Laughing at Dayasiri or ourselves?

On Wednesday evening at Sooriya Village, while speaking on relationship-education, vulnerabilities of children, especially girls, in cyber space, what can be done, what is being done and what should be done, Hans Billimoria asked a question from the audience.  ‘Did you get Sanath’s video?’  He pointed to several men and each of them said ‘yes’.  He went on to talk about consent.  Respect.  Knowledge.  

Had Hans asked ‘Did you get Dayasiri’s video?’ or else ‘Did you get that disce amuta disce discarde video?’ the chances are that everyone would have said ‘yes’.  I am pretty sure that Hans could have then proceeded to talk of hypocrisy, arrogance, ignorance, elitism and misplaced notions of self-image.  If he wanted to.   

Salivation.  That’s what it is all about. In both instances.  There’s nothing to dissect in the eyes-wide-open, jaw-dropping, tongue-hanging-out thrills sought by whoever it was that posted the first video and of course whoever passed it around.  The Dayasiri video is different.  That’s Dayasiri Jayasekera, Minister of Sports.  

Dayasiri mispronounced the Latin in the Royal College motto.  He also dropped the ‘Esto’ of the Thomian motto ‘Esto Perpetua’.  He stumbled.  He struggled.  He was reading a prepared text and perhaps the Latin parts were written in Sinhala.  Maybe there was a typo.  Maybe it was hand-written and maybe poor handwriting was what made the Minister of Sports struggle the way he did.    

It’s all over social media.  And it has generated a lot of comment.  ‘He should have made sure of the pronunciation,’ is a point many have made.  True.  As a public figure and one with quite a few years of experience, he should have known better.  ‘He could have spoken in Sinhala!’ some have observed wistfully.  Should have, under the circumstances.  Then of course there are those who are tickled to death by the whole affair.  

They laugh at Dayasiri’s mispronunciation.  They ridicule his ‘poor English’ (what’s ‘rich English’ by the way?).  Some even claim that the missteps, the struggles, the language-butchering and being unprepared are all indicative of general incompetence.  

Who are we laughing at, really?  Did those who laugh at Dayasiri on account of him not doing his homework, also laugh when other politicians messed up?  Did they laugh at Mahinda’s gaffes and pretend they didn’t hear Ranil’s howlers and vice versa as per the ‘prerogatives’ of political loyalty?  Is it only language-related screw-ups that they laugh at?  I mean, when it comes to politicians jumping the gun, dropping bricks and murdering the queen, do we laugh out loud for certain gaffes, polite cough at others and feign deafness at yet others?  

Dayasiri was tripped by pronunciation.  It was not Sinhala.  It was not English.  It was Latin, a dead language!  Around the same time Ranil Wickremesinghe talked about an ඉරටු තියෙන කොස්ස (literally ‘a broom made with coconut husks but [also] with ekels).  He should have said ඉදල (ekel-broom). Dayasiri’s error was mild in comparison.  But Dayasiri continues to be ridiculed, while the Prime Minister’s obvious unfamiliarity with the Sinhala language hasn’t prompted much comment. 

Are all those who laughed and/or still laughs at Dayasiri perfect in their English and in their Latin?  Does it make those who are good in English feel better when someone shows language incompetence?  Is English synonymous with ‘smart,’ ‘wise,’ ‘clever,’ etc for such people?  

Is English-acquisition a defining and important feel-good factor in their lives and is it this that is being affirmed in a roundabout way by Dayasiri’s little word-trip?  Is this a fallout of Puswedilla or is Puswedilla a product of all this or rather a piggybacking on this elitist language trip?  Is it just that psychological hangup that makes some people call others godayas or yakkhos or, in recent times, bayyas?   Is it a chip on the shoulder that prompts people to laugh at and ridicule mispronunciation, perhaps because they believe that mimicking the elite in this way would give them access to elite clubs?  

In the mid 1970s, I listened to a talk given by my father, Gamini Seneviratne, at an event organized by an organization of English teachers.  He was asked to speak on ‘The language of administration’.  I remember him mentioning the Dutch, the Portuguese and British and the languages these colonial powers used in administering the island.  His argument was that it is best to use the language of the people in the matter of administration.  During the Q&A session a lady asked a question. I can’t remember the question, but I still remember her interjecting something that seemed strange to me then but which I later understood was a product of a common malady among English speakers in Sri Lanka.  She caveated her question with the following: ‘We, the elite.”  I remember my father brushing her off with what can only be described as kindness: “If that’s your self-image, there’s nothing I can say.”  

