Beyond the pitch

 The online exams are a popular these days. May higher and tertiary level institutions have switched to online exams to continue the academic calendar. Sri Lankan schools have not yet done online exams and soon the students will also have to face online tests.  Assessments are a crucial part of any academic process. The assessments stems from the need to test whether the learner has acquired the necessary learning outcomes. Assessments help to assess the validity and relevance of the learning process. Students in Sri Lankan schools can get better grades or marks if their retension skills are high. The ability to regurgitate whatever they have learnt at the class or from the teacher is the hallmark of any good Sri Lankan student. Tjere might be exceptions, but more or less there is a common understanding that if your memory is stupendous, you can easily score high marks at any examination.  Advanced Level examination seems to be a different case to thr point illustrated ab...

 The past couple of years have seen a different shape in human civilisation. The speed which human being has tried to run has come to a sudden standstill with the pandemic and things that we took for granted have such a value now ; a walk with your friend, a trip with your friends or at least your freedom to see each other's face or even breathe. The mobility is no longer a comfort as it used to be. I do not want to talk or write about the travel restrictions imposed due to Covid-19, but my being circling back to Covid-19 proves how it has become a shared common reality in everyone's life.      What I want write about is  true friendship. But why do we need to bother about friendship or friends during a gloomy period like this? What advantages or what benefits a friend can bring to you in a trying time like this? Can they feed you? Can they give you gifts? Can they throw you surprise birthday parties? To what end? I am pretty sure these questions are not yours b...

 The second reading of the novel The English Teacher by R. K. Narayan was a totally different experience to the first reading. I first read The English Teacher four five years ago, but I was not able to understand Krishna's character and the way his character subtly hints the personality traits which are more or less common to every English teacher in the world. Slighlty timid, too much worrying Krishna shares with his readers ideological beliefs that an English teacher is beqeuathed by default as a person who deals with books and literarature. More surprisingly, his character seems to relate to me in a so personal level which I have not identified at all in my first reading of the novel. Krishna is a romantic husband and proves himself to be a loving, caring husband and father throughout the entire narrative. He quoted Wordsworth to compare the astonishing beauty of his wife with Wordsworth's poetic metaphors and most importantly tries to be romantic as much as possible with h...

Kadhal oru kavidai 'Unnai mattrum kadale' Aanal, Vallkai oru kavithai illai, Valakai  oru wanmurei kadal, Kavitaikaḷ kilinatana

 I have carefully analysed my own feelings when I was in deep pain. In fact I have noticed when I am in deep pain or agony I do not see the things around me clearly. It is like I am in another dimension or world (like Stranger Things or Spell Binder) where everything else ( the things like job, salary, and other material things) become so immaterial. I have also realised that the more I try to look up for solutions or more I try to find ways to get out, the pain becomes doubled or sometimes trippled.  Something else I have noticed is the sense of power and control when I am in pain. I tend to think I am the least powerful person with no control at all which also leads to the idea that right now I am the most victimised person in the world ( which is extremely big lie).  However, when I am happy I can takr things very nuetrally and I can be indifferent. Sadness is the feeling that destabilises me the the most. I only tend to relax when I try to see myself as someone totall...

I am and have been an ardent cricket fan since grade 2 or thee. Whenever I watch a cricket match, I want to shout and imitate the actions of the players. This process (or to be more accurate this madness) always makes me to think why do we love sports? It is to do with self-identification with players and catering to the need to nurture ego? Do we like to imagine ourselves as the players who are cheered, applauded in the ground? Is it to with the prime instinct to defeat someone and showing to the victory shout to others. In my personal opinion, sports are a perfect example of a crossroads at which humans are trapped in the process of evolution. If you take a look at the successful sportspeople and their signature celebration of their little moments, you will realise where I am heading! Players like to roar, dance or even flip: all these movements can be easily compared with the victory dances performed by the pre-hisotoric human being after a successful hunt. The difference between th...

 Sisyphus is a mythological character who is often cited for his action of rolling a boulder up a hill only to find it fall down every time it nears the top. Nevertheless, Sisyphus repeatedly pushes it up. The mythological analogy is often used to illustrate the absurdity of life as well as powerful metaphor in philosphy to be interpreted in several ways.