Faces of Sri Lanka- A Miniseries

The thin lines intersect and come alive. Decades of living, leave permanent imprints, revealing her story without saying a word. Unlike the promise of the roaming gypsies, her fortune speaks of the past, the lines of her face, tell the story of her life. And suddenly she becomes beautiful, wrinkles and all. And through her life filled with war, poverty struggle and love, she is the face of Sri Lanka.

Life here is hard on the skin, the penetrating heat of the sun burns and hardens even the darkest of complexions. The red dust settles in the pores and as soon as the sun rises the sweaty mixture quickly turns grey. But “Achhi or Granny” as I like to call her, was built for these surroundings. Every morning wearing her batik nightgown she waves hello and grumbles something unrecognizable through her betel stained teeth, or what’s left of them at least. I’m pretty sure she’s not altogether there, but seeing as I don’t speak the language, who I am to judge. The other day, Granny caught me completely off-guard. I was reading on my porch, when I noticed she was no longer sitting in her usual plastic chair and her casual grumblings were no longer audible. So I decided to wander down the hill in case she herself had wandered off. Then just as I neared the busy beach road, I found her clung to a small tree off to the side . She seemed to be looking for someone, likely her grandchildren, but again the language barrier made it impossible to know for sure. After some time, she noticed I was standing next to her. She grabbed hold of my arm, in what felt like a death grip, I can’t explain how shocked I was by her pure strength. So, anxious and a little weary that she might actually do some damage to my slight wrist, I managed to convince her that heading back up the hill was her best bet. Fifteen minutes later after a chorus of long winded mumbling, accompanied by a throbbing wrist , we made it back to the house and more importantly, to her plastic chair. As she slowly sat down, writhing in exhaustion and frustration, she looked at me intently and clearly spoke the words “thank you”. In english, I mean. I had to pause a minute to ensure that I had indeed heard her correctly. Imagine that. After all these months of seeing her every single day she had kept her secret, and saved her ‘thank you” for the perfect occasion. As I made my way up the steps to my suite a lifetime away, we exchanged a glance and shared the same knowing smile filled with understanding. And suddenly, for that moment at least ,we were more the same, than different. As she turned her head away and I continued up the stairs. . the mumbling began as normal.