chicken pox saga

I went to the doctor last month because there were some unusual blisters in my body. The doctor examined my mouth ,ears, back and forth and gave the verdict.

I was down with chicken pox. Well that was a bad timing, I had to rest in bed while my friends were busy working on group projects , workshops and assignments. I wanted to be recovered as fast as possible. But, well bad timing, I got chicken pox in the wrong era. Suddenly I found my family a group of very devoted followers of the God called Papola.

When I said that I wished to get the chicken pox shot, they were against me. Until that point to today I was tormented physically and psychologically by them.

Ah wait, behind them, there was another powerful figure.

That is called the CULTURE, the culture of myths.

While the culture of myths was slowly killing me, I was googling from the bed to find out an easy cure for the disease. There were many, but to my dismay, all were against “our way” of doing it.

I was fighting against this “our way” of my aunt, but it was not a success. She won. And as a result I spent a very unpleasant time in the bed.

Now its the time to take revenge. I will tell you the story.

At the end, decide whether you are going to kill the “culture of myths” for me or not.


Blisters

My decision to take the Chicken pox shot was not entertained by the family. They said that the coming of blisters should not be disturbed in any way. They should be allowed to come & disappear naturally. Blisters come because your body is hot. More blisters mean that the hotness in your body is being evaporated. So, it is better to have more blisters.

Well, chicken pox is just another viral infection. Blisters are a side effect of the virus. The idea of the hot and cold is a common belief in the ayurveda. I have no idea, what it has in connection to the chicken pox.

Medicine
According to the traditional beliefs, a person gets chicken pox, mumps and measles when is is subjected to the anger of the Gods. So they are called the diseases of the Gods. Taking medicine to cure the decease is similar to going against the Gods. So, the people would pray to the gods and make vows to go the temple and make offerings when the disease is cured.

Speaking of medicine, there is Acyclovir tablet and the vaccine for chicken pox. (Read the hand out issued by the government on treating chicken pox in IDP camps)

I wanted to get either one of them and my father and aunt were totally against it. When I asked why they had plenty of stories to tell me about the people who got big blisters due to the vaccines and girls who never cured their marks, got bad side effects due to the pills. It was interesting; they didn't knew a single success story of a person who minimized the effects by taking medicines.

In my case, all the stories I have heard were positive. In fact, my friends were telling me stories about people who got well within a week thanks to the pills / vaccine etc, but, it was sad that none of my relatives believed them

But they were helpless when it comes to the point of the tablets given to me by the doctor. What he gave me was Panadol, Piriton and another drug which looked like the old round shaped Panadol. I didn't know what it was. But I took the prescribed drugs despite of the strong opposition of the adults.

Food
Food given during the period was second only to the kiri hodhi & rice I had to eat when I had my first menstruation. Turmeric powder for food was totally prohibited. Meat, fish, dry fish, eggs etc were taboo. Fried food too was prohibited. Only 'good food' for chicken pox, as the adults said, was cold food. The idea of the cold food would have probably come from the belief that the chicken pox is a hot disease.

Despite of the cold food I was given, I had a problem of pooping. I felt that my digestive system had dried up. So I asked for papaya. In fact, I felt an strong desire to eat something watery like that because it was very difficult for me to eat hard things as I had blisters in my mouth. In Sinhalese, papaya is "papol" ( පැපොල් )and the sinhala name for chiken pox is "papola" (පැපොල). So my aunt said that eating papol when I have papola was not good. So I was not permitted to eat papaya. Instead I was given ambul kesel, which was again considered to be a cold fruit.

Although eating turmeric powder was considered bad, they diluted some of it in water and sprinkled all over my room and the house. When I asked why, they said that it was to kill the germs. My next question was “Then why don't you eat it? It will kill the germs inside the body?” For that question, the simple answer was “Its the tradition not to use turmeric in food”. So ultimately, when I was able to poop it was grayish, something like ash colored clay. At the first time I saw it, I was afraid of the unusual color, but after few minutes, it occurred to me the reason.

Sleeping
As soon as the news of my sickness spread in the university, many friends called me and asked me to sleep on margosa leaves (කොහොඹ කොළ) and alu kesel leaves. One friend even had taken the trouble to meet my father and give him some margosa leaves. I was first pissed off at the idea. But I could not lie to my friend saying that I was sleeping on margosa leaves.

So I got the them washed, waited till the water evaporated and spread them on the bed. Believe me, it was super cool. Ah, I forget to tell you that I was sweating a lot. It was very difficult to stay in bed when I was sweating. I felt as if my back was in fire. But with the coming of margosa leaves between my body and the bed spread, I found it more comfortable. I felt as if they were sucking the bloody burning sensation from my body out. In simple words, sweating on margosa leaves were more comfortable than sweating on the bed spread.

That was one of the good things I found in the traditions.

Bathing
This is the most dangerous and the horrible part of the story. In fact, this is what nearly killed me.

