From USA to Sri Lanka-1970

My Father was an academic at the University of Peradeniya, Sri Lanka during the sixties and seventies. While my Mother was expecting me, their first child in the sixties, my Father proceeded on to the US to do his MA. When I was nine months old, my Mother and I joined my dad in the States. My younger brother was born in the States the following year.
















Note: click on each picture for clearer view

In these two pictures: myself as a toddler in LA, California, 1967-1968.



















In the two pics here: I was about 3yrs old in LA, California, 1970.

Just before I turned four our whole family returned to Sri Lanka where my Father resumed his work teaching at the University of Peradeniya.

Soon after we returned we stayed with my Mother's Uncle and Aunt and their large family of five girls and one son. They lived in my Mom's grandparent's ancestral home in a village close to Peradeniya. After a few weeks we moved (carrying our belongings in a lorry) to a house that we rented in Ampitiya which is a suburb of Kandy. I have some glimpses of memory of the time we spent there.

We had nice neighbors at Ampitiya, they had a son a little older than me. I remember visiting them one day dressed in a white/pink cotton dress and I was quite enchanted by their little chicken coop with hens that laid eggs. Our neighbors yard was full of tropical trees. At the time I couldn't speak Sinhala although I understood it (having just returned from the States), so they spoke with me in English. Something else that I remember from that house is how we used to keep the butter in a cut glass dish filled with salted water and a matching glass cover on top. I'm not sure if people still keep their butter this way but this memory fills me with nostalgia. We only stayed in the Ampitiya house for a few months before my Father was allotted University Quarters.

The first quarters that the University gave us were at the Gal Bangalawa (Stone Bungalow) at Mahakande.