16th November 1997

The Rag

This short story from Sita Kulatunga's anthology 'The High Chair and Cancer Days', was shortlisted for the Gratiaen Award in '96.

Waves of pain were first moments of awareness. Emerging from deep a drugged sleep he shivered. Dreams had been disconnected and incoherent. The last was of a chintz cloth, bought for his mother. Did it come from something he had read, because mother did not wear chintz cloth? And he had never bought anything for his mother or father. The drip, drip of the saline, the upturned bottle, the fluid flowing through the plastic tube came into focus merging into one blotched whole a weird kind of composition. He, Manjula Priyankara the undergraduate, did not want to open his eyes. The eyelids were heavy and sticky as if glued down. Nor could Manjula Priyankara open his legs. He tried to think of himself as if he were another, like a journalist reporting.

No, he couldn't do that because he couldn't bring his legs together. The penis and the testicles were a ball of pain as if a whole pool of pain were frozen into one concentrated point.

'Amme, deyyane', he muttered to himself and shivered, reliving the moment they walked in. Would his mother ever know that such things happened? Would she ever comprehend that people could do this to other people - who in no way had wronged them? This was not the stuff in her book surely. He knew this would be beyond his mother's and father's comprehension.

When elder sister had her son, at the time he was waiting to enter University, he recalled how his mother bit a few grains of pepper and blew that breath over the infant's penis. He had laughed, watching, and told his mother, "be careful, it will smart if the pepper really touches it." His mother was offended, "do you think I'll be so careless? Haven't I done this to you?" Feeling shy he kept quiet, without arguing. He had not known why they did it - the blowing. He didn't think his mother knew either. She had said it was to keep away the cold. He had sat on the floor near the basin of soapy water in which his infant nephew had been bathed. His mother while powdering the grandson had said, 'this one also will learn well, like the uncle' and continued hopefully 'will go to University I am sure'.

Mother had still been gloating over his excellent results, the three As and the B. The baby's penis was small and tender. "Never, never will I let him step into that hell - damn it," he thought.

The hate came through as if it ignited there at the bottom of his pain. He didn't know how the Bodhisatva resisted hate and anger while they cut his limbs. In the helpless torture of his hatred his limbs trembled and the body broke out in a sweat and for a moment the pain and its intensity was taken over by the hatred. The saline bottle and the whole of its contraption shivered and to stop it he clenched his fists, nails digging into his palms.

"I'll get them, the sons of whores, bastards, whore begotten - dogs," he groped for obscenities he had never used - his legs trembled and to absorb the tremors he stiffened his body and clenched his teeth. A passing nurse seeing his condition stopped beside him, "why, why, now our drip also will come off, try to sleep," she said soothingly as if he were a baby. Under her breath she muttered, "animals" and he still thinking of obscenities which never in his life he had voiced, suppressed them all. He was glad that the nurse had correctly surmised the cause and the source of his agitation. But it occurred to him that animals never did such things and that it was unfair by animals to call them so. 'Sleep', she had also said but sleep brought shattered dreams, nightmare dreams. The As were in Sinhala, History and Buddhist Civilization. He wanted to study Archaeology. There was so much to do, he had hopefully thought at one time.

Manjula hated the waking up. If he could sleep, just sleep it all away - sleep dreamlessly to eternity. He had had enough. He had dreaded it all along, all the while as he struggled through his English - wanting to read those big books that lined the library shelves. He hadn't had time even to look at the library. Earlier he had heard that it was the Colombo and other town school chaps who got the worst of it. But then he was no Colombo school product, nor were the torturers, just before he collapsed he had a glimpse of the face of a guy who had entered the previous year from the Maha Vidyalaya of the next village.

The sour taste in his mouth made him remember what they did. The shame of the things they made him do. From where did they learn those things?

Learning English the hard way, all by himself, he had read whatever he could lay his hands on. Now he remembered how he looked up the words 'rag' and 'sadism' both in a dictionary at a library in his home town. Bile rose to his mouth and he wanted to vomit. Never, never in his wildest imagination had he thought all this possible.

The Malalasekera English-Sinhala dictionary he had referred had given the meaning of 'rag' vt, as 'baninawa' and 'samachchal karanawa'. If the author had lived to see what would he have said? That probably would be the only meanings his parents would know. When he refused they brought the candle and lit it. But he never thought they would use it on him. 'Will I ever go back?' He thought and his agitation attracted attention. It was almost visiting time and he wished he could die.

Yala The red crabs of christmas island

Yala

Yala National Park is the second largest and most popular Wildlife Reserve in this country. The Park is divided into areas and visitors are allowed only into one section. Inside Yala one can see many species of animals - mammals, birds and reptiles.

The largest of these, is of course, the elephant. Elephants roam around in herds or as single animals. Some herds have baby elephants and they love to bathe in water holes in the evening. Deer is found aplenty. They are quite shy and will run away when a vehicle comes close. Sambhur is larger than deer and more majestic. The male sambhur have large antlers. Peacocks pose for visitors on rocks and trees.

Waterholes are interesting places to stop a vehicle and observe wildlife. Wildboar can be seen feeding on grass in the muddy shores. Wild Buffalo wallow in the mud sometimes only their noses out of the water. Many birds feed near water. Herons, storks, wild ducks and if you are lucky you could see a spoonbill or jungle fowl. Watch out for well disguised crocodiles. They sunbathe on the shore. Monkeys dance atop branches and jackal could be seen sometimes scavenging for food.

The park also has leopard and bear. But these creatures are difficult to spot. At times you could even come across a large python coiled on a tree or on a rock. At a place called Patanangala the road leads to the beach. It is a beautiful place with a large rock jutting out of the shore. A lone elephant haunts the beach some evenings.

Visitors to the Park must be accompanied by a tracker, who will explain all about the animals. Visitors must not get out from vehicles. This rule is strictly adhered to for the safety of visitors as well as preserving the Park and its animals. Visitors must make sure that they do not litter the Park with even something as small as a toffee wrapper or pluck fruits, flowers or branches. Even fallen peacock feathers have to remain inside the Park.

The red crabs of christmas island

Once a year millions of tiny creatures make a treacherous two-week journey from the tropical rainforest to the Indian Ocean

From a distance it looks like the tropical rainforest is dotted with scarlet flowers or as if the seashore rocks have been covered in layers of glowing lava. But look more closely and the flowers begin to come to life, the lava slowly disperses and melts into the sea - because this mass of brilliant red is actually almost 100 million tiny crabs making their epic annual migration from the forests to the sea to reproduce.

Found on the remote Christmas Island in the Indian Ocean the crabs leave their subterranean homes in the forest's dry earth after the first rains and make their perilous two week journey across roads and fields to reach the ocean. Once there they descend to the beach covering the sand in a sea of red and bathe their weary claws in the water before mating.

The males then return to the forest alone until next year's migration while the females remain on the beach for ten days until they have laid their eggs - up to 100,000 each which hatch on contact with the water. Leaving their offspring behind, the females follows the males and 25 days later those baby crabs that have survived the predators also leave the beach to join their families in the rainforest.

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