The First Ever Temple of the Tooth Relic in Sri Lanka

Some little-known historical facts about the first ever "Temple of the Tooth Relic" of the Gautam Buddha in Sri Lanka.

In the fourth century CE, King Guhasiva of Kalinga in India possessed a precious relic, a Buddha's tooth.

For hundreds of years, the tooth was thought to confer a divine right to govern whoever owned it, causing political unrest.

Fearing that the object of his Buddhist worship might be removed from him violently, the King discreetly sent the tooth away with Princess Hemamali and her spouse, Prince Danthakumara.

Legend has it that they travelled to Sri Lanka disguised and with the tooth hidden in Princess Hemamali's hair.

Some accounts place their arrival in Sri Lanka at Trincomalee, while others place it at Welitota or present-day Balapitiya.

Pali Dalada Vansaya, or the Chronicle of the Tooth Relic, records the legend that they landed in Balapitiya, at the mouth of the Maduganga estuary.

According to legend, the pair hid the tooth in a sand shelter at Kothduwa while staying there before handing it to King Sirimeghavanna, the king of Sri Lanka at the time.

Deva Pathiraja, a minister to King Parakramabahu IV, who reigned in the 14th century, rediscovered Kothduwa several centuries later after it had gotten disconnected from the mainland and overgrown with vegetation.

The Minister planted one of the 32 sacred buds of Jaya Sri Maha Bodhi on the island.

During the turbulent 16th century, when the Sitawaka and Kotte kingdoms vied for power and the Portuguese threatened the shores of Sri Lanka, it is said that the tooth relic was kept by the hot-headed prince Veediya Bandara, who returned it to Kothduwa for safekeeping.

The island and the Dethis Maha Bodhi erected there fell into disuse once more until merchant "Samson Rajapakse" became interested in the area in the 1860s. He had the current temple constructed around the Bodhi tree.

ක්‍රිස්තු වර්ෂ හතරවන සියවසේදී ඉන්දියාවේ කාලිංග රාජ්‍යයේ සිටි ගුහසීව රජු සතුව බුදුන්ගේ දළදාවක් වූ වටිනා ධාතුවක් තිබී ඇත.

වසර සිය ගණනක් තිස්සේ දේශපාලන නොසන්සුන්තාව ඇති කරමින් එය අයිති කාට වුවද පාලනය කිරීමට දතට දිව්‍යමය අයිතියක් ලබා දෙන බව විශ්වාස කෙරිණි.

තම බෞද්ධ නමස්කාරයේ වස්තුව ප්‍රචණ්ඩකාරී ලෙස ඔහුගෙන් ඉවත් වේ යැයි බියෙන් රජු හේමමාලි කුමරිය සහ ඇගේ සහකරුවා වූ දන්තකුමාර කුමරු සමඟ දළදාව පිටත් කර හැරියේය.

හේමමාලි කුමරියගේ කොණ්ඩයේ දත සඟවාගෙන වෙස්වලාගෙන ඔවුන් ලංකාවට පැමිණි බව ජනප්‍රවාදයේ සඳහන් වේ.

සමහර ගිණුම් ඔවුන්ගේ ශ්‍රී ලංකාවට පැමිණීම ත්‍රිකුණාමලයේ ද, තවත් සමහරු එය වැලිතොට හෝ වර්තමාන බලපිටියේ ද සටහන් කරති.

පාලි දළදා වංශය නොහොත් දළදා වංශයේ ඔවුන් මාඩුගඟ මෝය කටින් බළපිටියට ගොඩ බැස්ස බවට ජනප්‍රවාදය සටහන් වේ.

පුරාවෘත්තයට අනුව, මෙම යුගලය එකල ශ්‍රී ලංකාවේ රජ වූ සිරිමේඝවණ්ණ රජුට භාර දීමට පෙර කොත්දූවෙහි රැඳී සිටියදී එහි වැලි මඩුවක සඟවා තැබූහ.

