The times we grew up - 6

Going back to Lake club, the club those days was on the lake road, not at the නනනනනනroad as at present. I think it was somewhere near present Kings hotel next to Suisse hotel on the lake road. The club had a a Saturday tombola show in addition to their regular activities. They would have had casino and other games of chance but  since we went only on Saturdays I have no idea what entertaintments they have for their customers.

Since this club was a members only club; any club where alcohol is served would have to be a members only club I suppose. When we were in the university , there was a club at Wijerama junction , on the left side when you turn to university road , called eleven stars sports club ( eleven, for number of players in a cricket team). After a probably couple of months into university some of us became members of the club to go and have a drink when we come into some money. I still remember in the membership card with our mug shot pasted on the inside.

The club had its tag line on the cover page of the membership card. It said ‘  කියවීම සහ මිනිසුන් ඇසුරු කිරීම මිනිසා මිනිසෙකු කරයි ‘ expanding on the Sir Francis Bacons “  reading maketh a full man , conference a ready man, writing an exact man” I suppose. These clubs, I know because I later became the president of Kandy Garden Tennis club, has to submit a report covering the sports activities they conducted during the year under review. And this club too organized a cricket tournament , two three matches being played just to justify their being called sports clubs because without some sports activities they will lose the license to sell alcohol. 

This was like a poor club with only basic stuff and when we had more money from tuition etc we promoted ourselves to Golden arrows club at Delkanda junction because it had more bites and a larger space space. Going by the names , eleven stars for a cricket club, golden arrows would have been an archery  club I suppose, except that we didn’t have archery as a recognized sport in the country. Those days.

Coming back to lake club in kandy, some of us became members there just to go to to see the musical show on Saturday night. For the musical show all the popular singers in the country came , about 3 / 4 singers. Sometimes music groups. Jothipala, Victor, Miltons, Sanath, three sisters and many others came. They performed in the hall during the breaks of  the tombola game ; about three breaks and three sessions of music in between.

Parents would never allow their children to go to club and I don’t think they even in their wildest dreams anticipated that we would go to Lake club, not even if Latha Mangeshkar came and performed in tombola breaks. So going to the club had to be kept top secret