It can’t be adios, my old friend NALIN VITHARANA Nalin Vitharana will not fall into the class of the ‘Greats’ going by today’s social standards. He was of another class. He possessed that rare quality: humaneness. In my association with him since the early sixties, I had not heard anyone speak ill of him nor [...]

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It can’t be adios, my old friend

NALIN VITHARANA

Nalin Vitharana will not fall into the class of the ‘Greats’ going by today’s social standards. He was of another class. He possessed that rare quality: humaneness.
In my association with him since the early sixties, I had not heard anyone speak ill of him nor did he speak ill of anyone. Nalin simply guffawed when those around him took hard objective views on controversial issues. He appeared not to take events happening around him seriously but with a sense of humour or cynically.

My first encounter with him was around 1960 while I was by the gates of my dear classmate Shanti de Zoysa at Siripa Road when I saw a Billy Bunter like character pedalling towards us on a Sunday afternoon on a bicycle that had seen better days. He was in shorts and shirt with a towel around his neck and spectacles perched on the tip of his nose. He did not seem to have spotted his neighbour until he got quite close. ‘Hello, hello,’ he bellowed as he jumped off his cycle and started talking to my friend non-stop about a party, seemingly unaware of my presence. My friend halted him and did the introduction. Undeterred he rattled on and suddenly said: ‘Mummy must be awaiting my return’, added a perfunctory ‘glad to have met you’ to me and disappeared into his house.

My description of our first encounter was typical of how Nalin buzzed along through life.

He was from Trinity and Ananda, a curious mix those days but he had imbibed the traditions of both institutions while maintaining his individuality.

Shanti, his brother Nimal, Nalin and I together with a few friends formed a group that met regularly, at Beer and Baila parties at Chinese cafes or at parties of rugby clubs after their big matches awash with beer and dancing. To my utter surprise I found out that our rotund Billy Bunter was as nimble as a ballerina on his feet and could even tap dance like the famed tap dancer of that time, Fred Astaire.

An amazing feature about my friend was his total disinterest in politics although his family  was steeped in it. His uncle (mother’s brother) was the legendary Trotskyite leader Dr. N.M. Perera But he never did talk about them or on any political subject. Politics, he said, bored him.

He graduated from his bicycle to a brand new Honda and whizzed about town meeting his  friends – girls and boys – but giving no indication about what he wanted to be in life.

Out of the blues, one day, while we were sipping beer, he announced that he would be marrying soon.

He married Sonia Edirisinghe and was gone like a whirlwind to London leaving a sudden void in the day- to-day life of his friends.

The hospitality of Sonia and Nalin at their home in Bickley, London to visitors from Lanka  was overwhelming. He liked working, living and bringing up his son and daughter in London but kept saying that when he ‘wanted to put his feet up’ it would be in Sri Lanka.

True enough, after his children completed their education and settled down, he came back home with Sonia. He joined the club which his close friends were members of. And back again after decades it was just like old times.

But every good action at times resulting in an opposite reaction, is a phenomenon of nature.

The wives of these jolly old men were furious for making them ‘Club Widows’.

It’s well past a year after his departure that I am writing his obituary.

Was it the procrastination resulting from diabetes, the cause? Or is it that writing an obituary is the final way to say: Adios, my friend.

No, it can’t be ‘ Adios’. I keep hearing the echoes of his stentorian guffaws far down the decades.

 -Gamini Weerakoon


Forever near

NADEEPA DHARMASIRI

In nostalgic thought, I cast my quill’s embrace,
To pen an ode for a sunbeam, that briefly shone.
Whose spirit got freed from life’s confining space,
Venturing into realms, reigned by God’s throne.

Amid veils of mist, I recall your radiant face,
A beacon in the dark, a cherished healing sight,
In whispered echoes, your laughter finds its place,
Guiding souls to joy, like the lodestar light.

Seven swift years have passed, you departed since,
Unyielding hands shuffled you off this mortal coil!
Leaving a tapestry of moments, rich and intense,
A steadfast flame that time can ne’er despoil.

Through these words, may my heart with no mend,
Convey the sorrow of a loss that words alone transcend.
For in this seventh year, as we gather here,
To honour our Nadeepa, forever near.

Ravindu Fonseka


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