The Grandmother & the “Kabakuruththuwa”

Sri Lankan grandmother  by Shahidul Alam

One burnt saucepan, 20 pages of editing, half a dozen lumosity exercises later am bored. This is life after retirement. I should probably jump on the treadmill but it is easier to turn to FB and there she was — a portrait of a Sri Lankan grandmother  by the Bangladeshi photographer Shahidul Alam. 

The years fall back as I gazed at this poised and composed lady as she sits against a wattle and daub wall. The specks of white must be flecks of sunshine behind her but that doesn’t seem to bring a smile to her face. There is a grim acceptance in her lined face. I notice the long nose and the earrings. It’s not difficult to imagine that she would have been pretty and had seen better days in her life. Like the Afghan girl, she had no name. So why was I smitten about this image out of the stream of photos Alam had been posting?

Her stance, her jacket with long sleeves, the pleats of her cloth at the waist, the ease with which she sat,  flooded me with memories of my great grandmother, grandmothers and grand aunts. They all wore the same type of the traditional jacket, called the “Kabakuruththuwa.” This they wore with a long cloth, called a Kambaya.  which is not like a sarong or lungi and underneath the jacket, a cotton home made bra that my grandma called the “bosthorokkey.” Not sure if this is corruption of a Portuguese or Dutch word. Both jackets, and home made bosthorkkey’s are hardly seen now as most village grandmothers now wear dresses or skirts and blouses that one can buy off the peg.

The Kabakuruthtuwa is the traditional jacket worn mostly by women of the “Karava“ clan  of Sri Lanka.

Portrait of Lily Nona, probably the last lady to wear a “Kabakuruththu” in
Hikkaduwa. 27 Aug. 2013.Photograph©Chulie de Silva

It is a uniquely designed jacket, cropped just below the waist with  no shoulder seams. The V neckline is edged with lace and the sleeves are set off the shoulder with long fitting cuffs. In the old days this lace would be hand woven “beeralu”  lace, also called renda or pillow lace, which my grandmother weaved at home. Introduced by the Portuguese, the making of this lace has been revived now as a cottage industry and the lace is being sold on Alibaba.com too. The more dressy versions of the Kabakuruththuwas often have pin tucks and  lace inserts. see: women making Beeralu lace and wearing jackets with the lace.

Lily’s and Alam’s grandmother’s jacket is held with safety pins like most everyday wear ones, but my great grandmother Annie Dissanayake, befitting the daughter-in-law of Mudaliyar Andris Perera Abhaya Karunaratne Dissanayake  wore garnet or ruby ones on her jackets. These were designed along the same lines as cuff links to hold the sides together. They used to call the gems “Rathu keta” meaning red stones.  In later life these fasteners of my great grand mother were turned into ear rings and gifted to her great-grand kids.

Dissanayake Waluwa family photo taken on my great grandmother Annie’s 75th birthday. She is in the middle with her 5 daughters, grandchildren and great grand children. The odd bod with the feet sticking out is yours truly! Photo copyright Chulie de Silva.

My Mum never got into one, though I got a couple stitched — one in pink and one in white with lace and pin tucks and wore them with Malaysian batik sarongs when we lived in Penang. Now that I have reached the senior citizen’s position of being a grandma, I should get some Kabauruththu and a couple of kamabayas — after all they lend themselves beautifully to expanding waist lines. …

Sailing on Recollection Seas

“If only we could set sail in ships whose cargo is memory….and thereby go out on recollection seas where all reality drifts and fades before great gentle beasts scaled by infinite possibility,” says my blog reader, one time visitor to Lanka and friend Dale Hammond. Words so apt – for the sailing I’ll go. …

Manel Kirtisinghe with cousin Seetha at Kataragama, Sri Lanka. Circa 1940s. Photograph© Chulie de Silva

The photo was a scanned copy of a faded one. The figures a tad blurred. My Amma (Mum)  had not even worn her specs or seated herself in front of the computer, when she saw the photo. She peered and said “That’s me isn’t it? and that’s Sita, my cousin from Elivila (Panadura).”

