‘Often it’s only me and the Morning Star’
Sunrise, Lipton’s Seat
If you’ve ever sat at your desk, gazed out of the window and yearned to take the road less travelled, Cecil Perera is a man after your own heart.
After some 31 years in banking, when retirement came at the age of 60, Perera found his true calling. At this point, he didn’t really know anything about photography.
He read books and scoured the Internet to learn what he could and soon found that he had an uncanny ‘eye’ for it. By then he was rediscovering another love which had been somewhat submerged in the busy momentum of working life –his love for places off the beaten track.
The latter stemmed from a childhood spent in Rakwana and Deniyaya. The thrill of scrambling up mountainous terrain and looking out on mist-shrouded hillsides never paled and he still maintains that Rakwana and Deniyaya are among the most beautiful parts of this country.
Not surprisingly when he gained a place at the University of Kelaniya, he chose to follow an honours degree in Geography and became somewhat of an expert in reading maps, a skill he now puts to good use.
Sharing a photo: Cecil Perera shows village schoolchildren how his Ipad works
After a brief spell teaching geography at the University, he joined the People’s Bank as a Manager and given a choice of postings picked Nuwara Eliya where he made frequent climbs up the mighty Pidurutalagala. But as his career progressed, he had to come to Colombo, and wound up his career as AGM of corporate credit.
His travels now are in search of the least explored parts of the country in search of nature, pristine and serene. Not for him the touristy places and well known sights. Schoolchildren he meets and talks to, and villagers, most often are his willing guides, eager to show him little known vantage spots and jungle paths barely trodden.
The pre-dawn hours are his favourite time, he says and seeking that elusive golden light he is ever game to trudge up a hill at 4 a.m. and brace himself against the slight chill with his camera and tripod until the first glimmer of dawn pierces the blanket of darkness.
‘Often it is only me and the Morning Star,” he says, confessing too to a deep fondness for mist. “I always look for mist-shrouded valleys – mist is something I want to capture in most of my photographs.”
These then are the photographs taken of mist and in absolute stillness that capture the country’s amazing diversity in all its breathtaking grace and grandeur.
Perera didn’t set out to compile a book but as his travels widened and the collection of photographs grew, it seemed a natural progression.
The Ella Gap pictured on the book cover
He has titled his book to be launched later this month ‘Sri Lanka- A Mystical Journey’ and it is indeed an ode to a precious communion with nature that he considers himself blessed to have experienced.
There are photographs capturing sights the length and breadth of Sri Lanka, the heights – like a spectacular sunrise at Lipton’s Seat and Riverstone, Matale, the lagoons of Jaffna and Kalametiya, the jungle fastness of Maduru Oya where he drove up and down a deserted stretch of road until he came upon a herd of elephants, the sanctity of Mihintale (he climbed an adjacent rock Eth Vehera to photograph it), a solitary Sal tree at Situlpawwa, a view of Adam’s Peak across a valley of mist from Bulutota…… all views awe-inspiring.
It is largely a lone effort, he makes his mostly 3-4 day trips on his own (with some food and drink stowed in his vehicle) and the choice of photographs too, his alone.
He has 77 in this handsome coffee-table book for which he did not rest till he found a publisher in Hong Kong who was able to ensure the quality colour reproduction of his images.
“Landscape photographers have only colours to show unlike wildlife photographers who have action,” he says. It is a book remarkably uncluttered -each image spread across the page accompanied by a single quote – in the case of a golden sunrise over the Knuckles range – Diane Arbus’ words’ My favourite thing is to go where I have never been.”
Sunrise on a misty morning, Minneriya, Polonnaruwa
Cecil Perera’s hope is that his photographs will prompt his countrymen to see their land with new eyes. It is significant that while most of the pictures are of hills and valleys far from the cities, there are too scenes not far away- the morning mist over the Bolgoda Lake and sunrise over a paddy field in Piliyandala.
His family, he says, have been supportive of his travels, and his son has gifted him many lenses for his Canon 5D mk 11 enabling him to indulge this passion that has made retirement so fulfilling.
For this soft-spoken man a quote from Thomas Jefferson that he has used in the book could perhaps sum up his thinking: “It is neither wealth nor splendor: but tranquility and occupation that give you happiness”.
Cecil Perera’s book will be launched on March 15 at the BMICH. It is presently available at the pre-publication price of Rs. 4,900 and thereafter at Rs. 6,000 at leading bookshops.
To pre-order, see his website www.srilankamj.com and also Facebook ://www.facebook.com/slmysticaljourney/
Uda Walawe reservoir, Sabaragamuwa Province