Though our calves and legs are still aching from climbing Adam’s Peak, there is no chance to rest due to the hectic schedule planned for the rest of our time in Sri Lanka. We spend a morning in Kandy walking through its huge botanical garden and an afternoon visiting the Temple of the Tooth, one of the most important Buddhist temples in Sri Lanka, as it claims to hold the tooth of the Lord Buddha himself. And in the evening, we take in a cultural show of Kandilayan dancing.
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| Botanical Gardens |
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| Temple of the Tooth |
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| Buddhists lighting candles at the temple |
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| Kandy Dancing |
After Kandy, we make an early morning start to head north to the small town of Dambulla. Dambulla in itself is not a particular interesting town, but it is the jump off point to visiting some of Sri Lanka’s ancient attractions. We end up staying approximately 10 km away from the town, at a small guest house by a nearby lake. The place was recommended to us by some American travellers that we met way back in Tissa. After checking into our guest house, we go back to town to do a little more temple hopping. We start off at the Golden Temple and then take a steep 15 minute hike up a mountain to the Rock Temple, an ancient site home to a series of cave temples near the summit. There are 5 cave temples altogether, each one of them housing a collection of standing, reclining and seated Buddha statues carved out of rock as well intricately painted murals decorating its walls. When we are finished, we eat an early dinner before retiring back to our guest house. We have an early start for the next day as we are planning on doing a day trip out to visit Sigiriya Rock.
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| Inside the Cave Temples |
Back at our guest house, we play a game of chess out on our veranda when all of a sudden, the power goes out. Luckily, we have candles and torches on hand for just such a scenario. Just moments after rummaging through our packs and lighting our candle, a girl in the distance holding another candle is walking towards us. It is Sawartha, the daughter-in-law of the owner of the guest house. She takes a seat beside us and shortly thereafter, her husband comes over to join us and lies in a nearby hammock.
We start chatting and find out that they, like us, are also newlyweds. Only how they met and got together could not be more different as their marriage, like many in Sri Lanka (about 50%), is an arranged one. When we asked about details of how they got together, they tell us the following. When Ravi felt he was ready to get married, he informed his parents that he wanted a wife and his parents contacted a local town matchmaker to help them look for someone who would be suitable (someone from a “good family” and is a “good girl”). Meanwhile, at the age of 27 years old, Sawartha’s parents thought it was about time for their daughter to get married and had also contacted the same matchmaker. The matchmaker, having his little rolodex of boys and girls within the town to match up, eventually made the successful connection and was paid 5,000 rupees (about 50 dollars) from each family, for his efforts.
Like many arranged marriages, Ravi and Sawartha were not allowed to be alone together until after their wedding day, which for them, was only 3 months after they met. Up until then, their pre-marital get togethers were always in the company of Ravi’s mother. I ask Sawartha how married life is, and she gives me a look of mixed emotions. It is good, she says, her new family is good to her and her new mother treats her like a daughter. But she misses her own family tremendously and it was difficult to leave her family when in all of her 27 years, she had never even left home for a day. I sympathize with her and realize in that instant, how difficult it must be for not just Sawartha, but all of the young girls in these arranged marriages who, once married, are suddenly uprooted from everything they know and are left to live forever with a coven of strangers.
On a lighter note, I ask Sawartha how she likes her new hubby and she laughs. Sawartha has an animated personality and tends to laugh often. “He is good, I guess,” she says “…..but….he doesn’t keep promises.”
Now I laugh. “And what promises does he not keep?” I ask.
“Well,” she says, “before we get married, he promise he would give me everything I ever wanted and make sure I’m always happy.”
“And now?” I ask.
“And now, he’s so lazy!” Sawartha sighs with exasperation. “The New Year is coming up in only 7 days and he hasn’t bought me anything! Every New Year I would get new dress, new shoes and some money” Another sigh. Ravi is still lying in the hammock without much comment. I turn my gaze to him.
“Did you hear that?” I say. “Sawartha is not happy. The New Year is coming up and she has nothing to wear! Please promise me you will get her a new dress, new shoes and….”, I rub my fingers together with my thumb for emphasis, “…some money. Remember, happy wife, happy life.” Ravi looks at me and then slowly nods his head. I’m not convinced that he understands me, so I slowly repeat myself again.
“Remember. Happy Wife. Happy Life.” Ravi nods again and grins. Sawartha is ecstatic.
Looking back at him, I can’t say I would put money on this kid coming through with a new dress anytime soon, but I am satisfied I have done all that I can. It never ceases to amaze me that despite how different people can be in terms of their culture, their customs and their religion, that when you boil it down and let girls be girls and boys be boys, that we are all much more similar than we are different.
