Appreciations
View(s):I wonder whether this tribute will make his grade?
Dr. Ananda Soysa
When he passed a year ago, I never thought of writng about him. My mother asked why I didn’t. With echoes of his voice ringing in my head “A pair of scissors like a pair of knickers” and “May I, not can I”, would I make his grade?
He was more Brit than the English. I remember a tuition master teaching him Sinhala. He taught himself essentials to make Tamil patients comfortable, and winced when we murdered the Queen’s lingo. Meal times doubled as exposure to Churchill quotes as he ate his stringhoppers and hoppers with fork and knife, and rice balanced expertly on the back of the fork. He vowed to disown us for using our fingers to eat.
Five older siblings spoilt him rotten. The age gaps were so large his eldest brother-in-law presented a tricycle to him. Cloistered at home and starting school late, he was atrociously naughty. Sent to the Rector’s office and made to kneel for a series of misdemeanours, he refused, stating that as a Buddhist it went against his principles to do so in a Catholic school. Father Nicholas is said to have dismissed him saying, “Brains are there. Use them,” and the mischief stopped.
Then, he married a Christian. His late schooling aligned his stars to be in the batch of a younger lady. The stars conspired again, and she became his ‘body partner’ in dissecting class at the Colombo Medical Faculty and they ended up as inseparable soul mates for 75 years. He humorously disputed this saying he asked for her anatomy notes but his ECG-like handwriting was misread and she replied, “Yes, I’ll marry you”. His brief time as a Christian saw him take the stage as Pontius Pilate. Thereafter, whenever he disagreed with my mother’s decisions on us, he promptly re-enacted the scene, “I wash my hands off this…”
My father went on to welcome sons-in-law of different faiths. The first was my husband, the Hindu. He was asked to come home in case there were scandalous rendezvous afoot, but, ignored when he arrived. Sharp at 9 p.m. my father jingled the keys indicating his time was up. When Ranjan was in a head-on collision after a Royal-Thomian and ended up in Emergency with severe injuries my father rushed carrying clothes and coffee. The next morning he raced him to the best plastic surgeon to undo the hasty sutures and embraced the son he never had. Imran the Muslim followed Ranil the atheist.
Tired of calling out ‘Dharini, Chandini, Keshini, Thilina’ he re-baptised us D, C, K and T. Except for T the names stuck. I’ve been called Cee, Cei, Zee and multiple mutations with only a handful aware of my name. Which leads me to my tattoo, ‘c’. When I casually mentioned my intent over lunch my mother let out a tiny hysterical laugh while my father not looking up from his fork and knife operation disclosed in a politically challenging whisper, “Tattoos are for the IRC and prostitutes”.
He read. Biographies of Bertrand Russell, submarine warfare and Winston Churchill fused easily with detective stories. He spawned four bookworms and never skipped a Saturday trip to the bookstore with my daughter as soon as she could read resulting in her room looking more like a library with a bed squeezed in.
He was a foodie.
His mother escaped his expectations by serving every curry in several dishes feigning a feast. He enjoyed cooking his signature dishes gazpacho, prawn cocktail and beetroot soup. He relished firing pot nit and curing ham for Christmas and scouring ingredients for my mother’s cordon bleu dishes. 5 a.m. at the St John’s fish market in his fishing clothes and galoshes for the freshest seafood. Young king coconut with the soft kernel inside and the bottom shaved for balance to serve a fragrant mulligatawny soup. Carving turkey and ham with surgical precision, firing Christmas pudding were executed annually with increasing drama. We surrounded him as his theatre staff did and dispensed as he called out, “Knife. Fork. White meat dish. Brandy”. Together my parents entertained magnificently.
We shrivelled from his smelly cheeses, Stilton, Dana Blue and Camembert, but now are guilty of sharing this love. Paradoxically, he had a weakness for canned food, a throwback from the World War II days and crammed the larder with pink salmon, anchovies, corned mutton or some such. Sunday lunch was incomplete without a tin being ceremoniously opened. It was inevitable we renamed this day ‘Tinday’.
