With rivulets of sweat pouring down her face, attractive Samanthi Irundika Padidiliyan is hard at work in her shop close to the Ragama junction.
It is not employment of the usual kind that this 28-year-old is engaged in.
Mal ketayam, along with her husband, has become her passion, assuring all those who buy her products, of one-of-a-kind creations which will never be duplicated.
It was by chance, about five years ago, that she got into this type of work, after her husband Ranga Ravindra began the mal lelli business.
Samanthi, coaxed by Ranga tried her hand at planing the castaway pieces of wood and then carving intricate flower designs “just as a hobby”.
Her eyes light up as she delves into detail how she has come up with the beautifully-carved mirror pieces. “We prepare the frame first,” explains Samanthi, adding with a twinkle in her eye that she and her husband have a “podi rahasa” (a little secret) when doing so.
Then, she hand-draws the design or ketayam, removing the excess wood from the block with the help of a machine. Thereafter, it is the niyana which she wields with skill, to get the ketayama to stand out, polish the wood with the grinder, spray it and finally fix the mirror.
 |
 |
| Samanthi at work and husband Ranga |
Godak illuma thiyenawa, smiles Samanthi, explaining that there is a big demand for the mirrors which have a grape vine, niyagala flower, a creeper or the sun around them.Custom-made pieces are her forte, where a buyer will get a unique work of art. “I don’t keep any blocks,” assures Samanthi, adding that the designs are individually drawn by hand, so no two pieces are alike.
Samanthi follows the angles and shape of the block of wood as it has been cut from the tree itself. Lelle hedathale thama, she says, explaining that the block is planed according to its own contours. That is why the mirror is uneven and the piece of work does not have perfect symmetry.
And how long does one piece take – if she dedicates her time fully, to the work at hand, it takes up to two days.
Life was a struggle and not on even keel when Ranga from Kirillawala brought home his new bride from Teldeniya in Kandy. He was working in a private company, and the young couple never imagined that they would one day start a business of their own, enabling them to put away in their bank book a tidy sum each month, while also employing eight others.
An accident left Ranga disabled for a while in 2002 and he did any job that came his way to keep the family afloat, working at a mal thawana (plant nursery) earning about Rs. 150 a day.
Humble were their beginnings and it was on their daily trek to a well to have their bath that the young couple spotted, by the wayside, a plant with a figure in it. This propelled them in the direction of ruk kalawa (tree art) with their skilful hands coaxing the form of a ballet dancer from that very first plant.
Soon the designs and the art within their very being took control, making them diversify into the ketayam kalawa. This is what they do now, works of love, sometimes deep into the night until they get the pieces they have visualized.
Samanthi toils over her pieces at her very own tiny workshop at Ragama and Ranga with the eight others at Imbulgoda.
Each and every piece being snapped up no sooner it is crafted, with orders flowing in vindicates any doubts Samanthi may have had of her ability.
Samanthi dreams of buying a small block of land and opening a shop-cum-workshop by the Colombo-Kandy Road, where both she and Ranga can work side-by-side, while her mother-in-law looks after their five-year-old son.
For her the time spent at the block of wood has become part of her life, not a stress or a chore – what makes her emotional, however, is when she has to part with a work of art. |
E-mail
