I’m 15 years old and standing side of stage in a community centre in Australia, waiting to dance with a winnowing basket. I’ve finished the first act where I knelt in front of a large flat drum with three others and thumped it to a staggered rhythm, reciting verses I don’t understand.
It’s my third year of performing in the Sinhala and Tamil new year celebrations, which fall on 13 or 14 April, timed to the sun’s movement into Aries and tied to the rice harvest. I’ve never seen the turn of a year in Sri Lanka because I left when I was one. With my family, obviously. After some years in Muscat and Dubai, we slotted into Perth’s tight- knit Sri Lankan community when I was 12.
The celebration is coordinated by the Sri Lankan associations. It starts with games on the sports oval next to the centre – three-legged races, lime-and-spoon races and cricket.
Then it moves indoors for a series of cultural performances. It’s mired in politics – who runs the games, who’s on the committee, who puts on a performance and whose kid is mentioned first in the programme, hurriedly printed off the night before. The rehearsals start many weeks beforehand and are fuelled by milk tea, curry and gossip. Most kids are roped in and most adults pitch in to help with costumes, backing tracks, dance moves and transporting the perfect giant brass oil lamp to light for luck.
I like performing with my friends, though I don’t understand the significance of anything we’re doing. I like the giant feast and hitting the dance floor with my family, especially my father who always whoops along to the songs. I feel uncomfortable under the watchful eyes of the aunties, who swivel their attention between the dance floor and the men who disappear into the car park to convene around the one car boot they’ve stashed all the whisky in.
In my future, I know that I’ll be a lawyer, telling off my husband for drinking too much and firmly encouraging my kids into these events.
Flash forward and I’m 38 years old – it really does happen in the blink of an eye. Life hasn’t quite gone to plan. I’m a comedian with no kids and haven’t gone to Sri Lankan activities in Australia for a long time.
My father has passed away and I feel a strong need to spend more time in Sri Lanka. He was my main link to the country and I’m afraid that I’ll flail without him. It’s a strange thing to wholly love a country and its culture while living outside it.
So now I’m staying at a hotel in Haputale in the Central Highlands with my white Australian husband Charlie and my parents-in-law. The staff tells us at breakfast that it’s the new year.
We light a giant oil lamp in the hotel’s reception and watch cultural performances against a backdrop of panoramic mountain views. A familiar rhythm on a large flat drum brings a flood of memories from my teenage years, then I feel an ache. For my parents and the other elders in diaspora communities who put in so much time and care to celebrate traditions passed down through centuries. For the kids who grow up trying to fuse the multiple cultures they must move between.
The ache subsides as Charlie and I get stuck into the games. I can’t help beaming as we try to smash pots blindfolded, work in teams to help a blindfolded person draw an eye on the picture of an elephant and race around with a lime balanced on a spoon in our mouths.
I decide that I’m not as Sri Lankan as I could be – but I’m Sri Lankan enough. I can never go more than a few days without eating curry and here I am, having rearranged my life to live here for four months and introducing my loved ones to its wonderful intricacies.
For the first time, I realise how many parts of this place live inside me. They may go dormant and need to be awakened. But it’s a relief to learn that they will never be completely lost.
