Serendib - August 2013

I dette nummeret

Kandy Esala Perahera parades the streets of the Hill Capital to coincide with the seventh/eighth full moon poya day (monthly Buddhist religious day) of the year.
With its unique buildings and beautiful campus, the University of Peradeniya provides visitors with a quiet retreat from the main road and a valuable insight into one of Sri Lanka’s leading academic centres.
Paddy cultivation forms the heart of Sri Lankan culture. Across Asia, rice is the giver of life. Ever since a group of hungry hunter-gatherers discovered the first grains of paddy stuck on the coat of an animal scampering out of a flooded plain in ancient China, rice has been a sought after staple for survival. While this Chinese tale of origins may be the stuff of fantasy, paddy cultivation is an important reality of the world’s agricultural traditions. There is evidence of domesticised wet-bed paddy cultivation in China dating back to 7000 BC.
Lionel Wendt, the ’43 group and 20th Century visual culture in Sri Lanka