I also remember my father giving a lift to English language educationist Douglas Walatara, who said with good humor, ‘I don’t think you really believe what you said Gamini.’  ‘I do,’ my father said quietly.  

Self-image is the big story that’s missing in the splash over Dayasiri mispronouncing Disce aut Discede.  And it is about two sets of people: those who think they are ‘elite’ (on account of English competency) and those who think they could get membership to elitist circles by a) laughing at those who mispronounce, and b) taking issue with the ‘Sinhala Buddhist Other’ that is the bugbear of English-speaking ‘elites’ at every possible turn.  

A lot of people would have smirked when Sanath’s video was released.  They were, in liking and sharing, disrespecting themselves.  There are many who laughed when Dayasiri slipped.  The truth is that Dayasiri just missed a step; those who laughed didn’t realize that they had been floored long before Dayasiri took the mic.  And in the end, they all laughed at themselves, Kumar De Silva was spot on when he made this observation a couple of days later.  Dayasiri was Dayasiri.  Those who laughed at him appear to have some problem who who they really are. 

See also:  The true meaning of "Disce aut Discede"

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Dinesh Chandimal: Sporting Personality of the Year 2014

Greatness in sports is often measured in the number and margins of victory.  Domination of a discipline or a sport over a long period of time naturally wins accolades.  Sports, after all, is mostly about winning. And yet, not everything that stands out for standing ovation has to do with besting the opposition.  Sometimes it is rising to the occasion to the point that you rise above yourself and your self-interest.  This is why ‘The Nation’ picks Dinesh Chandimal as the Sporting Personality of the Year 2014.

On that day in Dhaka there couldn’t have been any Sri Lankan without a smile.  There couldn’t have been many Sri Lankans anywhere in the world following the World T-20 final who is did not smile at that particular moment when Sri Lanka defeated India to win ICC silverware after 18 long years.  The entire team had broad grins. The officials too. And yet, one smile was special.  It belonged to someone who didn’t take the field.  Dinesh Chandimal.

There was a report that Chandimal wept when he heard he was dropped for the Semi-Final against the West Indies (he had been docked for the game against New Zealand due to a slow over-rate).  We don’t know if this is true.  It is never a happy thing to be dropped.  It is probably worse not to be picked at all (ask Marvan Atapattu, he has booked the defining chapter on ‘The Book of Drops’ if and when it gets written).  It was not that Chandimal was not picked.

It was not that he was dropped (he could have, so we are told, insisted on playing and that would have been it). What is ‘special’ about it all is that he was the designated captain of the team that went on to win the Championship.  And he, the captain, was dropped!   ‘Devastating’ doesn’t quite describe what he probably would have felt.

The man was woefully out of form and as Lasitha Malinga’s short and successful ‘captaining’ experience showed, a team that already had four skippers (Mahela Jayawardena, Kumar Sangakkara, Tillekeratne Dilshan and Angelo Matthews) didn’t really have to worry about him being dropped.  As someone pointed out, there was the ‘National Captain’, Lasith Malinga, and there was the ‘Leadership Council’ made of the aforementioned skippers.  Mahela led the leaders, it was pretty obvious.

What is beautiful about it all is that it was an issue for everyone except for Sri Lankans.  It is hard to think that the press of any country would not have raised a lot of questions if a designated captain abdicated for all intents and purposes in favor of one the men he is supposed to be leading.  For Sri Lankans, apart from a few wry jokes, it was as it should be. Logical to the last letter.

Still.

Still there’s the small issue of a young man who had been appointed captain and had to lead players who had a dozen years’ worth of experience more than he did.  There’s the small issue of having left Sri Lanka as captain and having to watch the final from the dressing room.  There’s also the small issue of Dinesh Chandimal running around the ground after Sri Lanka won the match, carrying the man who put the final touches to the campaign on his shoulders.  Dinesh Chandimal helped hold Kumar Sangakkara high.  He couldn’t stop smiling a schoolboyish smile.  That delight was unadulterated. That admiration was unadulterated.  And in this, there was as much ‘team,’ ‘team-spirit,’ and ‘leadership’ than anything we were privileged to watch unfold out there in the middle of the ground.

There was courage on the part of the selectors, that unhappy, ready to be maligned tribe; for they dropped the captain. Had Sri Lanka lost, someone might have said ‘you can’t win a match after dropping the skipper’.  Someone else might have said, ‘why did you pick him in the first place?’  A third might say ‘were you crazy to make him captain?’  Sanath was bold. Chandimal was humble.

