Api gihin ennam...

I bid goodbye ironically with a. “See you next time “. After 10 years we met and here we are now looking forward for the next time .

Then it hit me.
Although colonization, globalization and tourism have taught us to bide farewell, in the lines of “Farewell”, “Good bye” , “Hasta la vista “ or “See ya “ , for generations we used to say “Api gihilla ennam” (roughly translated in the lines of until we meet again) at the point of parting.

The more I ponder about it , more beautiful this phrase sounds in my head .

It gives out the meaning (atleast to me) that everything in life is a journey and all journeys eventually come a full circle. Until then, to kindle the love , the friendship and the memory. And a hint of sadness , hopefulness & everything in between.

Then again , you should not expect anything lesser from a culture where pilgrimage was an intricate aspect. People wrote their last wills and travelled to Sri pada, and climbed the uncountable steps to reach the uda maluwa . They braved the chill to see the sun rise from the Indian ocean.

Others walked for months , Pada Yathra, from Wanni to Kathiragrama , all in the honor of the Merciful Murugan . Forest tracks where muddy water fills the puddles : the places where wild elephants walked heavy. The smell of the leopard hangs still fresh . And they travel chanting Haro Hara , and leaving their lives in the hand of the deity they travel to honour.

Picture this . The dawn is just breaking outside and a lone bird has begun the day with his solo. A man stops at the front door on his way out , turn back and tell their loved ones whom they leave behind , “ mama gihilla ennam” .

To me that is pure Zen.

ආදී ශිෂ්‍ය සංගම් රැස්වීම

මාර වැඩේ

බස් එකේ හොරෙන් ගිය
දවල්ට නොකා ටියුෂන් පන්තියේ සටහන් අතර අතරමන් වුනු

ගණන් සර්ගේ වේවැලට බයෙන්

බස් හෝල්ට් එකේ උත්තර කොපී කරපු

තාර පාරේ රබර් බෝලෙන් පන්දු ගහපු
ගෑනු ඉස්කෝලේ බස් එකට හූ කිව්ව

උන් එකෙක් වත් නෑ

Black mollies in a bottle

Happiness sometimes
comes in a polythene bag
filled with waterin the form of two petrified
black mollies
charily carried by a boy
running fast as his feet could
To release them in to the empty
horlicks bottle
where until  yesterday
lived four tadpoles