Watte JUNIOR's Blog.

The ancient Kingdom of Kurunegala. According to ancient demarcations the Kurunegala city lies within the precincts of Daduru Oya from the North,Kalu Ganga from the South and the kingdom of Malaya from the East.The land itself had belonged to the ancient Kingdom of Maya.Even though the city is located on flat land it is surrounded by a mountainous region in one side and on the other there are five massive rocks namely Anda gala (a rock shaped like an Eel),Ibba gala (a rock shaped like a tortoise) Etha gala (a rock shaped like an Elephant), Yaddessa gala and Kuruminiya gala (a rock shaped like a beetle).These geographical formations had protected the ancient kingdom from invasions of enemy forces.The ancient routes that lead to the city fell along the passes that separated these huge rocks and hence they were arduous to trek.It is evidently discernible if one is to peruse though an ancient map of the city that the Kingdoms of Kurunegala and Kandy shared the same military stra...

The Shrine of God Gale Bandara. The custodian deity of the shrine is said to be Wathhimi Bandara a child born to Buwanekabahu the II (1293 -1303 A.D.)  first King of the Kingdom of Kurunegala and his Muslim escort.There are two shrines located in the vicinity of the Elephants' rock dedicated to God Gale Bandara. One of it can be found in the premises of Ethkanda Vihara (a historical temple with religious significance) and the other is being kept under the guardianship of Muslim curates.Before proceeding any further on the subject of these two shrines an analysis of who God Gale Bandara is needs be considered. King Buwanekabahu II had been meandering in the streets one day with his retinue. Besides being a spirited character the King espoused the importance of being duty - bound from  his courtiers.At around the same time a beautiful damsel had caught his eye near a place called Asweduma ( the ancient title deeds outline the boundaries of this area as the land in fron...

Trinity history. The inception of the college dates back to 1857 in response to an appeal for a college of higher education.At first it was referred to by the name Kandy Collegiate School (KCS). But the proceedings of the college had abruptly come to an end in 1863. Its' resurrection and continued existence began in 1872 when Rev.Richard Collins a master of Arts of St.John's College Cambridge re - opened the KCS. It was renamed as Trinity College Kandy in 1876 after the college he held a post of tutorship,which is Trinity College of Dublin. Up until 1943 all of it's principals were from Great Britain.They were eminent scholars from Oxford, Cambridge,Trinity College of Dublin and as well as other noteworthy theological schools.It was only in 1941 that Mr.C.E.Simithraaratchy a distinguished old boy with a unique record was appointed to the post of acting Principal.Subsequently in 1943 he was made the Principal which gives him the honour of becoming the first native S...

Cosby on why the Yankee have difficulty in grasping the game of cricket. Put your head gear on and take cover cos Cosby's gonna bowl you one of his beamers. The Cosby's playing cricket!. This was televised on a local channel in the years 1995-96. I'd say it was one of the hilarious episodes of the sitcom ever. Back then we Sri Lankan's have never heard of any Yankee holding a bat or bowling their arm around. At least not until a team consisting of our world cup winning squad toured the States for some friendly matches played against a test playing nation. When it came to light through the media that certain cricketing clubs have existed in America since the time slaves worked in the plantations. After a few minutes of browsing through the web pages, I could find some trivia about the English game played in the U.S. The game had its rudimentary beginnings in the state of Philadelphia and still functions as the headquarters of the American cricket. They even played i...

Somewhere around the 1990's many sitcoms and comedies made their debut on the Sri Lankan television screens. Almost all of them were half an hour shows therefore, they fitted in perfectly with the busy schedule of Sinhala programs. The Jeffersons was one of them. The routine time slot was shared among these sitcoms and comedies. The rest of the line up included Family Matters, The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, The Cosby Show which were of black genre and on the other end of the spectrum the viewers were entertained to an array of white sitcoms namely The Perfect strangers, Step by Step, Small Wonder, Who's the Boss and Full House. The transmission of television channels that were privatized was restricted to a few. The inaugural transmission of TNL had only been recent and the Etv which had a limited range of reception targeting its viewers in the greater Colombo area was too at its inception.

We were soon caught up with the newly bought setup. The integrated system had a distinctive contrast to the Radio/cassette players we owned previously. Not only for us but for many Sri Lankan's an integrated stereo system with a turntable on top was cutting edge technology in the 1980's and the compact discs were yet to invade the market. The platter on this automatic turntable is belt driven. Moreover, PHILIPS with it's advanced technology had made it's cartridge and it's attached stylus with superior material to give better sound reproduction. It's FM-AM digital tuner has 18 station presets and it's stereo amplifier has a 5 band graphic equalizer. We never owned a single vinyl record up until then but our craze to listened to one grew stronger every passing day. Therefore, my brother and I decided that we should purchase one in Colombo since we believed the stores in Gampaha where we were stationed could offer very little in terms of quality. A few ...