According to the traditional beliefs, it was necessary to abstain from bathing for 14 days of infection. Then, after the blisters had dried up, a seven day bath is compulsory. This seven day bath should be started on either a Saturday or a Wednesday which are called the "kemmura days" or the days of the Gods. As the tradition says, the bathing should happen before the sun rise. Before having a bath, it was necessary to apply a mixture of blended margosa leaves, turmeric and coconut all over the body; including hair in order to sterilize the body from chicken pox germs and to erase the scars.

Imagine my plight, I was to stay about an hour till that pack dries on my body and then have a bath before sunrise continuously on seven days!!

I strongly opposed the idea.

Meanwhile, I tried to get the back ground story to this from my aunt.

When she had got chicken pox, on the 14th day of infection (forgot to ask whether it was exactly a Wednesday or a Saturday :p ), she was taken to the near by river by my grand ma. Then, grand ma had prepared the mystery pack with margosa, coconut and turmeric and had applied it on aunt's body. Aunt had sit on a stone in the river till the pack dried off and then she was bathed. All this happened before the sunrise and mind you continuously for 7 days.

I do not know how she endured that, but aunt vehemently insisted on the fact that the scars go away only if you have a bath like that.

For her era, it was OK. They had no running water at homes those days. The only source of water was the river. If they get late to go the river people will be there and the patient as well as the care taker would have to answer the questions of the villagers. On the other hand, when it gets late, the water of the river gets polluted. For instance, the people in the upper side of the river may wash their clothes, clean their cooking pots etc and if the patient bathes such unclean water, it might result in another infection.

Since I felt good, said that I would have a bath on a Monday. But my aunt disagreed. She called this friend, that doctor etc and said it was not OK.

I had huge arguments with my aunt over the bathing time and finally agreed to have “the bath” on a Wednesday at about 10'o clock.

On Wednesday, day it was rainy and cold. Not even a healthy person would have a bath on such a day. I said that I cannot. But all my oppositions were in vain. She wanted to have the ceremonious bath on that cold rainy day. The rainy weather continued and so was the bath. I bathed continuously on Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday. After the bath, I was given cold things like kola kanda, saw kanda and thambili.

I insisted that I want to go back to the university on the next Monday. So I went to the doctor to get a medical certificate. By that Sunday, I had taken 16 days of leave. Doctor said that he couldn't give a medical for 16 days for chicken pox. As the law says, it should be just 14 days.

That was a huge contradiction. As the tradition, you should stay 14 days in the bed, then have the 7 day bath and go to work. In total that is 21 days. But the medical certificate says that all that bed resting and bathing should be finished by 14 days.

So, on Monday I went to university. I was asked to have a bath in the morning before going into the university. I agreed to that. Then, as I was trying to eat some rise and curry, my aunt came up with a kola kada (a drink made up of green leaves). I had to drink it because, well, because she was such an annoyance. So I drank the kola kanda as my breakfast and got into the bus. As I was getting off the bus, it was raining. My shoes were soaking wet when I finally made my appearance in the faculty. I finished lectures at 4.30 pm that day and came home around 5.30 pm. It was still raining and my tooth with a broken filling was hurting like hell.

What I wanted as soon I saw my bed was to have a sound sleep. It was cold and using hot water to have a wash was prohibited a long time. In consequence, I had go for a cold water wash.

By 8.00 am next day, I was shivering with fever. i was rushed into the medical center of the university from where I got to know the reason for my fever.

The doctor at the health center was suspecting that my fever was a symptom of pneumonia for several reasons. I was having continuous baths in the rain, I got caught in the rain..soo many rain and water related things.

That is where the tradition becomes the killer:(

I was suffering from fever for another week and that was a great loss when it comes to academic stuff.

I have one request to make from all of you. never resort to traditions if they seem irrational !!

Why just colour, we need the size too!!

Im keeping myself out from the Facebook fun these days. The only reason for that is my increasing love for twitter as a social network. Its simple, fun and useful in many ways than facebook. For example, if i have a problem in ubuntu, twitter status update is the best way to get the problem solved. If you want to check out a film before you actually watch it, a simple twitter search would allow you to know how the people all over the world from diffrent walks of life think about it.

Well, the preference for a social network depends on who you are, what you want and how many kilobytes of personal information you want to be leaked into the cyber space(and not to mention, the type of internet connection you have:P). I wrote a whole blog post on this issue and unfortunately, the recent ubuntu Vs XP issue in the home computer vandalised all the words, commas, fullstops and pictures beyond recovery :(

Fortunately, @ranmalee tweeted this post from Techcrunch about "twitter and how it is better than any other social networking services". So as a replacement post, read this and contemplate. After all, most of the ideas presented are similar to mine:)

eh, that is past and these days I see most of the women updating colors as their status updates!! I was wondering what the hell has happened to facebook or my lady friends there. In about 5 simple hours, my sms inbox was full of more than ten colour messages. In another few hours, mashable unveils behind the scene story as usual.

