I don’t believe this, only after passing the 37^th mile post in my life, was I able to full fill my lifelong dream to see the North of this country. “Damn lucky” were the words that sprang out of my close friends, who just like me were die hard city mice.

To us the buzz in Colombo was what fuelled our engines. The only time we shelved it out of our rigorous average 10 hour working lives were, when we felt we were going to snap if we didn’t smell, breathe and experience difference. That’s when paddy fields, the tea hills and the deep South beaches started to hallucinate us, amidst deadlines, meetings, reports and the non stopping flow of emails, texts and calls.

The district map of Sri Lanka would suddenly be our fond accomplice and amidst many hours of armchair travel, I would always drag my finger towards the very North and lose my self dreaming of the glorious day I will be able to set foot to a place ridden with a culture, that’s a stark contrast to the rest of the country.

Having listened to many who were fortunate to have made it between the 50’s and 70’s, my ears were filled with tales of a very reserved, hardworking, intelligent community leading simples lives, to whom education occupied the seat next to God. It was common to hear the brief description of Jaffna going as “if little pebbles are flung at the door of any house in Jaffna, chances are that there would be Engineers, Doctors, Lawyers, Accountants among the people who would have to wade through plots of Brinjals, Drumsticks, Chillies and Banana saplings”. Jaffna sounded unique and was always music to my ears. I never stopped questioning my mom who was lucky enough to have made it by Yaal Devi along with my dad and his classmate from Jaffna who was their guide. I always thought that whoever who had been to Jaffna was extremely fortunate to have experienced the Northern splendour.

On the 30^th of November 2009, when I stepped down in Palaly, I had to slap myself because it was more or less like a dream come true. The first thing that caught my roving eyes, were the Palmyrah trees that seemed to dominantly envelope the landscape. From that point, I developed wheels on both my feet and wanted to experience the unique charm as much as possible. Thankfully the work I do paved the opportunity for me to grasp the uniqueness of a place that was shut down from the rest of the country for over 30 years.

As I travelled to many of the remote villages, I felt I was ripping open a treasure box that was waiting to be explored. The lagoon, coast, fort and everything looked so chic in its own way.

Everywhere I went beautiful big eyes, ebony skinned, svelte women and children returned shy smiles and the men grinned through beetle stained teeth. When I looked them in the eye and tried to connect, I sensed that many of the eyes I looked into had a deep dark tale closeted in their inner vault. Those eyes said it all. I was not going to dig up the deep wounds and make them re-live the pain. I figured a simple smile was adequate to iron out my alien look, which I knew obviously was read in their minds as ‘not from Jaffna’

The sense of respect towards people in a higher job position ranked high on their agenda. Dark chocolate coloured hands would often be held in unison, chairs provided to sit, standing when people of such positions enter were rituals that everybody adhered to. An average daily temperature of 35 degrees posed no barriers to the Jaffna folk who cycled to work, plough the fields and get on with life, despite extreme humidity. It seemed like they were born to work and that too with extreme commitment.

Shades of Amber, Turmeric, Saffron and Bright Pink seemed like the preferred choice for most women’s 6ft long traditional saree or salwar kameez. Some were decked with flowers on their head. Looking at them coming out of a temple was a real feast to my eyes. Impeccably feminine they were often accompanied by their spouses decked in trendy white sarongs with colourful trimmings.

My lessons in Tamil somewhat paid off, when I realised I understood fragments of sentences that were rattled off in lightening speed. Some parts of the signboards, road signs were retrieved in my head after learning a few letters in the tamil alphabet. That was an achievement I thought, being able to read something. My attempts to talk the few phrases were most appreciated and I felt pleased that I could connect with these folk ; all these amidst smiles which I interpreted as that’s-nice-of-you-to-give-it-a-try.

It is untiring fascination for me to marvel at the scalloped edges, stone carvings and the colourful figurines in the Hindu pantheon. Some standing erect, some seated in a lotus pose, other raising their hands to heaven and me craning habitually to see if my favourite Krishna was visible. Sadly rarely I saw the adorable flutist in Jaffna.

In Nallur I found myself carrying on the same ritual, absorbing the majestic look, while snapping up a couple of pictures.

The Fort, Library, Duraippa stadium, were other landmarks that seemed to occupy a prominent position in the city’s landscape. In the streets it was interesting to see the rear end of bicycles strapped with a variety of things ranging from several Palmyrah baskets in circular form, bananas, coconuts, some sacks of vegetables which I read as village produce finding their way to the town for selling.

It seemed there were lots more to see and experience, the 5 days I spent were only the highlights. Would I go through all the time consuming procedures to get there again to get a microscopic view ? I asked myself. Unhesitatingly my mind replied ‘Ohm Ohm’ in true Yaal Paanam style !!!!