when memories flood back
The other day I was at the home of an old friend – someone I have known from our teenage years – and we decided to listen to some of the old 45 rpm records that he has in his collection.
In these days of digital sound and downloadable music, it might surprise today’s readers to know that there are still a few folk around who preserve and listen to music on vinyl records. My friend informed me that not only are vinyl records collectors’ items these days, but Long-Playing vinyl records (the larger 33 rpm LPs) are still being made – with several million LPs produced and sold annually.
Of course, my friend’s records (the smaller variety, known as EPs for ‘Extended Play’ or simply as 45s) are items that he has carefully preserved all these years. Listening to the old songs of the seventies took me back to those good old days when, as I often say, we were not so old and probably not so good!
The song that triggered off a host of memories was one made famous by a group called Gerry and the Pacemakers from Liverpool, titled ‘Ferry Cross the Mersey’. It was a tribute to their home city and the river Mersey that flowed past the Liverpool docks to enter the Irish Sea. The song refers to taking the ferry boat across the River Mersey, and has the lines
‘Cause this land’s the place I love And here I’ll stay”.
It could well have been written for those of us who live in this country – who despite all the trials and tribulations we have had during our lifetimes, still call Sri Lanka home.
This mention of the Mersey ferry took my mind back to the time that I, with a couple of my friends, did a hitch-hiking trip around our island. We left Colombo and walked south along Galle Road until we were able to flag a lift. In those days, drivers would stop and offer someone thumbing a lift a ride as far as they were going. Wherever our kind benefactor dropped us off, we would shoulder our packs and continue walking – until we could hitch another ride.
Our trip took us through Galle, Tangalle, Monaragala, Pottuvil, Batticaloa, Trincomalee and Kurunegala before we returned home. At each of these places we had kind friends and relatives who would give us a bed or a mat for the night. It was an experience that taught us much and gave us much pleasure.
And these are the memories and reminiscences that were triggered by my listening to ‘Ferry Cross the Mersey’ took me.
One of the things that really fascinated me during our trip were the ferries that crossed the many lagoons and estuaries in the Eastern Province.
The traditional ferry in those days was basically a sturdy wooden platform fixed on to two large metal canoes that resembled giant orus. Iron railings on either side of the platform prevented passengers from falling over into the water. At the front and back of the ferry platform were hinged ramps that allowed vehicles to get on and off.
The ferry was powered by the muscles of the sturdy ferryman who would use his pole to push it from one bank to the other. These men were essentially government employees who were provided with quarters (really a simple hut) near the ferry beach head so they were ready to take the ferry across whenever there was a load of passengers. If someone on the opposite shore needed to cross, they would alert the ferryman with a loud ‘Hoo!” and he would pole the ferry across to pick them up and bring them across.
A significant feature of these ferry crossings was that they were absolutely free – a public service provided by the government to its citizens. The ferry man was paid a salary by the government and so was not entitled to undertake private practice!
Since the time that we undertook our trip in the Eastern Province, bridges and highways have been built – and with the rumble of traffic on concrete bridges the ferryman and his craft have gone the way of the dinosaurs.
But these crossings on the ancient ferries still live on in my memory. I cannot put it better than Tissa Devendra who so eloquently described it in his book of Memories, Chronicles and Essays:
‘Reverie carries me back to being on a ferry in the falling dusk, the silence broken by the quiet splash of the ferryman’s oar, the plop of a fish in the water and the haunting cry of a kirala winging across the darkening sky as the stars begin to glimmer.’
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