Sri Lankan Aesthetics

You know how some people are just elegant and beautiful, in a very natural way, endowed with a sense of grace in everything they do?

Now imagine a whole country peopled with many individuals with just such an aesthetic, and you have Sri Lanka.

I have visited this little island many times since 1996 when I married my very own sarong-clad Sri Lankan, and I have never ceased to be amazed by the simple ways in which Sri Lankans add touches of elegance to their everyday lives.

Take, for example, this table setting at a roadside café on the road from Bandarawela in the hill country to Colombo, the capitol. Here’s the context – you’re driving down a twisty narrow 2-lane “highway” behind smog-spewing trucks, buses commandeered by maniacs and suicidal three-wheelers. You’re starving, tired and have breathed in enough carbon monoxide to darken at least one lobe of your lungs. You spot a sign for a restaurant up ahead and stop, not expecting too much and hoping with all your might that the bathrooms are clean. And here’s what greets you as the smiling waiter leads you to your table…

There were cotton tablecloths, for heaven’s sake! And that sweet little clay pot with a plant – just darling! Nothing fancy, no expensive Noritake place settings, no high-falutin’ glass/candle/whatever centerpieces.

This was the banister on the balcony overlooking the forest at that same cafe. Again, simplicity and nature at work – jute rope wrapped around the metal rails, and sturdy branches entwined just so. (And yes, the bathrooms were spotless, had soap AND toilet paper, which is a huge bonus as anyone who has traveled to Asia could tell you).

Roadside fruit stands are a mainstay in Sri Lanka, and the best fruit is often available at these simple farm-to-market businesses. On one trip to a wildlife santuary, we passed a town where most of the fruit stands were made out of stained and varnished branches built into gazebo-like structures, complete with doorways and window openings.

To my dear spousal unit's dismay, this is DEFINITELY going to be imitated in some fashion around our veggie-bed in our backyard when we get home.

My father-in-law is a swinging single 70-something year old, and he has this elegant wood sculpture on a window sill at his bachelor pad. (I’m hoping our names are on this item, in his will).

We visited an orphanage during our stay in Colombo, and again, I was struck by how people take pride in the beauty of their surrounding. We're not talking immaculately manicured hedges cut in perfect symmetry ala the palatial gardens of Europe here. No, this is something else much simpler and more pure in its understated loveliness.

The nuns had created an outdoor sanctuary and meditation garden beside the creche for infants and expectant mothers, complete with benches, pathways, a lotus pond and scented plants (think jasmine and frangipani - mmm dreamy!)

One of my sisters-in-law is a rare creature on the Colombo scene - she actually cooks for her family on occasion (everyone here seems to have fabulous cooks, as evidenced by my ever-widening girth). She had us drop in one evening for dinner - her 6 year old had helped her fix spaghetti for his American cousin. Here's what the table looked like:

I'm just hoping for some of this aesthetic to rub-off on me during our stay on this lovely island...and if not, I hope our daughters have inherited some in their genetic make-up. So far, the older one's penchant for all things Star Wars and her devotion to battleships have sublimated any such instinct from emerging, but a mum can still hope...