Smooth criminalI left a chicken to thaw in the sink, covered with a cutting board, and went to sleep. I wondered why the cat didn't come to bed, but at least nobody was pouncing on my feet. Turns out that the maid had removed the board and the cat was downstairs, having a fancy feast… “A cat in Dragonese is ...
These dumbasses are constantly interrupting me, consider this post an interruptionWhen I wake up the cat follows me downstairs and I let the dog in and they both get into some form of chaos while I'm trying to pray. If I'm lucky, no one's destroyed the tissue boxes or taken a sneaky shit. On a good day, they just chase ...
The Red Mosque in Colombo, by Sandeepa VithanageI've been fasting for Ramadan, so 23 days now. What this means, practically, is that I don't take food or water from around 5 AM to 6:30, despite it being the hottest season in Sri Lanka. What this means, personally, is I have a better understanding of my Muslim friends, who I've seen ...
The unending trauma of the Gaza GenocideI was watching a child escaping from the latest attack on a hospital in Gaza, saying “I swear, I’m scared, I can’t take this. I just want to leave.” Me too child. Me too. Allah be with you. God knows humanity is not. It has been nearly six months of this, of unremitting imperial ...
The 13th Battle of the Hindus annual cricket encounter between Jaffna Hindu College vs Colombo Hindu College will be played on the 15th and 16th March at Jaffna Hindu College Ground. The post LIVE – Jaffna Hindu College vs Colombo Hindu College | 13th Battle of the Hindus appeared first on ThePapare.
Lord Kalki, the final avatar of Vishnu, artwork from ArtNIndiaIt's sacrilege in the modern world, but every major religion looks forward to the end of this world. In Hinduism, this is the Kali Yuga (the worst yuga), which Kalki ends by the sword. In the Abrahamic faiths, the Day of Judgement is kinda the point of it all. The Buddha's ...
Keeping the 10 precepts, and failingToday is Poya. A full moon day. Poya is a public holiday in Sri Lanka and you can do nothing, but you're supposed to do a very specific sort of nothing. For a day at least, Buddhists are supposed to try and be Buddhist. So I've been trying. Going To TempleThe Buddha's path is clearly ...
The horse hiding behind a bush (top left) started it. From an alternate ending to the Ramayana.In the old Hindu stories I grew up with, the Ashvamedha is a classic tale. The tale of the wandering horse. In this ritual, the king lets a horse wander around for a year, accompanied by some warriors. Wherever the horse can go unmolested, ...
Photo courtesy of Colombo Times “Blessed One, Arhat One, Great Sage Sri Samanthabadra…”Part of the official invitation to the self-proclaimed Arhat cum Chief Sage Samanthabadra to preach his dhamma. “Mahinda is a religion. Mahinda is a philosophy. Mahinda is a culture and a morality this country needs.” Chief Incumbent of Mirisewetity (Lanka news web – 14.8.2020).The Tripitaka is silent on ...
source: Trinity College Kandy WATCH: How did it all Begin? Revisiting the vision of the pioneers & protagonists Presented by the Trinity College Library Council The third... | By Trinity College, Kandy | FacebookPresentation by Harendra Alwis at a webinar organised by the library council of Trinity College on 25th June 2022 as part of the sesquicentennial celebrations of ...
“Marcel Duchamp Fountain, 1917, photograph by Alfred Stieglitz at 291 art gallery following the 1917 Society of Independent Artists exhibit, with entry tag visible. “Right now, I have a cat on my chest so it’s somewhat obvious that I’m not alone in this world, let alone supreme. Then my son comes in and wants help going to the bathroom. He’s ...
The mystery of the Saraswati river, which I know nothing about, don’t @ me. Om Saraswati. Image via.I left a bowl out with some food in it and later it was swarming with ants. I washed the bowl out in the sink and now there aren’t ants there anymore. This is life, I think. The climate just messes you up ...
Entrance to the tomb of Harkuf, buried over 4,000 years agoThe oldest gods (I know of) are of the sun, wind, and rain. The weather. Beneath all the verbiage and mathmatage around climate change, that’s who we’re fucking with. They’re obviously going to fuck with us harder.No one since the even more ancient gods of cyanobacteria have ever even had ...
From The Dark Crystal, 1982. Honestly not that different from electromagnetismFor all the innovation of science, we still fundamentally depend on magic potions and rocks. Fossil fuels are the magic potions brewed deep in the earth, and magnets, uranium, and rare earth minerals are the magic rocks. We can cast incantations over these ingredients and the incantations work, but we ...
The Princess of Kelaniya, taking one for the teamIn the old days, in the old Kelaniya kingdom, the ocean rose up and swallowed villages and families whole. The gods were obviously angry. In sacrifice the king placed his beloved daughter on a rudderless boat and set her off to sea, to placate the devas of the depths. That princess Viharamahadevi, ...
a brain floating in a body of water with connections streaming out from it in Salvador Dali styleNo man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main… John DonneNo brain is an island, entwined only with itself; every human is a piece of the network, a part of the ...
‘Vesak’ poya, the day of the full moon of the lunar month vēsakha, which usually falls in May, is of great significance for millions of Buddhists around the world. Vesak marks three important milestones of the life of Gautam Buddha; The birth of Prince Siddhartha, the enlightenment of the Ascetic Gautama and the passing away or Parinibbana of Buddha. Marking ...
Early Buddhists avoided depicted the Buddha’s self at all, showing instead symbols or his feet, but that faded away quickly. (Via the Buddhist heritage of Pakistan)In what the late Mark Fisher called ‘the privatization of stress’, entire industries of mental health, wellness, and self-help have been built around the concept of self. This is really because our illusory ‘selves’ have ...
The Gangaramaya Temple in ColomboThe Buddhist concept Anattā is both easy and impossible to understand. It’s roughly translated at not self. You could also say no self, though the concept lives on the philosophical edge where zero and infinity are equivalently incomprehensible. You both don’t exist and exist everywhere all at once. It doesn’t fit into words, but why would ...