Food followed him everywhere; to theatre staff rooms, nursing homes, banks and the hairdresser, delighting them with delicacies. In later years he sniffed out friendly chefs in town for roasts, jacket potatoes, Yorkshire pudding or chicken pies, proudly brought to our home to dinner.
His dedication to surgery escaped the hospital and crept home. Dim lighting was out of the question; it had to be as close to 160,000 lux that domestic lighting allowed. Cutlery re-rewashed to be free of germs. No movie theatre on on-call nights. Piercings were taboo as infected cartilage shrivels and we’d be earless and tip-of-the-nose less.
Studying with the Royal Surgeon General in London, doctor to the queen and royal family he was told, “Treat the royals and leaders the same as the rest, no more, no less.” He attended to Governor Generals, Presidents, Prime Ministers, ministers and celebrities. Doing his preliminary accounts for pocket money before handing them to the taxman I noticed large numbers of FOC receipts. They were clergy from all faiths, folk with long waits at the State hospitals, anyone with a terminal illness however wealthy, doctors, men or women from the forces, neighbours, domestic aides and everyone’s friends and relations and later civilian bomb victims.
Nattily dressed in shirts of flamboyant colours horrifying us daughters, suit, suspenders, and golf cap on weekends, his trademark bowtie earned him the name ‘bowgatta’ by medical students. He scorned clip-ons, and made sure he tied his slightly asymmetrically so no one mistook it. On his passing, I delivered his clothes to the undertaker along with a red bowtie. When summoned to check before release to the parlour, there was my father surrounded by four perplexed men and the bowtie. No one knew the knot. My father’s chauffeur trained in the latter days failed. So did my husband. My daughter googled a YouTube tutorial, rested her mobile on his pinstriped suit and succeeded. I just tweaked an edge to ensure it was a tad crooked. He must’ve had a hearty laugh.
C (Chandini) Rajaratnam
He left behind a legacy that will be remembered by Josephians
Rev. Fr. Stanley Abeysekera
My mind is full of thoughts and ideas as I write this appreciation about my elder brother Fr. Stanley Abeysekera. five years after his departure from this world.
It is so strange how we gradually forget the memories of remarkable people after they leave this world. If we consider my brother’s life, it was very eventful, fruitful and successful in both his tutorial and spiritual missions.
I now begin to realize as to why my brother announced his wish to become a priest as early as 14 years knowing quite well that he was the eldest son in a family of seven children. It is said that God should be given the best fruit from the family. Accordingly, my parents agreed. I being the second son was more or less forced to take over the responsibility of steering the family.
He was Rector at St. John Bosco’s College, Kaluaggala, Hanwella, St. Thomas College, Kotte, St. Joseph’s College, Colombo (for 13 prosperous years), and finally at St. Joseph’s College, Enderamulla in the formation of the new Branch school.
He was parish priest at St. Thomas Church, Kotte, Spiritual Director at St. Joseph’s College, Colombo, did parish work at Luciana, USA, and was parish priest at St. Joseph’s Church, Nugegoda and St. Anthony’s Church, Kollupitiya for seven years.
In an appreciation after his death it was written ‘…. The charity he extended to those in need went unknown to others. His compassion and help were targeted to deserving and helpless individuals among his relations, friends and particularly minor employees around him…..’
He was an excellent mentor in Mathematics, which his past students always talk about. He was also a strict disciplinarian. What really mattered to him was the all round education of the child more than results of the public exams. Extracurricular activities including sports were treated on par with studies.
An old Joe, Suranjith De Silva who was closely associated with him wrote: ‘….. Little did we realize that this was the man who would go on to be one of the greatest builders of both buildings and men – that St. Joseph’s College had ever produced….’
“For Fr. Stanley St.Joseph’s College was his home on earth. What Fr. Stanley did and what he was to St. Joseph’s College has already been written in the College’s history in letters of gold….’