WTF, it is considered to make the whole world aware of the so called breast cancer. yeah, true it is a deadly disease, let alone just breast cancer, the whole disease called cancer is a freaky ghost. But how does the knowledge of one's bra color help to bring breast cancer awareness? In my idea, this colorful status trend of faceBook is nothing but a way to let the whole world know how many you-know-whats a particular woman has, the colour she prefers and according to some web sites, the colour describes how she feels. (link via @Binku)

Or else, the brain of this stupid godaya girl has no enough power to process the colourful information and decipher out the hidden breast cancer awareness message in facebook updates.

After all, this is another crazy trend started by guys/girls from a world where the people have thosand and one chances to see not only the bra colours but also bikini colors, boxer colors and thong colors. They won't mind somebody posting her bra colour as the status message. Well that is their culture.

halooo, welcome to Sri Lanka. Girls are supoosed to hide their bra using all types of under clothing available. When a bra is washed, grand moms want us to hang it in a place where the male family memebers would not see. If the bra strap is visible to the outside, even the girls with a modern mind set would feel embarassed and what if a guy or a girl in the bus stares at such a visible bra strap (which often happens in Sri Lankan busses) ? ahah, there you got it. No need to explain the feeling right?

So, how come all such girls publicly shouting out the colour of their under garment? oh, people forgeot to mention another thing, although now a widely known secret, it was first thought to be a "girl only secret" in Facebook. Here is one of the emails I received.

Its just a little fun for us girls only..Each of you write on your status what
colour your bra is..Nothing else, just the colour.... Then send this by private
message ONLY, 2 all the females on ur friends list.. Lets see how quickly we can
spread the wings of cancer awareness, and see how confused all the men get when
they see just a colour as our status...Take care

However, as one unfaithful woman of the pack has unveiled the secret to web, "the guys" got to know the secret in no time.

Now imagine a guy seeing "red" as the status of the most innocent girl in his faceBook friend list. I bet 10000000000000000000 dollers that his mind's eye pictures the girl in a red bra in no time. the image may erase itself in seconds or sometimes, it may be carved in the brain for days ; who knows, according to our Psychology lessons, typical male mind runs wild even after a simple stimuli. Of course, a stimuli may differ from person to person. For some, it would be just fun; fun to know something that a typical Sri Lankan girl would usually tag as too personal and keep as a secret. just imagine,

In facebook::
a guy writes "what is the colour of the bra you are wearing now?" in a random girl's wall.
The girl replies "WTF???$%^$%$$###@#@#@#$#@#@^(" and she would be no more in that particular guy's friend list

In real life::
A guy walks to a girl he knows and asks "what is the colour of the bra you are wearing now"
what would be the reply?? up to you to imagine !!

probably not positive right? and if in any case she replied with a color, she would be labled the "slut", or the "pros"

And now, thanks to this stupid breast cancer awareness programm, you are being the laughing stock of guys.

Im sure this color scenario would be one of the hot secret topics among guys (girls) tomorow, at work, school or uni.

"you know, she loves black it seems, she wore 4 blacks and 2 pinks over the week. so if you are planning to give her a gift, remember to buy a black one"

"yakoo imagine X in a dark yellow. yuck I would throw out right in her face!!"

"ooooi, all the other girls in the batch had colorful ones but X has only one color. Poor kella machan"

"it was fun to see how many bras a girl would change during a day"

"Munta lajja nadda manda mewa eli pita kiyanna (aren't they ashamed to say things like this in public)"

"You should have been on FaceBook man, weekend was damn funny, it was like how many bras, colors you have game among girls. This is the high time you create a FB account. who knows what would be the next :O"

Imagine how a boy friend would feel when his friends crack jokes on the color of his girl's bra.

How bad an ego of a Sri Lankan husband be hurt when he gets to know the color of wife's bra over FaceBook?

Finally, the breast cancer awareness turn out to be a joke. Frankly, how many of you guys or girls were tempted to raise awareness of breast cancers as a result of the color wave in facebook? Let alone raise awareness, did you atlest (happen to) read one article on how to prevent breast cancers or on the major causes of breast cancer ? In my case no. I was just educating myself about the colors of "those" and also learned that a bra involves some Newtonian physics. (link via @chanux )

I have no idea of the western world. However, for the average Sri Lankan, this would sure have been a big surprise bra color party.

so, girls, one humble request, think twice before a Fb status update again

One word again, all the above are my ideas in my world, if you think otherwise, you are free to leave a sarcastic comment or a laugh on me and my stupid brain


PS1: I know this is rediculous. but this is my crazy expalanation for the color wave in FB status:P
After seeing so many colorful bikinis during the summer, a group of guys have a thirst to know the bra color of their lady friends during the winter; may be to do a research on the underwear color preferences of women over season, who knows, these days people do weird researches:D

One comes with this magical idea of creating a female FaceBook profile and sending a secret message to all the women in the area asking them to update the color.

And Wow, the research questionnaire is filled by millions in minutes. nice!!

And what if they wanted to do a research on the breast size too? nicer no???

PS2. just got to know from a guy that the newest trend of the FaceBook girls is to update their hair style as the status. That is better than the bra idea anyway

Boys, Prefects and more

This post is nothing but some personal ideas.