14 වැනි සියවසේ රජ කළ IV පරාක්‍රමබාහු රජුගේ අමාත්‍යවරයකු වූ දේව පතිරාජ, කොත්දූව ප්‍රධාන භූමියෙන් විසන්ධි වී වෘක්ෂලතාදියෙන් වැසී ගිය පසු සියවස් ගණනාවකට පසු එය නැවත සොයා ගන්නා ලදී.

අමාත්‍යවරයා විසින් ජය ශ්‍රී මහා බෝධීන් වහන්සේගේ පූජනීය අංකුර 32න් එකක් දිවයිනේ රෝපණය කළේය.

කැළඹිලි සහිත 16 වන සියවසේදී, සීතාවක සහ කෝට්ටේ රාජධානි බලය සඳහා තරඟ කළ විට සහ පෘතුගීසීන් ශ්‍රී ලංකාවේ වෙරළට තර්ජනයක් වූ විට, දළදා වහන්සේ  වීදිය බණ්ඩාර කුමාරයා විසින් තබා ඇති බවත්, එය කොත්දූවට ආපසු ලබා දුන් බවත් කියනු ලැබේ. .

1860 ගණන් වලදී "සැම්සන් රාජපක්ෂ" වෙළෙන්දා මෙම ප්‍රදේශය ගැන උනන්දු වන තෙක් දිවයින සහ එහි ඉදිකරන ලද දෙතිස් මහා බෝධිය නැවත වරක් භාවිතයෙන් ඉවත් විය.

ඔහු බෝධිය වටා වත්මන් විහාරය ඉදිකරන ලදී.

My Podcast

How Did He Read the Future So Well?

One of my father’s younger brothers was in the Sri Lanka Police, not as a uniformed one, but as a male nurse in the police hospital in Colombo.

My cousin was a couple of months younger than me, and we were in parallel grades in different schools.

My uncle wanted to get his eldest son into the police force.

He was having high hopes and when the ordinary level results came in, his hopes were dashed as my cousin could not secure results to meet even the basic entry-level requirement for a position as Sub Inspector in the police department.

He was at a loss as he couldn't face his superiors after speaking in advance with some of the higher-ups to clear the way for his son’s admission to the force.

He was aware of my results and his next move was to approach my father, his elder brother, to get his blessing for me to step in instead of his own son, who flunked.

The only question my father asked him when the proposal was made was, "Are you crazy?"

His hopes were dashed for the second time.

Seeing how those who are in uniform behave in inhuman ways today and knowing how they have lost the respect of the public, who are calling them derogatory names in their absence as well as in their presence, I could not help thinking how farsighted and wise my late father was.

How did he read the future so well?

Now I am at a loss.

 

 

For a Brighter Future in Sri Lanka.

Watching from afar what is going on in Sri Lanka, I have a very mixed feeling.

I was saddened to see the difficulties the people have to endure and was not able to participate in person due to my present circumstances.

Furthermore, the inaction by those who have been sent by the people to the legislature to sort out such things so far.

For a few reasons, I am happy too.

The first one is to see that, finally, many people in the country are feeling the power of collective bargaining.

And the hegemony that was created by politicians and those who are in robes for their own benefits is being broken slowly but surely.

The third reason is that I was able to predict the trajectory of many things a few years ago and am glad that I have put them in writing here.

Being able to be ahead of the curve is something I can’t be very happy about, but not in these circumstances, which is why it was a very mixed feeling overall.

In general, if people in Sri Lanka used their brains rather than trying blindly to defend their foolish ideologies, such a thing would not have ever occurred.

My supplication to all is to use their common sense and brainpower than try to defend foolish ideologies created by those in robes and unscrupulous politicians in power.

For a brighter future in Sri Lanka.

King Sasa's Exploits

Are We As Rich & Famous As We Had Been Told ?

We met a Greek family on our recent flight to the USA and had a long chat on the 10+ hour flight from Athens to the USA.

I knew by looking at them they were in their retirement. I asked them what they were doing during their working life. The answer really surprised me.

The gentleman had been working as a bartender all his life and his wife was a homemaker.

They were going to the US to see their son and grandchildren, whom they had not seen for awhile due to travel restrictions imposed to combat the spread of the virus.