Sita sporting a fashionable short hairdo and Amma with her classic long plait had been in Kataragama. This was before her marriage and she looks a bit coy, so maybe my father took the photo somewhere in the mid 1940’s. The date and time and who took it is not in Amma’s cargo of memories. However, what’s in her cargo is that a coconut fell on Sita’s head and she was ill – “very ill, but they saved her. Seetha was  my Great-grand mother Annie Caroline Disanayake’s brother’s daughter. No one of that family are alive today.

The ship with the cargo of memories was in full sail now “I came to Hikkaduwa as a bride of 21, not yet 22, in 1944 on June 11. The wedding was at Waluwwa,  Panadura on the 8 June. I had passed my Senior Cambridge Exam and was teaching at Sri Sumangala Girl’s school, Panadura.”  She was the Head Girl of the school too, I hear but no mention of it was made.

Manel Kirtisinghe with students at Sri Sumangal Girls’ School, Panadura Sri Lanka. Circa 1940s. Photograph© Chulie de Silva

The one who jumps out of the cargo most often is her mother-in-law, the formidable SK Pinto Hamy, who had told her “Your job is to look after the husband and any children you might have. You don’t need to go out to teach.”

While Amma obediently nodded her head, my aunt Leela, her first cousin was angry. “You are a fool, a right royal fool, to let your mother-in-law dictate terms to you.” No one messed around with Aunt Leela. She had a great sense of humour, a deep husky laugh and was a very assertive lady. Great grandma Annie had stepped in to calm Leela  and say “I will look for a man without a mother-in-law for you.”

11 June 1944, there had been a grand evening tea party to welcome my father and his new bride to Siriniwasa Hikkaduwa. On that day, my mother says a telegram ( the closest equivalent to today’s sms) had come for my father Bennie from my Uncle Lionel’s care giver Mr. Susamuththu in Kankesanturai (KKS) Sanatorium ” Lionel mentally deranged, Condition serious, Come immediately.”

Uncle Lionel was Father’s no. 3 brother, his favourite Punchi Aiya. His Punchi Aiya had contacted TB, soon after he got marriage. TB in the late 1930’s was a terminal illness without any known cure. Father who was following a course in civil engineering at the Technical College dropped out to go look after him in KKS. Although brother Richie was a doctor and Bertie was probably at medical college, Pinto Hamy turned to my father and had declared “I need to sacrifice one to save the other.”  Father’s love for his brothers was legendary and I don’t think he needed much convincing by my grandmother. Still  a major decision that changed forever the course of my father’s life.

My Father Bennie, in the first photograph he had given my mother before marriage. Photograph© Chulie de Silva

Now Amma and I were pooling our joint cargo of memories. ….

A separate compartment had been booked to transfer the patient Lionel to KKS, through the Fort Railway Master, who luckily happened to be a relative. At the Fort Railway station, almost at the eleventh hour, Aunt Laura ( Father’s eldest maternal uncle H deS Kularatne’s wife) had asked her Doctor son Damon to go with my father in the train. My father and Uncle Damon, I remember had a very close loving bond — probably as a result of this kind of support.

My father’s eldest brother Edmund (aka Parakrama Kirtisinghe) who was a lecturer in Zoology at the Colombo University. He didn’t think his sick brother would last the journey.  So Edmund followed by car  journeying parallel to the train on the A9. At every level crossing they waited and watched the train they heaved a sigh of relief. The brother was still alive.The plan was that if he died on the train, the body would be transferred to the car at one of these crossings, to be brought to Colombo.

My father had rented a room in a house in KKS and had nursed Uncle Lionel for a couple of years. At times the medicine given for TB brought on hallucinations and controlling him had been difficult. Father was not unscathed. He contacted Malaria while studying in Kandy and this resurfaced in KKS and only got back to Hikkaduwa after Lionel was cured and was recuperating.

Thus the telegram was something that was not expected. It was not shown to Father or Pinto Hamy but Edmund had quietly dispatched No. 5 brother Vinnie to KKS to check on Lionel. Pinto Hamy was vexed. “Where has Vinnie disappeared to on this important evening?” she had kept saying. Lionel had felt insecure when he heard about the marriage and had dictated the telegram to Susumuththu. Lionel only needed the reassurance that he would still be cared for by the family.

Lionel’s Father-in-law Mudaliyar K T A de Silva was too scared to let his daughter Enid near him. So it fell to Amma, to prepare Lionel’s meals when he came back to Hikkaduwa, as well as for his attendant caregiver who needed a different menu.

