Sri Lankan Celebrations - New Year

Planets rule, OK?

 

Signs and Times...

When I was small, New Year meant many things for me. First of all, I had school holidays, and could enjoy the freedom with my friends. Then, as the New Year approached, some big decisions had to me made. What sort of sarong I could ask for? What sort of fire crackers would be allowed to buy? Then the sweetmeats my mother would make for the occasion.

For a number of years, a group of Sri Lankans living in The Netherlands, have been organising a market for New Year 'goodies'. This year, it was held at the premises of the Sri Lankan embassy in The Hague. From its origin as a 'car boot sale' involving a handful, it has now grown in size and depth and boasts a wide variety of items for the visitors.

Then there was also a chat session where we compared our notes on how New Year was celebrated in our original home towns. That did bring back a lot of memories. It also came to be recognized that New Year was indeed the true national celebration, other than the Independence Day, when all Sri Lankans belonging to the various ethnic and religions groups would set aside their differences and joined in the fun.

This is how we celebrated this year (2010):

This year, New Year greetings started to arrive earlier that usual. So, our preparations for the celebrations got underway well ahead of the 14th, thus avoiding the fun of the last minute rush to buy new clothes, the right materials for the delicacies etc. etc.

Savani bought her dress first. Then, the three of us went out looking for a dress for Shyami, who was at the time suffering from a severe flu. Savani was tasked to do the searching and selecting, while Harin and I got busy ourselves looking for ours. This year's official colour - light green, would have been no problem any other time. As things always turn out, we could have settled for any colour other than light green on that day. After the inevitable hassles, we managed to acquire suitable materials for the whole family and my wallet took the strain.

One afternoon was spent on visiting a Sri Lankan shop in Zeist, to purchase the relevant materials for the goodies we had in mind for the celebrations. That consisted mainly of rice flour.

As there was also a New Year market organised at the Embassy in The Hague, and I had promised to create a few items for sale on that day, we bought stuff to cover both situations.

For the market, I had kokis, welithalapa and athirasa in mind. The cunning plan was to use whatever that was left after the market, would fill the table on the New Year's Day. In the event, we were left with stuff to fill several tables.

The flour we could buy was of roasted rice - red and white, not quite the right material for kokis. So, we decided to grind our own from basmathi rice at home. Shyami, in spite of her flu, undertook to do that. Grinding flour at home is quite easy and painless. All you want is a sturdy coffee grinder and a fine sieve. I recommend you keep an eye on the temperature of the apparatus. Last time we used one, we ignored the rapidly rising warmth and continued regardless, which the grinder didn't appreciate and started to smoke instead. That was a write-off. So, we started with a new one this time and were constantly monitoring its health, allowing it rest periods from time to time. Yes, it is slow. But, are we bothered about time here???

Savani busy with kokis

Athirasa didn't pose much of a challenge. We could buy ground red rice at the Sri Lankan shop, but roasted. That didn't matter much, as the final product proved to us.

Click here for my recipe for athirasa...

The Athirasa Mix

The Athirasa Mix closeup

Harin busy with athirasa

Harin and athirasa closeup

Harin alone in the kitchen

For welithatlapa, too we used the same ground red rice from the same shop. Welithatlapa starts life as pittu. Making pittu, offers the real challenge. For welithatlapa, finer the granules of the pittu, better the texture, taste and appeal. They should live up to the name: weli (=sand). Some are experts in this field. I admit I am not. I don't have the patience to keep churning flour and grated coconut in a bowl, crushing the pebble-sized lumps down to sand-grain size, and every now and then, extract a handful of grains of the 'right' size. Lazy and techno-oriented as I am, I employed our food processor to d the job for us. My daughter soon mastered the skill and soon we were blasting away at full speed.

That comprised our main menu for the celebration. We consciously avoided any non-Sri Lankan food items from the menu. Well, bananas bought at the supermarket was the exception.

There was an initial confusion about the auspicious times, which were soon resolved with the help of that invaluable service offered by Mr. Laxman Abeykoon at the Jyothirvidya institute in Sri Lanka (http://jyotisha.00it.com/Newyear.htm). He publishes the times for a number of major cities of the world. For us, we had to chose either London, or Rome. We decided to chose Rome as we were in the same time zone.

Note:

Rome (41N, 12E), whereas we are in The Netherlands (52°N / 5°E). We are in the same time zone, but 7° further east of Rome. Strictly speaking, we should have made corrections to times published for Rome to account for the difference in longitude. This, we decided to overlook for the time being. (In fact this fact dawned on me after the event!)

The times, as it happened, were not the most convenient for us in Holland: the dawn of the New Year was set at 03:31 am. We set the alarm and went to bed. On the 14th, at the set time, dressed in the official colour, we set the cooker on and boiled some milk to signify the lighting of the fires for the first time in the New Year.

Starting the fires for the New Year

That also signifies the cooking of meals etc. As we had already prepared most of the food for the occasion, we decided to go to bed and wake up later to cook kiribath at the time set for preparing meals and partaking them, which was set at 06:34 am. That was fine. We two were both up on time and woke up Savani and Harin in time for them to wash and dress for the occasion.

While they were busy, I set the table.

The table set for action!

When everyone was ready, the traditional oil lamp was lit.

The traditional Lamp

I served the food.

Serving the food

That day, we all had an early breakfast.

At last, the New Year!!!!

Then we performed the traditional greetings to each other with betel leaves. These I had bought at the food market and safely stored in the 'fridge for the occasion. This event, I must record, as the first time we had ever been able to perform since the birth of Savani and Harin.

This was followed by a session of 'business' transactions. For me, it was not an auspicious beginning - I ENDED UP BEING THE LOSER!

Savani and Harin took off to university and school respectively. A little later Shyami left for work.

I was left to clear up.

Now, how did you celebrate?