Now that’s a World Cup story right there.  In some strange, round-about way, therein lies a gene-fact of a team-corporeality that helped bring the World Cup to Sri Lanka.  We didn’t have a single stand-out player in this tournament (as opposed to the previous two editions).  We do best, perhaps, when we do it together.  Dinesh Chandimal did his part and did it well.  With utmost grace.  Take a bow, Chandimal

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On the fallacy of infallibility

[This was written a couple of years ago, in response and appreciation of an article written by my friend Revatha Silva on Sanath Jayasuriya.  In these days of oneupmanship and sabre-rattling, stubbornness and indulgence in notions of immortality, Revatha's words came back to me and with them this piece]

Shakespeare’s ‘Julius Caesar’ was masterpiece in terms on political theatre for it gives us many, many insights into the complex web of political relations and the play of political forces. I first read the play when I was about 13 years and at the time, in the simple and simplistic black-and-white of a young boy’s perception of right and wrong and crime and punishment, Brutus was villain and Antony hero. Years later, my father, an English graduate, read me a different ‘Julius Caesar’ when I was preparing for an examination on Shakespeare. In his version, Brutus’ intent was not wrong, his method was and as for Antony, he was a demagogue; a classic model for all demagogues to mimic and seek to emulate.

That’s another story. The abiding fascination of Shakespeare is that he can be read in so many different ways and each reading can reveal something one might have missed earlier. And sometimes one doesn’t have to actually read to remember and thereby read differently. I have read the following line of Mark Antony’s oration many times, I’ve heard it in stage productions and films but did not realize its political significance until early this morning.

But yesterday the word of Caesar might have stood against the world; now lies he there and none so poor to do him reverence.

Yes, Antony was a classic demagogue, but that’s not important. He was saying something very profound here and in a way he was pointing to his fate as well. That day, as he wept over Caesar’s body, he was The Hero. When he perished, though, he was little more than a sentimental wimp and diminished many times from the man who in one speech turned Brutus, hailed as hero a few minutes before, into a villain whose blood was sought by a citizenry transformed by rhetoric into mob.

We all die. This we all know. This is perhaps why the only sustainable village-level social organization is, paradoxically, the maranaadaara samithiya (funeral-assistance society). Alexander the Great, we are told, wanted his funeral to be a tribute to this inevitability, to the fact that we take nothing when we go and no power on earth can grant immortality to anyone.

This is the one thing that we all forget or else postpone thinking about. The Bhagavad Gita makes the wry observation, for example, that the strangest thing is that even though thousands upon thousands of creatures perish every single moment we all act as though convinced that death will not visit us today.

I am thinking of Caesars. Kings. Corporate heads. It is not that the less powerful or the powerless do not operate as though immortal, but that the powerful can do so much and destroy so much by consciously or unconsciously forgetting their mortality.

Last week, my friend Revatha Silva wrote what I consider to be the most thoughtful essay on the phenomenon called Sanath Jayasuriya and a good wake-up call to all of us, especially those who are so ready to vilify Sanath without acknowledge the part they played in making him who he is including the frailties he’s acquired over the years. Revatha recommended the lyrics penned by Sunil Ariyaratne for Nanda Malini: poojasanaye oba hinduwa obata pudana me lokayamai heta obata erehi vee negitinne. (This world that elevates you, sets you on pedestal and genuflects is the same world that tomorrow will rise up against you).

There’s a yesterday for all men and women who are powerful today. There is a tomorrow too. There will come a day when they will have to think of a ‘yesterday’ when their word counted and indeed could have stood against the world, a day when they lie somewhere, nondescript and irrelevant, so unrecognizable that no one would step forward to revere or even acknowledge.

If all men reflected on the immutable truths called birth, decay and death, common to all beings, all things (anicca vatha sankara), they would learn the virtue of humility and be more effective in whatever they do. Refusal, on the other hand is a product of arrogance and ignorance, both key ingredients of downfall.

When a poor man is afflicted with one or more of the sathara agathi (the four pathways to destruction), greed (lobha), hatred (dosa), delusion (moha) and fear (bhaya), he causes harm, but only to a small circle of people. When a leader suffers from these conditions, larger entities are affected. When Caesars are arrogant, are delusional and given to immortality posturing, nations perish.

msenevira@gmail.com

 

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