Apparently Lionel was still poorly and Pinto Hamy in her usual way had said “Enough of Western medicine now let me take over.” She had got her horoscope reader who was adept at getting rid of evil spirits. He had chanted stuff with lime leaves, given him some concoction to drink, and he puked a lot of green stuff and a piece of metal, which they said was an evil charm.

Whatever it was, Lionel recovered ending the TB saga and worked in the Dictionary office translating scientific terms for the newly introduced Sinhala syllabi in schools thanks to his friend SWRD Bandaranaike. He was seen visiting his science colleagues frequently at the Botany Department of the Colombo University. He walked leaning to one side — the side where one lung had collapsed for the TB. Careful and always worried about his health he wore a hat and carried an umbrella too when he stepped out of his chauffeur driven car. This earned him the nickname “Hat & Umbrella Man”. He lived well into his 70s with Enid, the latter years in the Mudaliyar’s house and died peacefully in his sleep.

The Mudaliyar Great-great grandfather meets Olcott

Mudaliyar Andris Perera Abhaya Karunaratne Dissanayake of Dissanayake Walauwa, Nalluruwa, Panadura, Sri Lanka. Circa 1880s.Copyright Chulie de Silva.

I would make faces at him when no one was looking, quite sure he couldn’t come down to punish me, although I felt his piercing eyes follow my every escapade. He had a long impressive name — Mudaliyar Wijesuriya Gunawardene Mahawaduge Andris Perera Abhaya Karunaratne Dissanayake — and was my scowling grumpy looking maternal Great-great-grandfather (GGGF). He held a prestigious position as a Mudaliyar in the Colonial administrative system in the nineteenth century in Panadura.

The legend and the oral history was mostly on his dream of a location of “nidhanaya” a treasure trove and the gilded gold Buddha statue and other treasures. The loot he found is embedded in the Chaitya of the Welipitiya Abhaya Karunaratne Mudalindaramaya Temple in Panadura, that he built with his wife Waduge Appolonia Fernando ( Note women still hung on to their maiden names).

The Stone Inscription ( Shila Lipi) at the temple stating that the temple was built and financed by Mudliyar Mahawaduge Andris Perers Abhaya Karunaratne Dissanayake with his loving wife Waduge Appolonia Fernando.
Photograph© Chulie de Silva

The Chaitiya then and for a long time was the the largest one between the Kelaniya Temple and Tissamaharama in the deep South.

Chaitya – the Buddhist Shrine at the Welipitiya Temple. Photograph© Chulie de Silva

The U.S. Embassy in Sri Lanka in 1998, brought out a special edition of the “Images of Sri Lanka Through American Eyes”  to mark the 50th Anniversary of the establishment of full diplomatic relations between the United States and Sri Lanka and Sri Lanka’s 50th anniversary of independence.  I was working at the embassy then but didn’t discover till much later that this book contained a most colourful descriptions of GGGF when he played host to  Colonel Henry Steel Olcott — an American military officer, journalist, lawyer and the co-founder and first President of the Theosophical Society.

Olcott’s interest in Buddhism and its struggle against Christianity in Ceylon was roused after he read his friend J.M Peebles booklet on the famed oral debate between the Most Venerable Migettuwatte Gunananda Thera and Rev. David de Silva in August 1873.  Olcott landed in Galle on 17 May 1880, with a delegation from the Bombay Theosophical Society and with Helena Petrovna Blavatsky, the co-founder of the Theosophical Society in New York.. Olcott and Blavatsky occupies a special affectionate niche in the family not only for the contributions they made to the renascent Buddhist movement but also for the vivid description of the meeting with Andris Perera.

