The Gamarala Who Never Went To The Temple

 

The Gamarala Who Never Went To The Temple

or

Gamarala Sil Gath Heti

by Gyan Fernando

Illustrated by Kumaran

Technical details: This is another classic Srilankan folk story. 

We recently came across a new Sinhala version of the story in a pulp book called "Sabé Gamarala" (The Real Gamarala) written by some prat calling himself Jayatissa Boralugoda (ISBN 955-652-097-X), who attempts to sanitise and politically correct the Gamarala stories with pathetic results.

Any Srilankan who remembers the original story will agree that the new version is totally sanitised, a travesty and has very little resemblance to the original which appeared in the book "Ran Kekira Saha Thavath Katha" in the 1950s.

The MadPage version is closer to the original. In fact the original was so hilarious that the Mad Page didn't really have to jazz it up as such…

As usual memories were jogged by our MadSister Babs..

Once upon a time there was a Gamarala (village elder) who never went to the temple.

He had better things to do such as drinking arrack. This activity of course required a lot of advanced planning since liquor is not sold on Poya (full moon) days and the moon of course follows the Lunar Calendar.

The Gamarala and the Ash Gourd

The Gamarala and the Ash Gourd

or

Puhul Hora

by Gyan Fernando

Illustrated by Kumaran

Intro: This is another classic Srilankan folk story but spoilt by the rather tame and goody-goody ending. So we jazzed it up and in keeping with present violent times in the old republic have added a bit of violence! But don't worry: No one gets killed and so it has a U certificate and is therefore suitable for family viewing!

Once upon a time there was a Gamarala (village elder). This is the same Gamarala who appears in previous stories so read them first. He was a cultivator by day time and an Arrakku soak by night but he never was a violent man. 

With a dozen or so assorted kids the only solace he could find was of the bottled form.

Classics Up To Date: How the Gamarala (nearly!) went to Heaven

How the Gamarala (nearly!) went to Heaven

or

Gamarala Devlova Giya Hatti

A classic Srilankan sinhala folk story given the MadPagetm treatment!

Illustrated by Kumaran

Explanatory note: This story is based, rather loosely, on a very old classic Srilankan folk story. A Gamarala is best described as a village elder/farmer. As usual the story has been given the MadPage tm treatment and modernised with a very slight political/social commentary slant...

Once upon a time......

or Ekamuth Eka Rataka...

Sri Lanka Classics up to date: Nari Bena

Nari Béna or Hivala Saha Gama Duwa

Honey! Our son-in-law is a Jackal!

Another Srilankan folk tale updated!

by

Gyan Fernando

Illustrated by Kumaran

 Introduction: This story appeared in the Kumarodaya 5, a Sinhala text for the sixth grade in 1952 and can be found in later editions (Gunasena Publishers). It has been made into a play ("Nari Béna"). Our version has been modernised and jazzed up! The Gamarala in this story is a different one from the one that appears in other stories...

Once upon a time in a village just off Avissawella (in Sri Lanka) lived a family consisting of an elderly Gamarala (village elder), Mrs Gamarala and their teenage tearaway daughter.

McMalupaan: We took on the Big Mac!

The McMalupaan Corp

On the 22nd of April 2001, feeling rather militant and anti-American, we decided to take the mickey out of McDonalds and launch our own McMalupaan Corporation. This was largely to make fun out the Colombo 7 types who queued up for miles to get into the first McDonalds in Srilanka, mostly just to be seen. 

So we said:

"The philosophy of McDonald's is simple.....

Serve food that can be eaten with fingers. Cook fast and serve fast. (The food itself is only of minor importance). Bung it in an attractive wrapper with an eye-catching logo. Make your employees wear backward facing baseball caps. 

Teach them how to say "Can I Help You". Diversify into ethnic foods, especially when people go off traditional beefburgers because of Mad Cow Disease.

Thinking on the same lines, the Mad PageTM decided to introduce McMALUPAAN before our competition (i.e. The McDonald's Corporation) thinks of it!"

We gave our location as Punchi Borella and a lot of people fell for it! 

View the original article 

We went on to market McMalupaan, McMalupaan with Cheese Big McMalupaan McDelfries McVaddai and McPortello

We stopped short of marketing McKoththuroti 

For example we said: 

The Daily Ranil

The Daily Ranil

At the height (or bottom) of his career, we ran a one-off spoof newspaper titled "The Daily Ranil", making fun of Ranil Wickremesinghe, then the Prime Minister (or Pry Minister, as we called him) of the crazy republic.

            Have a look.

The Daily Ranil 

The Daily Ranil Features 

We also wrote "Ranil's Diary" for him. Have a look!

Ranil's Diary

Archives: Ranil's Diary

Australian Lanka Girl Has 42 Teeth!

TOOTHPASTE

At about the time that Crazylanka got on the web, Sri Lankan Australians started a sickly-sweet, goody-goody website called Ozlanka.

Amongst other things, they carried a glossy web magazine called estyle which basically consisted of a front cover with a picture of a well-fed and obese Sri Lankan-Australian, middle-aged female or a picture of a teenage Sri Lankan-Australian girl with a toothpaste smile.

The latter intrigued us and with a bit of photo manipulation, we did a one off spoof cover of the said magazine, calling it the "Toothpaste". 

It carried a picture of one of their fixed-smile models and it was headed "Australian Lanka Girl Has 42 Teeth".

We hope that the poor girl concerned has lived it down!

The Revised History of Sri Lanka

The Revised History of Sri Lanka 

(Abridged)

When we at Crazylanka first revised the History of Sri Lanka, our idea was to get rid of the boring bits, find the funny bits and jazz them up.

At that time it was received well when Sri Lankans had the ability to laugh at themselves in a self-effacing manner.

I am not sure if the sentiments are still the same. Nationalistic pride is important but so is the ability to see the funny side of things.

Without further commentary, here is the story about the arrival of the Portuguese in Sri Lanka which appeared in Crazylanka on the 24th of February 2001.

It is presented here in a re-formatted and very slightly revised form.

The Best of Crazylanka

Crazylanka.com

Crazylanka.com was first launched on the 1st of August 2002. Before that, it existed as Gyan's Madpage. 

In recent times, Crazylanka has been dormant but we thought that some of the hilarious material was worth another look!

So here we go!