Paradise Espied

By Aditha Dissanayake

The long line of vans and buses parked outside the entrance, which stretches on for about a mile, makes you shake your head in disgust and say to yourself, "there won't be room to poke a finger inside." So, on every weekend sojourn in the hill country, you go past the place without daring to draw your own vehicle to the side of the road. Like what the fox said to the grapes, you believe that inside those gates, there won't be anything worth seeing, anyway.

One Sunday, you do stop after the last bus on the line and decide to visit the renowned Hakgala Gardens What happens? Nothing really, except that you find the place is not what you had feared it to be.

Upon entering the gates after purchasing a ticket of Rs. 15 for being a "deshiya vedihiti," the first thing you notice, is not the flowers that bloom in abundance, but the hordes of other "deshiya" adults who are seen either on their way back or walking ahead of you, shouting in shrill voices, laughing, bursting out in ecstasy at the flowers.

Oh, in what a hue of varieties they appear! Gangs of boys, clad in denims wearing two or three shirts with one tied at the waist, dancing and singing (one can never be sure whether they are intoxicated by liquor or by the fresh air around them). A dozen villagers from remote Hanguranketha, led by a self-appointed know-all, who points to the huge trees and reads their botanical names out loud. The group of families who had got together for an outing, the fathers walking ahead with their sunglasses and beer bellies, the over-weight mothers walking behind them, shouting at their younger offspring not to run or to wriggle about; their teenage daughters following a few feet behind, giggling and eyeing the teenage boys who come after them, cracking the kind of jokes exclusive for teenagers. Absorbed in observing the Homosapiens you almost miss the flowers and the jutting stones, which lie, maliciously on your path to trip you over.

But soon you come across a mud-strewn roadway. This is the moment to turn off the trodden path. Leaving the normal tourists and those who are determined to have a good time behind you, you plunge into the isolated by way, climb a few steps desolately, and lo and behold, stumble into paradise.

Up above you is only the blue, blue sky. Down below a velvety carpet of soft Cypress leaves. In between are the huge trees, with their branches spread towards the sky, their brown trunks giving them the appearance of medieval friars. The wind that blows through the leaves gives them a voice, till you almost feel with hushed reverence that you are in a monastery of the twelfth century. The wind running through the leaves are the voices of the monks in prayer.

You fall down on your knees. No, not to pray. But to pickup a white ball the size of a marble. Rabbit droppings. The place is abundant with them and for a minute you imagine what it would be like on a moonlit night, when the rabbits come out to play on the grass. How they would jump over the fallen trees, how they would race each other on the flat ground.

You find yourself totally alone with nature. Suddenly the air seems heavy with the spirits of Wordsworth and Keats. What it means to "commune with nature" becomes all too clear. So clear that the feeling is unbearable. You lean against a huge Cypress tree and doze off.

"Chirrup, chirrup, chirrup.... the sound is familiar. Surely you have heard that bird sing back at home too. Wondering if it's a blackbird you drag yourself back on to your feet. The sound continues, and now, suddenly there is a mechanical twist to it. Not the sudden outburst of a blackbird, it is your own mobile phone, summoning you back to the land of civilization. You retrace your steps to the entrance knowing that you'll be stopping there the next time and the time after that and the time after that.... till as long as the trees would stand and the rabbits play in the moonlight.

Hakgala Gardens! who would have believed it but it provides a niche for everyone. The Japanese executive on vacation breathes in deeply the crisp fresh air as he walks admiring the flowers, a far cry from his cramped apartments in Tokyo Park no doubt. The lasses from Anuradhapura are thrilled with the roses, this one is as big as a bun, one is heard to comment. And it provides a quiet corner for the one who wishes solitude, one who wishes to rejoice in simply being close to nature.

It's good to be old fashioned

My darling daughter

A few days ago a friend of mine was quite aghast at the uncensored views of sexual exploits and aberrations that the media was highlighting. 'Just imagine,' she said 'those were things that would never have been spoken about openly. Even if such things happened then, and they must have - it was all hush-hush.'

Another of my friends who was present disagreed with her. 'It is better to be open about such things,' she said.

I wondered which of them was right? Whom would you agree with daughter? I like to think that you will agree with me to that extent that some things are not meant to be broadcast to all and sundry. What a person does in the privacy of his home should not be a matter to be displayed for the consumption of the general public.

A term that comes to my mind is the phrase 'a sense of shame.' I think that this 'sense' would effectively cover those situations which today are so blatantly discussed even in front of the young, admitted and accepted. It is in a sense this sense of shame that helps us to preserve our own dignity for instance, no-one would think of parading the streets naked, and yet some appear to take immense pride in parading naked their lack of morals and their experience of sexual relationships outside the norm.

Many years ago the young were protected from such disclosures, a sense of shame prevented adults discussing such matters even if they did exist in the presence of their children.

Today by our attitudes we tend to make the young feel that permissiveness is an another way of behaviour. I guess this is due to the fact that with the influence especially of western electronic media our eastern reticence is being eroded. By doing so we have let the world intrude into our privacy and belittle our concepts of right and wrong. It is sometimes better to be a little old fashioned.

I wish daughter, that you will cherish those old fashioned notions that deemed that certain speech and modes of behaviour were too shameful to discuss or display in public. The phrase, a sense of shame will pave a path, which will be free from the dirt of a lax morality.

Ammi

The kind leading the blind

Everyone knows a man's best friend is a dog — and a blind dog's best friend is.... a seeing-eye dog!

Ben, a homeless little mutt blinded when sadistic thugs cruelly stabbed him in the eyes, was befriended by his very own four-legged guide named Bill.

The pair of half-starved strays became inseparable after Ben was blinded — and Bill started acting as the bigger dog's eyes to protect him from danger in the streets.

After the story of the inseparable canines ran in a British newspaper, an incredible 5,000 animal lovers called the dog pound which rescued the outcasts to offer them a home.

And now the heart-wrenching tale has a happy ending: The English Jack Russell terriers have been adopted by a wealthy couple who've given them the run of their historic mansion — and are spoiling them with love.

"I suppose you could say they've landed on their paws!" laughed Lady Yvonne Becher, who already had one Jack Russell named Rosie.

"I wanted company for Rosie because she was lonely. She loves having them around."

Pound owner Eunice Barbier explained, "We had to find them a home as a pair because Ben is lost without Bill around."

Eunice was moved by Bill's devotion to his blind pal. Ben followed him everywhere — gently holding on to Bill's neck with his teeth as they ventured about.

"My heart just went out to them when I heard what happened," added Lady Becher, who lives with her husband in a four-storey mansion in Brighton, England.

"They're settling in nicely. I think I'm the lucky one — not them — to be chosen from 5,000 other people to look after them."

More Mirror Magazine  *  Paris fashions  *  Dark circles under the eyes  *  Bawa's building reborn

Return to Mirror Magazine Contents