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 Portuguese "Discover" Sri Lanka 

In 1497 a young Portuguese lad by the name of Vasco da Gama went on a sailing holiday. (It was his gap year.) He rounded off the Cape of Good Hope and managed to find India. At least he was aiming for India and found India ....(unlike a certain Chris Columbus!)..

Another one of his countrymen, by the name of Lorenzo de Almeida fancied a similar holiday in Goa and set off with his pals..He did round off the cape and get to the Indian Ocean but it was the wrong time of the year! Monsoons!

They were drunk as well....A storm blew up and he made a wrong right turn at the Equator (Bugger!) ending up in the natural harbour of Cola Amba Tota..in a little island that the natives called Srilanka. This being a rather mouthful the guys decided to call the place Colombo, and the island Cee-lan...

The date is the 15th of November 1505.

Seeing that the whole place was full of "bloody foreigners" Lorenzo and the boys let off a few cannon....just for fun..! The locals had never seen such behaviour....allright they did fight a bit amongst themselves and with their darker skinned bretheren of Yalpanam (Jaffna), but that was with swords and spears and arrows and elephants and boiling pitch..but this was real live ammo!

Moreover the "white guys" were drinking red stuff out of bottles labeled Vin Rouge (very definitely blood!..and didn't they eat large white chunks of Dolomite which they called Paan!?) They burped loudly and farted loudly and threw up and sang boisterous songs called Bailé..

Take me to your leader!

Lorenzo sort of liked the place and wandered along the harbour and bumped into a native who happened to be a local tout."Take me to your leader" said Lorenzo.The native didn't understand Portuguese; so he rotated his head from side to side and rolled his eyeballs and flashed a set of betel-stained teeth.

Lorenzo said "Are you a bloody moron man?".

The native did a slightly different rotation of the head and said something in Sinhala which Lorenzo didn't understand. So Lorenzo rotated his head violently, rotated his eyeballs violently, stuck his tongue out and said "F***".

The native rotated his head violently and rolled his etc and said "F***"!?. Everybody had a good laugh. Lorenzo said "That's a bloody funny accent mate!" and patted the native on the back and gave him a gold coin (actually a copper coin painted gold..)

Everybody laughed. Friendly relations were established.

The natives had a few glasses of Vin Rouge with Lorenzo and his mates...and a few more glasses.... Good stuff this! Better than Ra! said the natives..Yes! we will take you to our leader (Hic!) they said..but it will be a six day round trip all inclusive..and that will be three gold coins per head..

Guided Tour

Sore heads next morning. Tour guides/touts decide might as well make the most of this.

The capital of the Kotte Kingdom was at Kotte..just six miles down the road. In fact, if he had been sober, the lookout in the crow's nest of Lorenzo's ship would have been able to see Kotte because there were no skyscrapers around the harbour then.....

The touts take the Portuguese by a circuitous route taking several days.....Lorenzo is impressed by the size of the country..Takes three days to get from bloody Colombo to bloody Kotte!..he thinks.

Lorenzo gets on well with the King. Says "Nice kingdom you've got! Look me up if ever you are in Lisbon, mate!"

Comes back to Colombo and gets his men to carve the Portuguese coat of arms on a large granite rock. Sets up a trading post. Recruits local labour. Things work while for a bit. Locals like the foreign currency! Set up Foreign Exchange booths. The price of everything goes up. Brisk trading on the Srilankan Stock Exchange. Good fun all round!

Can you hear the drums, Fernando?

Catholic missionaries arrive and put an end to the fun. Go about "converting" everybody. Build churches..Force the drunken Portuguese sailors to attend mass..Natives impressed by this..They serve wine at mass?!.. Free?!.....Might as well go for mass in the morning and then go to the tavern at night!.. No you can't, you need to be baptised first! Just needs water and a few prayers! Painless!

A local tribe by the name of Warnakulasuriya, fishermen by trade and of the Karawe caste, are the first to join up. Take on the new name of FERNANDO...become violently Catholic...Others follow..Soon there are Pereras, de Silvas and de Almeidas.

The Portuguese build a fort at Colombo....Still known as Colombo Fort. They build more forts and churches at Kalutara and Galle. Portuguese now control the maritime areas...........to be continued....