1. Curry
Possibly the most well known yet most misunderstood food item in the world. In fact, Netflix did an episode called 'Don't call it curry!' in one of their original series called Ugly Delicious, which I highly recommend, if you are interested in food, lifestyle & travel category. Curry is not a specific flavour, dish or a cuisine. It's an entire range of countless dishes. It's a way of preparing food. And you most definitely can't bottle it up as a powder. Imagine if there was an off the shelf 'roasting powder' you could buy. Or 'stir-fry flavour' which you could use to flavour mayonnaise or chips. Imagine how incredibly limiting and frankly insane that would be. That's how I've felt for the past decade every time I see 'curry flavoured' things or the one type of 'curry powder' in the supermarket. The food of billions of people from different countries and cultures all captured into one bottle. In my language, Sinhala, 'curry' translates to ව්යංජන (vyaṁjana) or හොදි මාලුපිනි (hodi mālupini) which means a collection of dishes to accompany rice or the main carbohydrate of the meal.
Some of you smarty pants might say, "but Harsh, we've been to Sri Lanka/your kitchen with a magnificent spice cabinet and have seen a spice blend labelled 'Curry powder'. Ha! Gotcha". Yes, but it's the same as French-fries not being 'French'. Simply adding this 'powder' into water or coconut milk doesn't make it a curry. It has to be combined with many other aromatics, spices and ingredients, and then cooked in a certain way for a certain time to make it complete. Moreover, it's possible to make a variety of curry dishes without using these 'curry powder' blends. Also the type of spices and their ratios used to create a 'curry powder' blend, depends on who you ask and where they live. In Sri Lanka alone there are 21 million people and India has roughly 1.4 billion. And there are 100's of countries in the world that have their own different versions of curries. So you do the math. The only common thing we can all agree upon when it comes to curry is that, it's freaking delicious. I think that's enough said.
2. Arranged marriages
"Are arranged marriages still a thing in Sri Lanka?" you may ask in disbelief. Absolutely, yes. It's a massive thing. We have pages upon pages of local newspapers dedicated to 'Marriage proposals' where prospective brides and grooms publish small adverts to find the most compatible life partner. [I will cover the precise details of this in another blog cause it's worth it.] Of course, it also happens by word of mouth and websites set up for this purpose. It's not like in that one Bollywood film or book your read from decades ago, where the bride doesn't see her suitor until the wedding day at the alter, and she has no choice but to say yes to a marriage arranged by her parents before she was even born, to the son of their business partner. That's not how it goes.
Think of it like Bumble setup by your parents, or in some cases relatives, family friends or older siblings. There's a set of criteria from religion and ethnicity to education level and career that's taken into account. Then there are certain personality and physical attributes that are sort after. And once a set of matches are found, through a paper advert, credible website or social networks (not like Facebook but real life), they are presented to the singleton in question. This means looking at a bunch of awkwardly rotated graduation pictures of some guy or girl sent as an email attachment. If you like what you see and read on the lengthy profile descriptions including details since childhood of the potential suitor and his/her extended family, you agree to meet up. If not you just say, "nope, not interested", and return to the conversation you were having with your cat. If you do meet up and it goes well, you date for a while and after what both parties think is a reasonable enough time, you do the whole tying the knot thing. If the meeting doesn't go well or turns sour after a few meetups, you dump their ass, and go back to the match making process again. So like I said, it's like using a dating app, if your parents did the first round of swiping for you. A particularly good option for those who don't have the time or opportunity to find Mr/Mrs. Right on your own.
3. Alcohol-free socialising
A glass of wine over dinner, a cool beer afterwork or grabbing some drinks with friends on a weekend is as common as taking a shower for many of us. But I grew up in a society where the only time a woman would consume alcohol is from a tiny sherry glass during Christmas or at a wedding. I was told as a child to not drink water during meals, or else the rice will float in my stomach. You finish the meal and then drink water. So I don't drink anything during my meals, even today, let alone alcohol.
Of course, we do serve booze at parties but most of the time it is reserved only for men who enjoy it in a circle setup away from rest of the guests. Going out to a pub or a club for a drink really isn't a thing at all. I've been out exactly 3 times in my whole life in Sri Lanka to a venue with friends where I had an alcoholic beverage. To those who know me, this ratio will really put things into perspective. Things have changed drastically over the last decade and the young people today enjoy a vibrant social life particularly in the capital with access to all the top venues and alcoholic beverages you can imagine. But the fact is, you don't need to go out or be in an alcohol induced situation to socialize. Most likely you live with or within walking distance or in the least a close ride away from your family and friends. It's largely an outgoing, welcoming and warm culture where getting involved in each others lives is encouraged. So there's no need for booze to keep spirits up and the conversation going. So no, alcohol is not such a big deal in day-to-day life.
4. Meditation
Now we are approaching controversial territory. Meditation technically does not have a religious connotation. It's a practice of mindfulness and reflection that we can all do, I suppose. But the masses associate it with Indian religions which according to Wikipedia are Hinduism, Jainism, Buddhism, and Sikhism. Of which I'm mostly familiar with Buddhism, with my dad, 50% of my relatives and 70% of the Sri Lankan population being Buddhists. I'm also to an extend familiar with Hinduism with some of my closest friends and former colleagues being Hindus. But never in my 31 years of life have I heard any one of them say out loud, "I'm going to go and meditate now" or "I'm going for a meditation class". It's not to say they don't meditate. I know for a fact most of them do, regularly. And sometimes they even attend retreats at the local place of worship lead by a monk, perhaps even for an entire day or weekend. But I've always felt the vibe that it's a very personal, spiritual and humbling experience. It is not something you bring up in every other conversation or put up on your tinder profile. It's a state of mind between you and the god or just the inner peace you are trying to reach. It's not a mass scale monetised group class fuelled by an instructor who talks really very slowly and an endless supply of lemon water. It's something you do for yourself, if you want to, in your own time, the way you want, where you want. So mediation is not a 'thing' (you flash) in my community and for the record, I don't meditate.
5. Not sunbathing
Another thing that's not a thing is sunbathing. "But Harsh", you exclaim, "if I lived in a tropical paradise like Sri Lanka, I'd lie in the sun all day!". Let me break it down for you. We come from a society of deeply rooted colourism. Fair skin is associated with higher social class and superiority for several different reasons. Mainly because after 100's of years of being colonised by the Portuguese, the Dutch and the Brits people are conditioned to associate lighter skin with power, and privilege. Secondly, to have darker skin would have meant you worked outdoors in the sun doing labour intensive work. Unlike someone who stayed in the shade and could pay someone else to do the labour intensive work in the sun. None of these are excuses for this petty mindset, by the way. Skin colour does not and should not mean a freaking thing. Unless, it's orange or green or something, in which case you should probably see a doctor? Just stating the facts to explain, why the idea of proactively getting tanner, is really not a thing.
Also don't forget that the sun is abso-freaking-lutely scorching hot all day everyday, so unless you order dehydration, headaches and skin cancer to go with that tan, it's not something you'd want to do all the time. Finally, Sri Lanka is a developing country. Most people struggle through the week taking long commutes to jobs that don't pay much, and spend the weekends loaded with chores and preparing for the week to come. Perhaps even working. So there's no time to enjoy the sun because it hasn't risen when you leave for work and it has set by the time you come back home. So 'sunbathing' is not an activity people in Sri Lanka get up to.
Are there any other topics you're curious about? Or subjects that have been grossly misinterpreted over the years? What types of question do you get about your home, people and culture? Let me know.
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