These days are making history. A girl was killed inside a school and apparently, a phone, some prefects and teachers are to be responsible for that. Some girls and boys who were imagining that they were in love had eaten kaneru to frighten the parents. These incidents may be just news for the majority of the nation. For parents, it may appear as a warning and for the students it sure is a shocking news. Since many have talked of the incidents in the above points of view, why not blog about the way i feel about this whole thing as a past prefect?

I was the deputy school captain of my school for the year 2006/7 . more than 3 years back, my thinking pattern was very very different than the present one. there are plenty of reasons which you 'll understand by the end of the post.

I still have no clear idea what was in that mobile phone to make her suicide. But I'm sure the school has a big share over her death. if the same incident happened in a boys college, he would be punished, may be kneeling in front of the office and that is all. so , what is wrong with all this girls' colleges?

First and foremost, I love my school because it is the place which made me who I am. If you enjoy being friends with me, you have to thank my school too. How ever, that does not mean that I only have to speak of the good side of everything.

Going back to the incident, if I was the Head Prefect of that school,and if I had the power to decide, what I would do is to talk to the child and let her walk off with the phone. no problem to both sides, she will get the phone and I will get her abide by the rules of the school. But, that is not the case, all the senior prefects would have got together and they decide what to do. This "what to do " part is dangerous. Being prefects, they have the power, but using the power in the proper way is not taught to them by the relevant authorities or simply, as any other human being, they need to use power to gain wealth and status.

It is true that I also had to take some actions to some "actions" when I was working as a prefect. but now, they seem stupid. totally stupid. Once I was talking with a younger sister of the school and she was saying that she was afraid of me. I asked her why. she said that I was strict. well, I would have been strict during the school time, but now i am not (although i think so, its up to you to judge). so the reason to think that I'm strict and a monster to be afraid of?

Tearing up a picture of prince william in front of her eyes! I didn't even remember doing it, but it seems it was embedded in her mind. I continued the conversation. Akki I was born in UK and I love that country. Prince william is the royalty of my mother country. It is true that he is a "guy" but still its nothing but a mere liking to collect pictures of the people you love.

I was sad. but was helpless. during the time when I was a prefect, we had to abide by the rules and if went other wise, it means the end.

Thus, boys were out of everything. Being prefect, I had to be of an exemplary moral character and according to the idea of the world in which I was living at that time, being good is all about being good and being away from boys.

If I go for a debate, a quiz or any other inter school competition, talking with boys was looked down upon by me myself. It's not that I hated guys. It was more like a virtual dungeon. I was under the impression that talking with boys and joking was a bad thing and each time I talked with them I was mentally counting the time and make sure I end the discussion before hitting the red line. It was such a difficult thing for me to talk with boys, let alone having a boy friend.

It was the result of both the school and the family. On one hand, I'm grateful for both the parties for keeping me out of the company of boys and on the other hand, I'm so sad that I missed a great company during the school time.

That is all about being a prefect in summary

Since I missed the company of boys during the school time, now I know what I missed during the past. I personally do not like being in love during the school time. How ever, not having the opportunity to be friends with boys is sure a misfortune.

When a girl with lesser understanding about the creatures called boys come into a society, she a sure to be an easy catch. But today hardly any school would admit the fact. For most of the girls' colleges are walling up the avenues for their students to mingle with boys. Its just crazy....

When such students become citizens of this big society, they fall in to the trap easily. Guys would come as lovers, friends, study mates, project team members etc to your life and who knows what their real intention is if you have no understanding of the way the mind of guys behave?

For me, luckily I met this guy who very well understood my situation and helped me to get away with my boy phobia. But, we cannot be sure that each and every girl would have that chance. Although I had no close male friends at that time, I believed in him and it is my luck that he is such a good person to be with. what if he turned out to be a crazy moron. When he was being friendly with me, I thought it was love but he was just being friends. That was just because I didn't know how is it to be friends with a boy.

When he first phoned me, I thought it was a sin to answer.

But today I laugh at the fact.

The reason is that today I have male and female friends alike and I think it is a priviledge.

However, during the school time, it was not. talking with a boy was considered a taboo and I used to look down upon the girls who had male friends. Any girl with a strict family back ground and would think the same. The situation would be dangerous if she was brought up in a girls only school.

Then, let us consider the present situation in sri lanka.

Mobile phones being prohibited

Facebook banned

Porn sites blocked

Movies with adult only content censored/prohibited

If i was a prefect, I would say yes to all these.

But as I'm not a school child anymore, these things stand just like bullshit.

To start with, I would quote "ඕවා මේ ලංකාවේ බ්ලොක් කරනවා කියන්නේ අනාගත පරම්පරාවම අවුල් කරවන වැඩක්. මොකද ඔයා හිතාගෙන ඉන්නේ අපි බැඳපු දවසේ රෑට කරන්න ඕනේ දේවල් අපේ අම්මා, තාත්තා කියල දෙයි කියලද? ඒවා ගැන අපි දැන ගන්නේ ඕවා බලලා තමා."

Note that this was uttered by a school boy in a conversation he had with me about blocking the porn sites.