The preaching hallwhere Olcott probably addressed the 4000 people. Photograph© Chulie de Silva

Olcott in his dairy says:

“We were lodged in a new pansala adjoining a Vihâra, which had just been erected by a picturesque-looking old man, named Andris Perera, at his own cost. He was tall, thin, dark, had a spacious forehead, wore his hair brushed back and twisted into a long switch, which was put up like a woman’s hair, with an immense and costly tortoise-shell comb; and a circular comb—a Sinhalese fashion—arched over his fine head. He wore the country dhoti, and a single-breasted, last-century coat of blue cloth, with long skirts, turnover cuffs, twenty large gold buttons down one side of the front and as many loops and lacings of gold lace opposite them, and the same ornamentation on the collar and cuffs. A gold-laced scarlet baldric, passed over one shoulder and under the opposite arm, supported a short sword with a gold scabbard; a huge gold medallion-plaque, as large as a dessert plate, was suspended diagonally in the contrary direction by a golden chain; a heavy and richly embossed gold girdle was buckled about him. His feet were bare and he wore leather sandals! The figure was so striking, so unlike any other we saw, that I noted the above details in my Diary. He had advanced some little distance from the house to receive us, and behind him stood his six tall, striking-looking sons and three handsome daughters. The group struck us as being very picturesque. I bethought me of Torquil of the Oak and his stalwart sons, though I cannot say that I thought the Sinhalese family would have withstood the Gow Chrom as well as the champions of the Clean Quhele. Without delay, the old “Mudaliyar” (the title of a Headman’s office) led the way to a large permanent preaching-shed, and I addressed some 4,000 people.”

Olcott had developed an interest in spiritual phenomenaand had met Blavatsky, the daughter of Colonel Hahn of the Russian Horse Artillery, and widow of Colonel Balvatsky, Governor of Erivan in Armenia. Olcott & Blavatsky together formed the Theosophical Society in New York in September 1875.

H. P. Blavatsky, editor, of the Theosophist, writing in the VOL. I., No. 10 – JUNE, 1880 (Section 2), in an article “Our delegagtes in Ceylon” says:

“The party lunched at the house of Mr. Arunachalam, the Justice of Kalatura, a Cambridge graduate and a gentleman of high breeding and culture. The unfinished railway (Colombo and Galle Railway) is here reached, and the Theosophists were conveyed by train to Panadure, where the station and platform were found tastefully decorated with cocoanuts, flowers, and foliage, and both sides of the main street and the approach to the bungalow set apart for their use lined with strips of palm-leaves suspended from continuous cords.

Their host at this town was the venerable and wealthy Mudeliar Andris Perera, a stately old man with a large family of stalwart sons and daughters. He had not allowed any committee to assist, but had supplied every thing — decoration, house, furniture, food, and servants — at his personal cost. As the guests neared the bungalow, they saw a triumphal arch. erected at the gate of the compound, and their host approaching them in the full uniform of his rank of Madeliar. A large shell comb — the comb is worn by all Cingalese gentlemen — was in his iron-gray hair; his dress comprised a blue frock-coat with gold frogs and jewelled buttons; the national skirt, or dhoti, worn as a simple wrapping without folds and confined at the waist by a gold-clasped belt; a satin waist-coat with two rows of large emeralds for buttons; and a magnificent sword with solid gold scabbard and hilt, both studded with gems, suspended from a solid gold baldric elaborately carved. He was attended by two stave-bearers in uniform, and followed by his family and a host of acquaintances. As he marched along in the full sunlight, he certainly presented a very gorgeous appearance. His sword and baldric alone are computed to be worth at least 2,500 Pounds.”

The Tortoise shell combs were worn by gentlemen then, to separate themselves from the labouring classes who carried goods on their heads.

The British Coat of Arms at the entrance to the Dharama (sermon Hall) Salawa, Welipitiya Temple, Nalluruwa, Panadura, Sri Lanka. Photograph© Chulie de Silva

The building of the temple commenced in 1868, in what was a marshy property he and Applonia owned. The recovery of the Gold Statue, the erection etc  makes an interesting story too. He had used a mini army of workers who passed baskets of sea sand from one to the other to fill the land. Next came elephants to stomp on it till firm to make the ground solid for building. Although he at first wanted to build it to be as big as the classic Ruwanweli Seya in Anuradhapura, the work couldn’t progress. After another message in a dream he reduced the circumference and then work progressed. Looks like he was a man who listened to his dreams or knew how to interpret them or better even is the thought that he was a clever strategist who knew how to make himself a powerful man in the community. Although Olcott states he had 6 sons and 3 daughters, its listed in a little booklet on the temple that he had 6 sons and 4 daughters.

They were Nicholas ( aka Baron); Arnolis; Helena; Carolina; Francina; Charles; Selesthina; Hendrik; Abraham and John Perera Abhaya Karunaratne Dissanayke.