And when they wanted to know where we were coming from, I was happy to say that we were from Sri Lanka, but unfortunately, they had never heard of a country called Sri Lanka before.

Bringing the tea into the conversation would stir their memory of the famous Ceylon Tea brand name, too, was met with the same response.

This made me think of two important things.

The first one was, "Can a bartender from Sri Lanka afford to pay for airfare to visit someone living in another part of the world?"

The answer to that would be a resounding "NO."

And the second question was, are we as famous as we had been told?

The answer to that question too would be a resounding "NO."

This was further affirmed when I had to borrow someone’s phone on landing in the USA to make a local call. The gentleman who was kind enough to lend his phone had never heard of a country called Sri Lanka (neither Ceylon).

I think our education system, politicians, and clergy are making too many ostentatious claims and assumptions about our country, simply to fool people and for their own survival.

 And most of our countrymen are duped into believing such ludicrous claims solely because of their frog in the well and bogus patriotic mentalities.

Colombo Airport Ratmalana

 This is the first-ever International Airport built on Sri Lankan soil.

It was operational from 1942 to date without any significant interruption despite the country had to endure three decades of the separatist war.

This is known as the Colombo Airport Ratmalana, located in a small city a few miles away from the heart of the capital.

I was privileged to be able to travel from this airport a couple of times during my school days and those fond memories still linger.

This was where I was first exposed to the joy of enjoying a cup of tea, poured from a real porcelain pot and to add more excitement, sugar and warm milk came in different porcelain vessels.

I still remember that brown sugar was the norm then and I am sure many can reconnect to the ear that I was referring to.

King Sasa's Exploits

Inapt and Inefficient Sri Lanka Postal Service

My present work involves dispatching items to various parts of the country.

Last week, someone requested certain items and since it was bulky in shape decided to give it to a private courier service.

The parcel was given to them in the afternoon and the following day morning I received the confirmation from the receiving party that the item has reached them intact.

Again the same party requested the same item ordered previously but it was in small quantity.

Despite previously having bad experiences with them I foolishly decided to trust the Sri Lanka Postal Service again.

Not to save money or anything else but I was not having the appropriate packing materials with me and I was aware that the Postal Service have their own bubble-wrapped manila folder, just well enough for my need.

In fact, it cost me more than using a private courier service in the end.

At the time of accepting the item, the Kottawa Post Office staffs behaved very unprofessionally and were making not only me to feel but others who were there too that as they were there to do us favours and not to serve us.

Since I have already come there, I have decided to swallow my pride a bit and go along with their directions.

The parcel was accepted and a receipt was issued.

Details are as under.

Receipt No – 4219 dated 10th December 2020.

Since good three (03) working days have already gone and no confirmation received from the receiver, I decided to call the party to get to know that the parcel has still not been delivered.

I called the Postal Service-Hotline 1950 next.

After listening to my issue, I was given another number to call and that was 011 2440159.

I may have tried hundreds of times but no one picked up the call from the other end.

As the last resort, I went back to their Hot Line again, where a totally a different number was given to me this time.

That number was 011 2328359.

After many attempts of ringing, someone picked up the call, just a few minutes after 3pm, where I was told to call back again at 9am tomorrow morning as all staffs have stopped their work at that time.

Needless to say, I was shocked because I never knew that state employees stop work at 3pm and it was news to me too.

However, because of my insistence, the person from the other was trying to give me a Cock & Bull story and was trying to defend their staffs and their lackadaisical level of service.

When I asked him to be identified him, he was very reluctant to disclose details but again thanks to my insistence that he finally said that he was the CC meaning Chief Clark over there.

But again the credibility of that information I doubt very doubtful.

Immediately after getting off from that toxic telephonic conversation, I sent a written complain electronically with a copy to the Post Master General, but I am more than confident that I will never get an acknowledgement from even

Up to now, I do not know what happened to my parcel sent under the registered post or its whereabouts.

Now I have to wait till tomorrow (15th December 2020) to start the same agonizing process again to locate the parcel.

At the moment all I know is that I have lost a very credible and regular client of mine, thanks to inapt and inefficient Sri Lankan Postal Service.