Although not 100% correct, he definitely has a point there.

I do not encourage anybody to watch porn, but at least you got to have an idea about sex, no need to explain as I believe that the readership of this blog is matured to understand what that means.

Going back to the words of that teenager,it reflects how young people find a way to quench their thirst of curiosity. If one way is blocked, they will soon find another way.

The issue is the same with all the other taboo topics.

Now you might wonder what the heck me being a prefect has to do with this?

Well, being a prefect, I tried to be a goody goody person. No jokes, no friendly talks with boys and no any other non-sense. I even avoided chatting, emailing and IMing in sinhala thinking that it would destroy the image that the public have of me.

But to day, I'm different, may be different than a traditional girl who would not blog about porn sites being blocked. Coming into the university and of course reading made me completely a different person. The bottom line is that when you hang out with people, you can get to know the society and it is not what the school offers us or at least it is different than what the school promotes. (Now, that statement is personal guys. so, please do not get angry over it.It is how I felt)

This difference between the actual society and what the school wanted us to be makes lot of troubles.

With all those hushed up thoughts and feelings, I came out of the school in 2007. when I was feeling that society was diffrent than the one that we had inside the school it was too late. However, being a prefect, i have got lot of experince on how to deal with people. Being a silent girl those days, i observed the society and of course, made some terrible mistakes too.

But still, being prefect gives you the courage to carry out any task succesfully in life. for me, today I have managed well in the company of males because being a prefect gave provided me the right time to be open. so dear sisters and brothers.think of the chance and act carefully. And parents, im sure if you are with your children and be friends with them, many disasters can be avoided

One country one nation......big thank you to all the sons & daughters who contributed towards it

(Pilimathalawa town celebrating the victory )


War is over. LTTE leader is dead.

People rejoice.

But who knows when and where they would start again?

ARTS is NotShiT

This post goes out to all the people who think that ARTS degrees are of no value. For the Information of you guys, I will tell you of the subjects that I have to follow this semester, and had to follow last semester. I'm doing Sociology, Management and Western Classical Culture(WCC) as main subjects and apart from them we have follow two foundation courses per the requirements of the university(I'm referring to the faculty of Arts in Peradeniya University)

For Sociology, we had to study all sorts of theories and introductions to the subject and this term, we are dealing with Sri Lankan Society from Vijaya to the modern period.(well some thing similar to the O/L history part but more in detail)

For Management, we had to learn about the theories and the four major functions of Management, planning, organizing, leading and controlling and this time, we have to Accounting with a nice young lecturer

For WCC the syllabus for this term can be found here and for the last term, we had to do Odyssey and Argonautica. Yes, two big books

For the foundation Courses, we had to do Maths and Writing Skills and Computer last term. Now I must tell you something of these three subjects.

Maths was hard because apparently, it used to have elements from the the syllabus of the Engineering guys at UoM.

Writing skills was harder because, we had to write research papers and critical arguments just after setting the foot in to the university.

Computer was hard because it was soooo hard to find a free computer in our lab.(other than that, for me, it was OK. I do not know about others. Just the history and introduction to networking and hardware stuff. No programming at all. Instead we had some advanced work to be done with Office package)

And this term, the foundation courses include basics of the following subject areas.

Human Mind

World Religion

Law and Ethics

Art and Aesthetic Subjects

Environment

Society and Culture

International Relationships

History of Science

According to Prof Desmond Mallikarachchi who had designed the course, the above subject makes a qualified undergraduate. To be called an real graduate, you should at least know basics of the other subject ares as well

Now,One question for you Engineers, Scientists, Financial Experts and Doctors....

What do you know about Art and Aesthetic? International Relationships?Society and culture? Of course, if you are exceptional engineer or a doctor, you will say yes to at least for one question. But for many, it is a “big no”.

Any way, on the contrary, the Arts graduates have the opportunity to learn something out of their subject matter, which in my idea, is a great achievement.(here in pera, we are given the chance to attend lectures in any faculty but the students hardly do it. It is another problem)

But still, in the long run, they(not Arts graduates) get jobs and a good salary while the “real graduates” sleep in the pavements.

So, the public think that doing Arts is useless. Children choose Maths and Bio science for the Advanced level examination and when they get screwed up for several times, they learn the so called useless arts subjects to get into the university. For many think, arts is the easiest of all the streams in the Advanced level. But it is not and I have the right to say so because I have experienced how it is to do English, French and Greek and Roman Civilization to get into the University.

I have deliberately put in my A/L subjects because they too belong into the category of Arts. Well but many think those subjects belong to a new category called languages. No it is not, they are same as Sinhalese,Logic and Political Science. The only difference is the medium of instruction.

However, there is a general idea among the public that doing Languages worth it than doing Arts. There is little truth hidden in the statement because the competency in English language always matter a lot in getting a job in Sri Lanka.

But knowing English itself is not enough to get a good job. You should have the knowledge in the subject matter the way the world demands. For example, learning how to draw a graph using Microsoft Word 95 is considered nothing these days.

