This is Sri Lanka.
To all those who would mill and mine Sri Lanka’s Easter Sunday massacre for your own divisive ends. Who seek to place our people in boxes and brackets to score political points or worse, to bolster your own racist, extremist ideologies - please know this, we reject you. You do not know us. You do not know Sri Lanka.
My family members are Muslim, Buddhist, Hindu, Christians, of all denominations, agnostic, atheist. We are LGBTQA. My cousins are American and Australian, my nieces and nephews are British and Canadian. We have relatives and ancestry traced from China, India, Iran, Germany, France, Singapore, Malaysia, Morocco. Many families on our island are like mine.
This is Sri Lanka. A true melting pot of 21 million. A richly-woven shared land, shared culture and shared food. Lots of food. At Christmas we eat Christmas cake. During Ramadan it’s Biriyani. Last week it was Kavum (oil cake) and Kokis (dutch sweetmeat) for Sinhalese and Tamil New Year. This is week was Easter, Easter means chocolate egg hunts and Hot Cross Buns.
Everyone awake yesterday, as the attacks began to unfold, had someone to call, someone to check on. An attack on our Christian community is an attack on all of us, not because they are a part of us, but because they are us. Family, friends, colleagues, who attend early morning Easter services at any number of Churches or Easter breakfast at one of our many hotels.
When the inevitable, devastating list of those murdered is made public, there will be people of all backgrounds on it. Because we all mark Easter, together, as a nation. And as a nation, we will protect those who celebrate it, this year, next year and forever. We will protect the right of all to be safe in their houses of worship, in our hotels, for our people and guests of our country to be safe at a f*cking buffet. To be safe at places they should be safe. Happiness and security are things we are willing to fight for. This is Sri Lanka, this is the nature of us.
The tragedy of Sunday, April 21, 2019 is overwhelming. I went to bed horrified and I woke up horrified. On this new day, there are many things that are still unclear. The scope of this is massive, it will take years to come to terms with it all. There are issues to be dealt, severely if necessary. But the hard truth is that we know how to do this. Despite 10 years of relative peace, 30 years of brutal civil war has taught our people many lessons. We as a country know how to deal with this.
One positive outcome is that we have enough experience to be fair. Sri Lankans know to separate the terrorist who commits atrocities from the people who share their ethnicity and/or religion. We know how to act. We know how to help. We are kind and generous and courageous. The kind of people who will line up for hours in the baking sun, as bombs continue to go off around the country, to donate blood. Some of these people were eventually turned away yesterday. Thank you, but the blood banks are overflowing, our wounded can be treated, we have enough. This a place where, despite the horrors of our past and the uncertainty of our future, the good will always outweigh the bad. Fear will be conquered through humour and prayer. Peace will prevail. Our people will live and die together as we have always done, side by side, surrounded by the ocean and all that it provides and carries to us.
This is Sri Lanka and everyone is welcome here, but your divisive BS is not. Keep that shit away from my replies, away from my inbox and away from my country.