Not a Bad Readership !

 Just to say thank you for reading.

Not a bad readership.

Please check out my Youtube Channel King Sasa's Exploits too.

Thank you again.

Ministry of බුළත් විට & අලි වැට

Someone I spoke to regarding these new ministries appointed said, these new ministries are given according to the present needs of the country and he further mentioned the අලි වැට to drive his point home.

The need to have an effective control and remedy over human animal conflict is needed but why it can't be dealt by the ministry of Wild life is puzzling.

Take the existing ministry under the ministry of Defense and improve that creating a totally new ministry is just a waste of money only.

 

Now I see more and more people are selling බුළත් විට on roadsides to get a few extra bucks to supplement their ever shrinking and meager household incomes thanks to Corona and this government's foolish monetary policies.

I am sure now we can expect a new  ministry called ministry of බුළත් විට, just like the අලි වැට soon.

Another need of the hour.

 

What a disappointment it was.

 

It proves the fact that Small minds think SMALL right again.

Arrogance can be Tolerated but not Hypocrisy

Recently someone invited me to join a Facebook page called Ceylon Then Sri Lanka Now.

There were some interesting historical pictures, facts and trivia in it so I decided to join the group.

Then I posted a picture of a not so well know heroes of yesteryear.

It was approved without much delay and was well received by former fellow members.

The second post I made was about the VOC coins issued by the Dutch in the 17th century.

That too was approved with not much delay.

The third one posted was a picture of the then CBC (now SLBC) and wanted to know the identities of the personalities in the picture, as I knew the identity of only one person.

That post got delay to come up and thinking that there was some technical difficulty that it did not reach the right people (despite having seen the prompt I got on the screen when posting that it has been sent for moderator / Admin for approval) I repost it once more.

Again the same result and I was curious to know the reason why it had not been approved.

So, for the third time, I posted it again and requested the reasons for not approval.

After my third attempt, it got approved and the Admin / Moderator sent me a PM stating that it was initially not approved because there was not Caption in it, but that was incorrect.

It too got enough traction and part of the information I was seeking came from a source overseas, which I duly updated.

My fourth post was about a coin issued in 1815 and that two had a Caption written both in English as well as Sinhala.

It too got the same treatment as my third post.

Since I knew the identity of the Admin / Moderator by then thanks to the PM he sent earlier, I asked his again as to why it has not been approved.

I felt fishy earlier because I have seen that some guys who are in the friends' list of the Admin / Moderator getting their posts appear quite frequently.

I hate to beat around the bush; therefore I asked him directly if you do not want us to post there, say so then we can stop posting and leave.

At the same time, I reposted the same post again while I can still see him online but this time with a Caption written in Sinhala.

My last comment angered him and started becoming more and more aggressive in his responses.

First, he wanted to know what was my problem and why was I grumbling so much about not getting my post approved.

Then he changed the direction and said that delay was that he was not online for two days.

Then he was complaining about having more than 80,000 members to look after and I am not the only person needs his attention.

Further, he admonished me to try not to teach him how to manage his page which he had been doing since 2014.

The line was changed again and the reason it was not approved due to no Caption which was not true and when I mentioned that it had a Caption.

Then he said that posts with Captions written in Sinhala will not be approved due to many overseas members who are unable to understand the contents.

The man who tries to portrait him as a Busy Bee and have to look after more than 80,000 other members was sending PMs to me from 13.38 till 15.05.

A few hours prior to this conversation, another post was approved with a Caption written in Sinhala.

Even prior to that too, some other posts appeared some without Caption and or some not written in English.

Immediately, I sent him a screenshot of that post and he came back suggesting me to check my eyesight first.

I have put an arrow mark near the Sinhala Caption to draw his attention.

His last response was that he has no problem with his eyesight and Goodbye.

I knew what was to come so I made him read that I can tolerate arrogance but not hypocrisy.

With that parting remark, I was trying to access the page and as expected he had removed/ banned me from his page, which I have no issue but the purpose of this is to expose such hypocrites on social Media.