Unfortunately, the knowledge of the students who learn in Sinhalese has ultimately fallen into that category today. I m not asking all the students to offer courses in English medium After all it is our mother tongue. But they should have a working knowledge of English so that they can apply what they learned into big companies.

And that is exactly what most of the Sinhalese Medium students lack. There are many reasons for that but I would not like to deal about them further because Prof. Shantha K. Hennayake has already done that here. ( Refer to the section on ragging)For your information, I would quote his article here.

"Students should not speak in English as it’s the "para bhasawa". (meaning not only a foreign but also oppressive). Generally the union leaders are English illiterate English."

With such practices, I wonder whether the efforts of the ELTU are fruitful. But they are doing a good job in the university. Hats off to you nice ladies and gentlemen!!

Another thing is the lack of computer knowledge. Some times, even a simple thing like formatting a USB Drive. The most common reason given by such students is their inability and the fear. There can be other reason like the ones I explained in one of my earlier posts. Anyway, such things are unforgivable at the University level. You have a computer lab where you can do anything(I mean not changing the OS, but simple things that are vital in day today's life.) So you can practice and learn, After all if we do not make use of the facilities who would?

English medium students too have this problem but at least they have English; something very very important for a good carrier like computer knowledge.

So, due to the lack of those simple two facts we ARTS students are considered to be the lower class in the hierarchy of the Faculties in Sri Lanka.

But in the reality, we are taught about the humanity so that we should have the ability understand it ,to be flexible and adopt to any situation easily. We have the best knowledge base in Sri Lanakan students; I mean, with regard to the breadth of it.

Earlier, an Arts degree was something to do with Sinhalese, Political Science and Sanskrit. But these days, the trend is changing. You have the access to many fields such as management, computing ., law and many things. (Well, I'm not talking about the private universities)

And if you have the means, doing another degree or a diploma in a private institution to is possible. But if you make the best use of University of Peradeniya, you can have an Arts degree as well as a part of the Engineering Degree(cz you can go for the lectures in the Eng fac if you wish. I do not know about the other universities)

My dear sisters and brothers who are planning to enter into the university, why don't you give a heed to these thoughts and decide your University life today it self?

After all, ARTS is not shit if you manage it properly!!

(Will talk about my point of view about this in the future)

This is not funny OpenOffice, you made me crazy.

This post is dedicated to my dear computer system, OpenOffice.Org writer and the Electricity Board of Sri Lanka.

hi!!

After a long time ha?

You may wonder why I was not active during the last few days.

When I was typing hard to quench your thirst, the monitor went suddenly off. Power failure again. I have a UPS but it is not connected to the monitor.

So the monitor went off but the system was still running.

“ctrl+s”ed several times and pushed the power button. But the familiar beeps were not heard. Instead the red bulb in the casing was running as if it was normally working.

I was not very sure whether I saved my document. So I typed in “ftrrergihoo” and pressed enter but no reaction. (I really do not know what has happened at this time)

Time to experiment. Pressed all the funny looking keys on the keyboard. One key made the machine sleep and at once I thought it was shut down. But wait, I heard a noise which means that machine was just sleeping.

Pressed the re start button cz I know something was going wrong. The machine restarted and the monitor is still off. The UPS was hooting his mouth off and my brother was shouting his*** off.

The UPS gave a really fine hoot and went silent. hi there all the Electricity people, I love you more than my life! This is the second time (for today) you made me hear the lovely songs of the rocking UPS.

Everything silent, a moment gone and the UPS shows the Green light.

The machine boots again. No worries, no scan disks and all the play things. It just came into the welcome screen. On launching the Writer, there comes a message saying that I have to recover a document, in another words, my next blog post. While recovering, it says that my document is not saved and therefore is an error recovering the document. I was nuts. As you all know I pressed ctrl+s so many times right?(I love OpenOffice too) however, I was given the choice to save the recovered part of the document. I did save it and opened the document, what do you thinkI saw?

Another blank document!! ( you know how I love myself right?)

What to do. Back to experiments. First, opened a blank document and pressed ctrl+S and got to know how to save a document even if my monitor was off. Then tried pushing all the funky keys on the key board. One made it shut down.

Now I know, pressing that button makes it shut down. I was in a mood for experiments. Turned on the computer again to write about my experience to the fellow bloggers.

I mean to ask all of them to practice some blind computing as I did.

And guess what, I opened the blank document I had saved in the recovery process to type in the post and it was there!!Without missing a single letter(oh how I love open office!) OMG, at last, i have got everything back.

I think this had happened cz of one thing. Simply, I have set the auto recovery information to be saved after each one minute. Seems OpenOffice had done his job property even though I had not done it.

(in another words OpenOffice had saved a auto recovery details so that i could get my original document back even though i had not saved it manually. try it yourself and see.)I do not know if MS word offers such cool features as I have not being using word for a long time.

Whatever,East or West

OpenOffice is the best!

