{"id":68203,"date":"2017-07-26T20:39:00","date_gmt":"2017-07-27T02:39:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=68203"},"modified":"2017-07-26T03:04:09","modified_gmt":"2017-07-26T10:04:09","slug":"modern-day-sinhalaya-in-sri-lanka","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2017\/07\/26\/modern-day-sinhalaya-in-sri-lanka\/","title":{"rendered":"MODERN DAY SINHALAYA IN SRI LANKA"},"content":{"rendered":"

By M D P DISSANAYAKE<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n

Majority of Sinhalese in Sri Lanka in today\u2019s society are quite funny.\u00a0 If you go through the Media, the impression is that Sri Lanka is almost finished.<\/p>\n

But lets look at the behaviour of Sinhalese. None of the topics that are being currently debated have \u00a0grass root\u00a0 reaction. Sinhalese\u00a0 go merrily with their days work, looking after themselves and families and solve their problems.<\/p>\n

They are divorced from the so-called problems of the country.\u00a0 \u00a0Lets examine few burning issues and reactions of Sinhalese:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. New Constitution:\u00a0 Many Sinhalese say that is only a sheet of paper, who cares, (apita moko\u201d);<\/li>\n
  2. Maha Sanga disagreement over new Constitution:\u00a0 Most of them never heard of such a thing, they simply say: we don\u2019t know\u201d (apita wedak neha);<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    iii.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Bond Scam: Sinhalese say: They are all the same\u201d<\/p>\n

      \n
    1. Delay in holding elections:\u00a0 Sinhalese say when an election is held, we just vote for someone who help us ( apita wedak thiyena kenekuta chandaya denawa\u201d;<\/li>\n
    2. SAITM Issue: Sinhalese don\u2019t care about this matter;<\/li>\n
    3. DENGUE:\u00a0 This is the only issue Sinhalese are serious about at the moment. There is a growing commitment at the lowest level of the society, to carry out proper housekeeping. Numerous deaths\u00a0 and serious illnesses at most villages have forced parents, friends, children to take ownership of this matter on voluntary basis;<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

      vii.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 COST OF LIVING: Sinhalese spend less money on food, but spend more money for educating children, buying land, renovating house or building three storey homes.<\/p>\n

      STRANGE SINHALA BUDDHISTS:<\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n

      DANSALS:<\/p>\n

      In the past, the Dansals were conducted mainly during Wesak and Poson Poya Days.\u00a0 But today, in almost every poya day, you will find Dansals, providing cool drinks, rice and curry.\u00a0 For rice and curry, the queues are generally longer than 1 km.\u00a0 Dansals are well illuminated plus Sunil Perera\u2019s\u00a0 type of thuppahi bailas take the prominence.<\/p>\n

      PIRITH CHANTING:<\/p>\n

      This has become a style nowadays. Pirith Chanting is not organised now for death anniversaries or 3 months after death, but for any occasion including wedding anniversaries, birthdays etc.\u00a0\u00a0 Once again, there is a growing business for those providing Tarpaulin Sheds, Lighting.\u00a0 It is like an Exhibition, with 3 wheelers waiting outside.<\/p>\n

      BUDDHIST TEMPLES:<\/p>\n

      Almost every Buddhist Temple will now have a Hathara Maha Devela\u201d complex for God Vishnu, God Saman, God Katharagama and God Ganesh. Each complex is built by a particular person\/family in memory of beloved ones, their names and photos displayed prominently. ( These complexes look like Vevrukannala Vihara in Matara District, with huge photos of dead persons attached to Wall Painting. The entire temple looks like a Cemetry). Vast volume of Joss Sticks are burned by devotees at the complex, making it extremely difficult to breath;<\/p>\n

      ALCOHOL:<\/p>\n

      Those who organise Dansals, celebrate their achievements with Gal, Pol, Mendis Special.\u00a0\u00a0 Whilst Dansal is still\u00a0 in progress, you find the drunkards fight among themselves, with their sarongs falling down, providing a moment to laugh whilst waiting in the rice and curry queue.<\/p>\n

      In one of these incidents, a 3 wheel driver who got beaten went home with his family. He pretended as he was sleeping, later at night he drank further, carried a knife and got into his 3 wheeler to teach a lesson to those who attacked him in front of Dansala\u201d.\u00a0 On the way, he was run over by another vehicle almost at mid-night and killed in a drain instantly.<\/p>\n

       <\/p>\n

      \"\"<\/p>\n

       <\/p>\n

       <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

      By M D P DISSANAYAKE Majority of Sinhalese in Sri Lanka in today\u2019s society are quite funny.\u00a0 If you go through the Media, the impression is that Sri Lanka is almost finished. But lets look at the behaviour of Sinhalese. None of the topics that are being currently debated have \u00a0grass root\u00a0 reaction. Sinhalese\u00a0 go […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[63],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-68203","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-dr-m-d-p-dissanayake"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68203","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=68203"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68203\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=68203"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=68203"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=68203"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}