New Breed of Slaves

The Salves that we have read about, who were chained and brought from Africa to work on farms and do other hard labour works must have loved to see their Master being beaten in public by someone else for his misdeeds during their times but it never happened.

Those Slaves got liberated and now live a normal life like everyone else.

However, there is another new breed of Slaves I find very interesting in this country today.

They are the political Salves and unlike the other Salves, they hate to see their Master being even challenged, leave alone beaten and of course in the literal sense in public.

Their Master has not served them anything good in their lifetimes but they still guard their Master’s image even like a bitch guarding its litter.

A whiff confrontation in the air, this new breed of Political Slaves come at the challenger like a wounded water hog with all their guns (read Teeth) blazing.

Some very easily identifiable and visible traits of this new breed of slaves are aggressiveness, the incomprehensibility of even a very simple fact and most importantly the use of vulgar and unprintable words in public.

With those traits and their dispositions too are not in favour of them, slogging them (literally) in public will not be a way to get them reformed.

Like Harriet Tubman, once a Slave herself said: “ I could have freed a thousand more, only if they really knew they were Slaves”.

Let them eat the humble pie someday first and though it will be too late for them, complete avoidance of this new breed of Slaves is the best strategy one could apply if you want to stay sane while discussing politics in public forums.

Right to Kill & Right to Bury

Many people debate two things these days.

One is the xenophobic suggestion by a Television journalist of having the right to kill one segment of the society and the other is to have the same segment’s rightful burial rites.

First thing first I cannot endorse and or approve if anyone advocates killing and or condoning such brutal advocacies.

Now to the second issue of whether someone should be able to bury a dead body according to their own believes.

Yes, they should not be denied that under normal circumstances and otherwise it will be a case of suppressing someone’s religious freedom.

However, having said that let me add that this situation of CORONA virus causing havoc cannot be considered as a normal situation when the whole world (except China of course and many know the reason why as well) is battling this deadly virus spread.

The World Health Organization (WHO) is a world body and represented by almost all nations in the world and they have come up with some recommendation on how to handle and disposing of a body of a person died due to this deadly virus infection.

And based on those recommendations, the Sri Lankan government has issued instructions accordingly.

A few politicians have objected to those recommendations simply because some conditions therein are violating their usual burial rites.

And let me be honest that I am not a religious scholar so I deal with things using my common sense.

This is a world crisis situation and what is important and has to adhere is to are to the systems created with the notion of “Good for All Mankind” and not one segment of the society in mind.

All crises are dealt with differently.

Those who profess, advocate and endorse even to have their own burial rights no matter what the prevailing situation is should be reminded that it is not acceptable and tolerated anymore by the majority who believe that the recommendations are for the benefit of all mankind and they too are part of the big picture.

Either comply voluntarily or the authorities will force to comply.

Same goes with those who advocate killing.

Either keep your inner feelings to yourself than creating disharmony in society.

Or the authorities will have to step in and deal with it too.

I am not a legal expert too, so I will keep it this simple not knowing what entails such xenophobic vitriols.

Ps.

The sad thing about our so-called professionals is that they don't have the shame of going back on their own words a few days later.

Now they say that the WHO recommends burying is another acceptable way of disposing of a body of a person who had died due to the Corona infection.

Then, in the first place, why did you opposed to it and waited till some discord in the society to check the proper details.

My initial reaction when I read their retracement was to take down this post totally but later I decided instead to add a further note to it or otherwise, it will not be fair to those who patronize and read my blog often.

As far as the xenophobic comment made, some still try to defend him by saying that he did not use the very word KILL.

Yes, I fully agree with that but what he really meant was to HARM and that too is in no way acceptable in this century.

We are now not living in an era, where killing (or read beating) someone because they do not fit into our (perfect) way of thinking, is acceptable.

පර සුද්දෝ vs පර සිංහලයා !

ක්‍රිකට් ලෝක කුසලානේ වෙලාවෙත් " පර සුද්දෝ " කියලා සුද්දන්ට බනින්න තරම් අපි අමන ජාතියක් වෙලා.