Guys I'm sick of your blogs

I'm jealous of pahan , indi and shakunthala because i do not know how they have developed such sites

I hate sudaraka because he makes my blog a website of a 5th Grader

I avoid visiting chamila and kalinga because they eat my time


And above all I m sick of all you guys for you all have proved that girls are dumb when it comes to computing( I m not talking about the blog posts. I m referring to the format, color combinations and the technologies that you have used to make the pages appear dangerously lovable)

As a victim of your brilliantly developed pages, I have the right to point my finger towards the
criminals.

some simple questions;

--how many times have you chased away your sister from the computer?
--how many times have you deleted your sisters' documents just to take revenge for a silly thing?
--how many times have you hidden music and movie files so that the sister would spend less time in front of the computer?

and, how many of you have given user accounts with administrator rights to your sisters?

guys I know your answer.

But you alone are not the criminals.

Our culture itself limits a girl to the kitchen from birth to death. When parents buy toys for
children, they go for dolls for the girl and cars for the boys. In few days, the girl becomes an expert in raring children and the boy becomes an excellent car driver.

The story continues.

When the girl wants to touch the car, the boy wouldn't let her.

The car and the doll reside in the beds of the respective owners without even being touched by the other.

Time passes, a computer comes home and the same story continues.

Touching the computer is prohibited for the girl as she would "break it". Most of the times, this rule is imposed by the boys on girls.

It is true that everything is best learned by experience. Then why boys don't let the girls experience and learn? why don't they allow girls to do mistakes? why don't boys remember that it is the way they learned?

I have been fighting over this issue for ages with my brother and this is what he had to say as a conclusion.

"I make mistakes and i do learn. but when it comes to you, you do silly things ( for example, changing the modem settings to see how the performance changes with the settings and leaving it as if nothing happened. cz I m sure he will kill me, if he knew i had done that) but you do them at least twice to learn."

Yes, an average girl is not the techno type, she would be into more feminine things all the times. For example, just take Facebook. Girls would be talking of all the status messages of the hot guys in town and about the number of gifts she had received. But a boy would be speaking of the security in face book and he might compare Face book to Linked In.

Girls do not talk of security in Facebook because it is none of their business. they just want to keep in touch with friends and that is it. she doesn't have enough time to spend in front of the computer and she is not expected to. have you ever heard of a girl who is referred to by the parents as a child who is always sitting in front of the computer? (i bet no. but if you have heard, you are lucky)

You see it is obvious that girls take a lot of time to learn.

Now to the point of view of the boys. you might say that girls do not have the interest in computing cz they can get everything done by boy friend or brother.

you are correct.

Any way, im lucky to have to have a brother who comments about my modem usage in the blog and say in person that i myself have to find the ways to control it. I think that is what you should do. let her experience and learn but ,support her to do it.(although my brother is too stingy when it comes to support)

On the other hand,as chamila said in comments of my previous post, most of the ladies think they cannot work as well as men.(ගැහැනුන් තුල (75% and decreasing) ස්වාභාවයෙන්ම තියෙනවා හීනමානයක්.. මට පිරිමි තරම් වැඩ කරන්න බෑ තියලා...). this is one of the key reasons for girls to give the field of computing.

But there are exceptions too, do you konw that the head of the Computer Science Department in University of Moratua is a lady?


After all, here i am, trying to edit the blog template for a week to get a share this button at the end of all the posts.

Guys now you can laugh at me( for i know, in your eye,i m a girl who downloads you tube videos this way)



The reason is that i know only a little bit of html and java. But at least i know that there are many things to learn.

The lack of knowledge made me helpless (In fact, it also made me sick of the nice blogs) and sick of our culture which nourishes the stupid idea that the girls are for kitchen.

And one important point.

It is learning and experience with the support of my brother.

If he does not allow me to use the computer through out the day, I would be thinking that blogging is just about posting and adding widgets to the template.

So guys, one humble request, help your girls and sisters to experience. If you take the initiative, they can come out of the "cultural shell"

and girls, please do not fear, experience and feel the challenge


PS:: The blogs I have mentioned above are the ones that I really love.

----There is never jealousy where there is not strong regard--- Washington Irving

Of blogging, debating, ragging and English

I seriously need to work with Sinhala Unicode. (try my web tutor) The reason is nothing but the mere feeling of outlandishness I experience when commenting on Sinhala Blogs in English. The valance of Sinhala Blogging in developing or diminishing the image if Sri Lanka in the web is a problem to be debated. However, it is nice to have at least a small portion of servers to store information that cannot be decoded other than by a Sri Lankan. if we have the resources, now we can even end up with something like Youkutube in Sinhala.

Now, some of the English Bloggers would say that Sinhala Blogging is just bullshit. Why waste server space for the use of a small number of people? The Chinese do it because China has the largest population in the world. The Indians do it because Tamil and Hindi and India are known through out the world.(This reminds me of a comment reply that i received in You Tube.)

