Bearing 'pirikara' (gifts to monks), at a Buddhist temple, Avissawella, Sri Lanka.

On a full moon (Poya) day, devotees are seen carrying gifts for the monks in the Buddhist temple, at Manickawaththe in Avissawella. This was around 6pm on 5/8/2009.

An arch bridge built of granite stones, Rathnapura, Sri Lanka

Bridges built of stones were an innovation, pre-dating the Roman times. The arch with the 'key-stone', supported the load over a waterway. When railways with their heavy steam engines appeared in the latter part of the nineteenth century, cheaper alternatives to the stone bridges had to be found. It was the French engineer Eiffel, who pioneered the building of railway bridges with steel girders. In Sri Lanka we have quite a few old stone bridges with arches, built by the British. The above is one of them seen in the Rathnapura district.

A waterfall in the Sabaragamuwa, Sri Lanka.

'Doovili Ella' on the Kaltota road from Balangoda.

'Rattan weaving couple, Avissawella, Sri Lanka.

A husband wife team in their late 50s, came to the gate of my house and inquired, if there were rattan chairs to be weaved. The bottom part of the chair would take about 2 hours to weave and cost me Rs.1000/-. The man did weaving in the 1950s, later he took up to textile sale in ‘polas’ – weely village markets. After the JVP troubles in the 1980s, he had to give up the sale of textiles. He went back to rattan weaving. They have a son who became a Buddhist priest. This was the result of an earlier birth’s ‘vasana’ the father said. The son wanted to be a Buddhist priest from a young age and has now made quite a bit of spiritual progress, according to the father. In the 1950s the weavers used to go to the Kalatuwewa jungles, to cut ‘rattan’ trees, more than 100years old. They would then bring the bundles of rattan to a shop near the Boralugoda entrance. At the rattan shop there, the vines were split, teased and polished using various implements. The strands were soaked in water laced with turmeric and then boiled. The strands were dried and later used in weaving. Nowadays they use plastic strands of various grades. Genuine rattan strands are now imported from Malaysia via Singapore, by Don Carolis. The price of plastic strands are Rs.1200/- a roll. The price of imported rattan is Rs.2500/-. The natural one lasts for 40 years. The best plastic one lasts only for 20 years. I took this photo in late August 2009.

Materials for packing of an older era, Sri Lanka.

Fresh vegetables were wrapped inside the base of the leaf of an arecanut palm, to retain their freshness in days gone by. Old newspapers were also used extensively. This method was bio-degradable and eco-friendly. I had some vegetables wrapped for me by a villager from Kosgama, Sri Lanka.