Beyond Check-points: Stories of Human Resilience in troubled Sri Lanka by Duleep de Chickera.The Diocese of Colombo, 2023. |
Extracts:
Counting shells – How plantation Tamils joined the LTTE controlled areas
“The daily lives of these twice oppressed humans redefined human desperation. They were on their own, among their own and in need of protection from their own. Their presence served the cause of those near and far. They had to be there to churn out cadres with no questions asked; just as they produced the best tea in the world for the lowest possible wages with no questions asked. Decades of suppression had conditioned them to passively obey. They were the idea ingredients for a fascist regimes; the ‘indispensable-dispensable’, dressed in rubber slippers and fed with layers of indoctrination.”
People of conscience
“As several like Fr. Clifford were learning, it was daily doses of restrictions and not carefully clichée statements in impressive assembly halls that stimulated these conscience corners of human resilience. All the UN’s motions and all the parliaments of the world brought little relief when tyranny strode down lonely byways in the darkness of night.”
“If you happened to be the Tamil from beyond the border, you had to be Tiger on this side. This is the plain message I got again and again,” he sobbed. Hell, for the young Tamil fleeing the LTTE, was a place that moved with you.”
Beyond Checkpoints
“The check point culture was much, much more than the visible or the moment. Those who met there carried heavy baggage that had to be unpacked in a matter of moments. For the few who stood there through the day, the ability to observe, question, screen and ensure all was well with courtesy, a thousand times over, was commendable. For the many who passed through, the ability to be patient and understanding when questioned or searched several times a day, was equally commendable. That these interactions occurred without incident through the day and night, spoke volumes about the goodwill and co-operation between those who stood and those who moved.”
“But for now this is our life, looking into peoples’ bags and getting scolded by everyone. What to do, this is our fate.”
OpenEdition vous propose de citer ce billet de la manière suivante :
NR (5 juin 2024). Books on the war. SRI LANKA & DIASPORAS. Consulté le 13 novembre 2024 à l’adresse https://doi.org/10.58079/11rwy