And i have noticed a big difference between the English and Sinhala bloggers. Most of the English bloggers(I mean posting 100% in English) are equipped with good english and most of the popular bloggers are working in big companies. They are far superior to the sinhala bloggers who are mostly uni students, school goers and all the nitwits. (now, guys, i m new to this world and this is my first impression. if i am wrong, please forgive me.). Most of the Sinhala bloggers are fun type. but they are real Sri Lankans and you feel it when going through the blogs. For example, a Sinhala blogger would say"මම ඊයෙ හන්දියෙ කඩෙට ගියා පාන් බාගයක් ගන්න" and an English blogger would say the same thing like this" I went to the boutique yesterday to buy a loaf of bread"(pardon me,i don't know how to say පාන් බාගයක් in English). But හන්දියෙ කඩෙ is totally different from the "boutique in the junction". And consequently, the person who says හන්දියෙ කඩෙ is treated differently by the person who says "boutique".

It is a simple fact for the average Sri lankan. The fight and the discrimination is everywhere. School, University, Bus, market, Tuition Class and even the Bath Room..If you do not know the English Way of doing things, you are sure to end up using comed as the wash basin like BORAT (In fact, that had happened to me.. but yes, not literally)

In the school, i was in all this "English Socieities" . But my parents knew very little English. My mother once accompanied me to a debate to see how im doing my job although im sure she wouldnt have understood half of the things i said at the debate. But that is motherly love. Mothers love to see how well the children are doing. But that very "love" had made her left out in the audience. Apparently, the English had won the day. Love was a scrap. She was treated by the other parents as if she had drunken the waters of comed simply beacause she was not good at kadu fighting (English) and she did not fit in the "make up all over", "posh","wearing expensive clothing" society. When all the people are speaking in English, a non English speaker would keep the mouth shut. She did that too. The conclusion was that she was a misfit.

That was the first and the last time she accompanied me to a English drama, debate or to any place that i had to deal with English speaking crowd.

And hats off to you who guys did it. Now i know when to use English and when not to use it.

"Mother like daughetr" ---Darcy is correct (If im still ok with the loving memory of Pride and Prejudice). Im going through the same.

University Life is the latest. I did my A/L and got into the Uni to become a member of the Non-Ragging student community. As a Buddhist, im really happy that im not hurting others nor get hurt by others in the name of "orientation" or "Welcome" . I have the freedom from seniors to do what ever I want. I really appreciate that.

but,

when the freedom itself becomes a cage where my true self is tormented. It hurts.

I dont know how to speak, dress and eat like a daughter of the elite class but i was chosen to be among them. May be to watch and learn how to dance and speak English Fluently and practice the elite etiquette like they do. But Lord, God who ever you are , your decison dosent work for me. Still im a misfit, just like my mother.

I feel nervous when talking to the receptionist at ACHE (in English) because I Know Im sure to make a mess in front of every body. so I tend to speak with a low voice. Then they hear the simplest thing like "close the door" as "I wanna go to the toilet". I may be too timid and they might have also thought that I belong in the dust bin.

Yes, that is the place for all the (English speaking) girls with a parentage who does not know English,unshaven legs and hands, no expensive car and the no high society etiquette. People say that you have to learn English, but believe me, it is not enough, you have to be like one of them. Until then, you will be a misfit. Just like how English comments in a Sinhala blog would sound. Another important thing,"හෙට මට ශොපින් යන්න තියනවා මෙයා" is always laughed at(by the Godaya and accepted by the other group) and "හෙට මට කඩෙ යන්න තියනවා" is always accepted(by the Godaya and laughed at/ considered uncommon by the other group).

But

Im not broken.
Im happy and proud of me, myself and I
I will not change

And

I will grow with the people who accept me as this

What Tamilnet says about the Sirasa Attack and the Lasantha Wick assasination

Sri Lanka: RSF condemns attack on Tamil-owned TV station

Reporters sans frontiers (RSF), a Paris-based media watchdog, in a press release issued today, condemned the attack on Maharajah Televsions Network (MTV) near Colombo by heavily armed men early morning Tuesday. "Violence and threats against such privately-owned media outlets and journalists trying to impartially report on the conflict must stop," the RSF release said, adding , "[t]he network is one of the country's few, and very popular, independent news sources." Several Sri Lanka Government Ministers and Government owned media have previously charged the network for being not "patriotic" enough in reporting the war between Sri Lanka military and the Liberation Tigers.

Sri Lanka: RSF: Mahinda Rajapakse "directly to blame" for Wickrematunge murder

Expressing outrage over the murder of Sunday Leader editor Lasantha Wickrematunge, Reporters sans frontières (RSF), a Paris-based media watchdog, in a press release issued today, said: "President Mahinda Rajapaksa, his associates and the government media are directly to blame because they incited hatred against him and allowed an outrageous level of impunity to develop as regards violence against the press. Sri Lanka's image is badly sullied by this murder, which is an absolute scandal and must not go unpunished."

It seems that the LTTE is taking the best out of the situation in the country. Just Imagine the picture they create to the world with these head lines.

i took these from the tamilnet RSS feed as the site is not working.

where do we stand?

well good morning guys and girls..well thought of continuing the X Y stroy after getting some comments. untill then, i got a strange map to share with younote that Sri Lanka is listed in the middle area, just above China..