My Sri Lanka In Crisis
A recent holiday back to my (once) beautiful Sri Lanka proved to be a journey to hell. I wanted to cherish the dreams of my childhood in what was once the paradise on earth but had to return to my second home deeply disappointed and angry.
My childhood seems like tales from a fairyland. Sri Lanka has changed. Racism, violence and hate have become the norm in Sinha-le Sri Lanka. The Tamils have been crushed and humiliated after the brutal war victory and now it’s my community, the Muslims that are targeted. No one trusts each other in Sri Lanka anymore. Children no longer play cricket on the streets, TOGETHER. They are ethnically divided even in sports. 20 years seems like two centuries, to come back to a land that was once heaven on earth.
The much-hyped government of good governance that was elected in January 2015 with the promise of peace, tranquillity, and dignity to all Sri Lankans has become a pawn in the games played by some extremists. These include some saffron robed racist bigots who probably are on a paid mission to bring back the former President Mahinda Rajapaksa to power. A left over suicide bomber of Velupillai Prabhaharan may be needed to settle this threat once and for all for the 6.2 million voters.
Maithripala Sirisena, the current president could have stepped in where Mahinda Rajapaksa failed to be the bridge between communities after winning the protracted civil war, which liberated the Sinhalese, Tamils and Muslims. I see Maithripala playing the racist card and hoping to become popular. In my opinion, he is turning out to be the greatest racist of them all when he got Wijeyadasa Rajapakshe to elevate the sadist Galagoda Atte Gnanasara Thero to the same level as that of the Mahanayakes in meetings at the presidential secretariat. My guess is, he would soon outdo the Rajapaksa dynasty. What a sad end to the promised Yahapalanaya.
The once respected Mahanayake’s too have started prostituting in politics probably fearing a threat to their comfort zones. They too want this land for the Sinhalese. The saffron politics is becoming a tornedo. Ashin Wirathu, the face of Buddhist terror has already paid a visit. Aluthgama, where my aunt lost everything seems a precursor. The international Islamic Terrorists, like ISIS, Al Qaida, Taliban, Boko Haram etc.. will soon be at our doorstep at the invitation of some bloody extremist Muslims. The saffron brigade is opening the doors for them that could lead the country to another 50 years of armed conflict.
The Wattalapam loving neighbours I grew up with are no longer our friends. The school that I attended is as strange as it could be, because they would no longer take any from my Muslim community. The mosque that was part of my childhood does not welcome me any more because it has been taken over by a few fundamentalist ideologists, the females in my extended family I knew so well will not speak to me anymore, because they have been forced in to exile behind a black veil by their fanatical men. Religiosity or at least the outward appearance of it seems to be visible everywhere amongst my Muslim community. The mosques are fuller, but there seems to be no serenity, the women are well covered but seem to expose their nakedness in humanity, our children are segregated, most of them schooling in exclusive Muslim schools or the so called International schools set up by rich illiterate businessmen. The kids in these schools have no opportunity to be friends with kids of other ethnicities.
What has gone wrong with my beautiful country? I forgot my dream holiday and started talking to my once brothers and sisters from the different communities. I realized that quite a few of them do not believe that I belong to them anymore. My 20 years in greener pastures have deprived me of my country, culture and traditions. I started believing that I am an alien in my own country.
I started loafing around in the Malls of the new elite shopping centres that have sprung up during the last 20 years. Many of the window shoppers were Muslims, easily identified with their Islamic clothing covering their ever-emerging bulge. I was wondering whether I was in a mall in Dubai. I soon realized that the only entertainment these women have is window-shopping in their spare time? There was the conspicuous absence of the Mullah clothed Muslim men, but there were plenty of good-looking Muslim boys in designer clothes and flip-flops, flirting around with young women. I couldn’t figure out whether they were after the Muslim girls or not as their eyes were set on scantily dressed women. Most of them spoke English with a foreign accent convincing me that they were the kids of the nouveau riche Muslims who have attended international schools. They probably have left their traditional shop keeping and are ready to leap into the corporate world of entrepreneurship.
My Biryani and Watalappam loving Sinhala “uncle” next door is now a big racist. He sees us Muslims as Islamic fundamentalists or extremists and feels that the Arab world has financed us to colonize Sri Lanka. He thinks that my Muslim sisters are breeding children like rabbits and not registering their births even though his daughter and my sisters have only two kids each. He thinks my brother has multiple wives, as he has never seen my sister in law’s face. She even covers her eyes with a net veil, a real ninja for sure and my bloody brother can take any women along the streets in that attire. My neighbours do not have access to our house as they used to when my father was alive because of the fundamentalism of my brother. Their late night political discussions with strong cups of coffee would never come back to our generation. We have become distant and lost.
