eelamists did not say was that these houses were without roofs because the LTTE  had ordered them to remove them.

Visitors  are not encouraged to wonder what was the fate of thousands of people who were in this area when the war ended. The memorial to Gamini Kularatne celebrated his sacrifice but did not consider the sacrifice made by the Tamil Tigers who died in the attack. LTTE were simply seen as the enemy not as someone’s sons, daughter, father relative or friend, said Eelamists.

Eelamist commentators have their own interpretation of the war. The army was the aggressor., not the LTTE. These monuments    ignore the grief of the Northern Tamils who faced the brutal Sri Lankan Army assault. Pudumathalan  monument is a symbol of the victory of the Sinhalese state in what was once Tamil Tiger territory. It was illegal for the Sri Lanka army to enter Tamil territory, they announced.

These monuments  are oblivious to the grief of the Northern Tamils who faced the brutal Sri Lankan Army assault. All these monuments at iconic locations send a strong message of the complete Sinhalese takeover of the Tamil land. The defeated Tamils are excluded from that imagination, these pro-Eelam commentators said.

There is no  mention of the civilians who died as they, along with the LTTE, were progressively herded into a smaller and smaller ‘no-fire zone’ into which the army  repeatedly fired. There is no possibility of multiple narratives, recognition of civilian suffering, apology or contrition, concluded these writers.

Since  they were doing travel writing , not political reporting, writers have  felt free to fantasize. Victory Memorials were symbols of   Buddhist hegemony , over the Tamil parts of the island., they said.  (Hegemony means the dominance of one group over another). The zealous construction of Buddhist stupas after the war and the ‘discovery’ of new Buddhist pilgrimage sites in the predominantly Hindu north  reveal much about contemporary imaginings of the Sri Lankan nation, they said.

The Tamil Tigers were not regarded just as a threat to the unity of the island, said these writers.  They were  also regarded as a threat to the very existence of Buddhism in the  island. When this is acknowledged it quickly becomes clear that pilgrimage to these war sites is not only a pilgrimage to remember the Sri Lankan victory, it is a pilgrimage to acknowledge the victory of Buddhism on the island , they  continued, nonsensically.

This religious aspect is especially important because Sinhala Buddhists favor one other kind of tourism more than anything else, religious pilgrimage. Good Buddhists make a point of visiting the Temple of the Tooth in Kandy or Adam’s Peak. Now a new religious pilgrimage tradition has been established  for the Buddhists in the form of war tourism in the north. Where, celebration of the Buddhist victory over the Tamil Tigers is perhaps a more significant motivating force than simply going on pilgrimage, the writers concluded.  

 To illustrate this, one writer  invented a  fictional account where the tour leader fixed a large national flag to his Tata bus,  put  a sticker inside the bus claiming that this was the land of Gautama, the  family piled in and  off they went to see  the north. 

Writers have commented on the War Tourism which arose at the end of Eelam War IV. A ‘tourist industry’  developed  in the North, supported by the  army.

The army  constructed hotels for tourists. Lagoons end”  was a luxury  hotel run by the army   at Nandikadal. It was  opened in September 2012. Patrons are Sinhala and foreigners. it is staffed by Sinhalese. Though situated deep in the Tamil cultural heartland  it was opened with Kandyan drummers and dancers, said  Sasanka Perera.  

There was the smaller less glamorous  Green House also  at Nandikadal. Army handled admissions to the two hotels. There was also Nature Park Holiday Resort in Chundikulam opened in 2012. It is managed by the 55^th division.

The food served in these hotels as well as elsewhere, were Sinhala,  string hopper, pol sambol, or noodles, also a western breakfast   of fried eggs, no Tamil food. Tamil hotels had got Sinhala speaking waiters to cater to the visitors. There were also kades for the Sinhala soldiers.

In the meanwhile, Tamils were in flimsy tents as refugees, lacking food, lack food, inadequate shelters,  few jobs, little or no savings, no economy opportunities, said Frances  Harrison in Huffington Post

Jaffna  tourism has been bashed by Eelamists. A novel kind of tourism  arose as an outcome of war said critics.  Sri Lanka army  tourism  initiatives, have been  identified and condemned as  unethical  tourism by   organization such as Sri Lanka Campaign for Peace and Justice. They do not generate local employment either, said Eelamist commentators.

But War tourism is nothing new.  Poland (Auswitsch), Japan (Hiroshima) Vietnam and Cambodia encourage war tourism . War sites and monuments are  a part of their mainstream tourism.

 Tours in  Poland include Krakow, Wieliczka Salt Mines  and Auschwitz-Birkenau. Auschwitz-Birkenau is  largest of the German Nazi concentration camps.  One million Jews were killed there. There are  guided  tours of the concentration camp. Photos of executions, torture  are displayed, also various gruesome items.

In Vietnam the following are included in the tour itineraries. the War Remnants Museum in Ho Chi Minh City which  displays American cruelties at war, Con Dao Prison, used  by the US for torture and abuse of prisoners,  the  Vịnh Mốc tunnels where 300 people lived and worked in a multi-tiered system of tunnels for over six years and the Củ Chi Tunnels which were  used for military purposes.( continued)