We have kept in touch with only the clan of John, the Great grandfather and his wife Annie Caroline Fonseka, who had four daughters:

Gillian Appolonia who married Aaron Edwin Fernando; Eva Edith Engalthina, my grandmother who married Romiel Anthony Fernando; Rita Caroline who married Notary Wiliiam Fernando Wijesekera; Birdie Agnes who decided that she didn’t want to marry; and Nora Agnes who married Abraham Hector Lawson Perera.

Panadura clan at Dissanyake Walauwa on my Great-grandmothe Annie Dissanayake’s 75th birthday Re-photographed from a original by Chulie de Silva.

Front Row: Leela eldest daughter of Gillian Appolonia; Abraham Hector Lawson Perera & wife Nora Adlin; Romiel Anthony and Wife Eva; Great grandma Annie Caroline; Gillian ( husband deceased); Notary Wijesekera and wife Rita;  Birdie Agnes; My mum Manel with Bro Prasanna.

Back Row: Victor husband of Leela; Nissanka, Iranganie & Sepal, no. 2,3 & 4 children of Romiel and Eva; Swarna & Srimathie no 3 & 2 daughters of Rita and Notary; Nanda, Wilmot and Peter sons of Gillian; Bennie My father and Malini, eldest daughter of Rita and Notary.

Seated Front row: Indrajith, youngest son of Nora & Hector; Chulie (me); Nimal, youngest daughter of Rita & Notary; Neomal, eldest son of Nora & Hector and my sister Yasoja, eldest daughter of Bennie & Manel..

Reference: Goonetileleke, H.A.I. (ED.) Images of Sri Lanka through American Eyes, 2nd ed. 1978. pp 155-156.

A Salutary Poem at Vesak from Rabindranath Tagore

Frescoe at Katudampe Temple, Ratgama, Sri Lanka. Photograph (c) copyright Chulie de Silva

13 May was my late father – Benny Kirtisinghe’s birthday. Fathers and daughters bonds are special.  Even a decade after his death memories of him can bring tears to my eyes, as I yearn for the voice, the humour and his presence. This year Vesak comes a bit later than his birthday and am yet again far from Hikkaduwa to have joined in the almsgiving my mother would have held to remember him at the Katudampe temple.

He was not much of a temple goer, neither am I – In my case I wasn’t consciously following him.  Like him I didn’t feel a need for it. I remember rebelling against going to Sunday school in Panadura.  He ruled then, that 5 days of school was enough and children needed time to play and read and enjoy chidhood. I skipped and jumped around in joy at the decision. So we grew up for better for worse sans Sunday school. Panadura folk were not amused. They were then and even now regular temple goers. I thought we had a surfeit of Buddhist rituals and prayers at the Walauwa of my great-grandmother Annie Dissanayake. She looked fragile and gentle in her kabakuruttu but no one messed around with her. She till her death remained the “boss lady”. The Moratuwa uncles jokingly used to called her “Annie get your gun” – but then that’s another story.

In 2000 or 2001 when I told him that I was coming to Dhaka he said “That’s Tagore country” bring me a book of him. Then Shahidul’s Amma took me shopping for the book. It was on his bookshelf when he died.  I had picked it up after the funeral and ferreted it away.  I am glad that I did that, as the tsunami of 2004, couldn’t take it away. Here in Dhaka, I prowled around hungry for that book, for a touch the pages, that he turned, for the passages and poems he read to me, to bury my nose in the slightly musty pages, for the words that would calm my restless heart. ….. …

And then memory stirred, and trawling my Gmail archives I found a poem sent by my friend Raglan from England in 2006. I thought of it as a wonderful gift then, and wished my father was alive to share it – instead here it is for you. …

Go not to the temple to put flowers upon the feet of God,
First fill your own house with the fragrance of love…

Go not to the temple to light candles before the altar of God,
First remove the darkness of sin from your heart…

Go not to the temple to bow down your head in prayer,
First learn to bow in humility before your fellowmen…

Go not to the temple to pray on bended knees,
First bend down to lift someone who is down-trodden…

Go not to the temple to ask for forgiveness for your sins,
First forgive from your heart those who have sinned against you…