සුද්දෝ ආවේ අපේ රටවල් වල තියෙන සම්පත් අරන් ගිහින් පොහොසත් වෙන්න කියන එක රහසක් නෙමෙයි.

ඒ උන් ආදරේ උන්ගේ රටට නිසා.

අපේ රට හදන්න කියලා ආපු රටට ආදරේ කියලා කියන අපේ කට්ටිය මොකද කලේ?

උන් ඉස්සරා දනින් වැටිලා රස්සාවල්, වරප්‍රසාධ ඉල්ලන අය ඇයි " පර සිංහලයා " කියලා මුන්ට නොබනින්නේ ඇයි?

මේකට උත්තරය හොයා ගත්ත දවසක අපි දිනුම්.

නැත්නම් එක්කෝ පර සුද්දෝ කිය කිය දිගටම උන්ටම බැන බැන එහේන්ම කකා බිබී ඉදන්, මැච් එක දවසට විතරක් ලංකා කොඩ් වනමු.

නැත්නම් සුද්දා ගෙන් ලැබෙන ආධාර එකෙන් කකා බිබී 2500 ට වැඩි ඉතිහාසය ගැන ලොකු කතා දෙමු.

තිරණය තියෙන්නේ පර සුද්දා ගාව නෙමෙයි, අපි ගාව.

Human Protectors

Why some dare to cross lines

Wade waters

Conquer seas

With the intention of

Protecting Gods (or and even Goddesses).

Do Gods (even Goddesses)

Need humans as their

Protectors or

Why cannot they do it themselves?

Why not leave humans to protect

Their own kind

From murderers to rapists to wife beaters

To you name it.

What is our role here

Sometimes I wonder

Is it

To protect Gods (or even Goddesses)

Or

Protect our own kind.

This was something I wrote a few years ago and thought of reposting again after yesterday's bombing in Sri Lanka.

Sweet Cinnamon - Sri Lanka

Cinnamon

Ceylon Cinnamon (Cinnamomum Zylanicum) a plant indigenous to Sri Lanka.

Cinnamon was one of the first traded spices of the ancient world and was a popular spice in the ancient Arab world.

The Arab traders have paved the way for Cinnamon to travel a long distance through the spice route to the European market.

Cinnamon has motivated many historical voyages leading to the discovery of New World by Christopher Columbus and Vasco De Gamma.

Introduction

Taxonomy

Family                            –          Lauraceae

Botanical name           –          Cinnamomum zeylanicum

Common Name           –          Cinnamon

Cinnamon grown and produced in Sri Lanka has acquired a long-standing reputation in the international market due to its unique, quality, colour, flavour and aroma.

Cinnamon is used in bakery products, Asian foods and flavoured tea with its distinctive aroma & flavour.

With growing concern on health hazards associated with synthetic flavouring agents used in the food industry, there is an increasing preference for natural flavours worldwide.

The Ceylon Cinnamon belongs to the family Lauraceae and it contains about 250 species and subspecies.

‘Ceylon Cinnamon’ (Cinnamomum Zeylanicum) and Cassia are the more important ones that are traded in the international market.

Cassia is originated from different countries such as China, Vietnam region, Java region, Indonesia and India.

‘Ceylon Cinnamon’ referred to as “sweet cinnamon” and “true cinnamon” is considered superior to the variety known as Cassia.

The unique method of processing and curing of cinnamon entices the characteristic Flavour over Cassia. 

The preparation of Cinnamon quills involves a combination of art and skill unique to Sri Lanka and has been handed down from generation to generation over centuries.

Health Benefits of Cinnamon

•    High Source of Antioxidants

•    Anti-inflammatory

•    Protects Heart Health

·         Helps Fight Diabetes

•    Helps Defend Against Cognitive Decline & Protects Brain Function

•    Help Lower Cancer Risk

•    Fights Infections & Viruses

•    Protects Dental Health

•    Help Prevent or Cure Candida

•    Benefits Skin Health

•    Helps Fight Allergies

•    Used to Sweeten Recipes without Added Sugar

•    Used as a Natural Food Preservative.

King's Trove Exporters