A past Josephian Assistant Head Prefect, Avishka Mario Senewiratne wrote about his brainchild the fabulous Sports Complex as follows. ‘…..The great idea of building a Sports Complex was conceived when Fr. Rector visited his brother Dr. John Damascene Abeysekera at the University of Luleå in Sweden.The main foundation stone of the complex was laid by His Grace the Archbishop Nicholas Marcus Fernando in March 1993. Fundraising for the multi-million rupee Sports Complex was not an easy task. Fr. Abeysekera himself compiled about 2500 letters for old boys overseas. The donations received were extremely high…’.
‘….. The Sports Complex was ceremoniously opened on the Centenary celebrations in 1996 under the presence of Archbishop Nicholas Marcus Fernando, Bishops, Priests and thousands of past and present students.’
Realising the tremendous values and advantages of this fabulous construction which brings in rich dividends to the College Fr. Sylvester during the period of his Rectorship, named it the “Stanley Abeysekera Sports Complex.”
This great venture is the legacy left by Fr. Stanley Abeysekera which will remain in the minds of all Josephians, priests, friends and educationists for many more years to come.
Fr. Stanley’s final assignment was to prepare a book covering the history of St.Joseph’s College which he completed with the able assistance of a young past Josephian.
A catastrophic problem that affected this great priest was a vision impediment from a very rare eye disease called Retinitis Pigmentosa which can end up in total blindness. Persistent prayers and his great faith prevented the symptoms appearing early in life.
He bid farewell to this world at the ripe age of 80 years. God loves you Father Stanley and so do we! May you rest in peace!
John Damascene Abeysekera
Buddhist scholar and erudite exponent of the Mahavamsa
Wijesiri Wettimuny
With the passing away of Wijesiri Wettimuny, Sri Lanka has lost a historian, writer, teacher and humanitarian. More than all that he was an erudite exponent of the Mahavamsa – the political, cultural and religious history of Sri Lanka, a work unparalleled in the world. Originally written in Pali, it had been translated to Sinhala by some scholarly monks, but it was very difficult for the average reader to understand it. Mr. Wettimuny wanted to render the Mahavamsa into simple Sinhala. He did it. I still remember how he was working with Mahavamsa Aṭṭhakathā, Samantapāsādikā, Mahavamsa Tika.
His ‘Sarala Sinhala Mahavamsaya’ was an authentic work. People read it, understood it and praised it. But I wonder whether it got the credit it deserved from the literati and State.
Mahavamsa is not the work of a single writer. Its first part was written by Rev. Mahanama Thera, the latter part by Tibbotuwawe Sri Siddhartha Buddharakhita Thera. It was continued up to 1948 by Yagirala Pannananda Maha Thera and up to the end of the Mahinda Rajapaksa regime by Mr. Wettimuny.
The last time we chatted on the phone, perhaps two days before his passing away, he told me that he wanted to bring his book ‘Sarala Sinhala Mahavamsaya’ up to the Gotabaya Rajapaksa regime.
He was also writing about classical Sinhala literature. He even wrote about modern Sinhala poetry ‘Sinhala Kavi Sangara’ titled, ‘Deshayata Jeewaya Dun Panas Weni Dashakaye Kavi Sangara’.
Mr. Wettimuny was a devout and practising Buddhist. His humanity and selfless services all had the hallmarks of the Buddhist way of life. In his leisure, he read the Thripitaka. Reading Buddhist canons was part of his daily routine. He was so conversant with the Pali Thripitaka that he wrote the stupendous book ‘Samma Sambudun Samaga Sanvada’- dialogues of the Buddha. Only he could do this for it needs such close familiarity with the Thripitaka. This is the ideal book for anyone who desires to learn Buddhist philosophy through the very words of the Buddha.
His last publication “Budun Wadala Thama Pasupasa Ena Karma Vipaka” is no doubt one of the best Buddhist books ever written on universal law of cause and effect.
My life-long best friend is no more. Our friendship continued for over 60 years. We both taught in a remote Maha Vidyalaya in Walallawita where we, teachers and some government officers had rented a house and would get up early and prepare the bed tea. Some of us collected dry sticks and lit the stove. While the water was boiling, we would sing an old favourite song. ‘Sudupiruwataandala…’
Those wonderful memories will be etched in my mind till my last breath!
G.A. Mathupema