The
arborist
They
say reality is sometimes stranger than fiction, not sometimes I feel if you
closely observe reality most of the time
is weird and wonderful. Close observation of course is important , because if
you don’t observe it up close you tend you miss the most interesting component that makes
the story interesting.
Like
reality, there are real people who are sometimes more interesting than
fictional characters in fiction in novels or movies.
He
is an Arborist, not for recreational purposes but for living. An arborist is a
tree expert , this guy, lets call him
Wimale climb trees to cut trees
down or spruce them up because they are overgrown and blocking the sun from
other trees or for safety reasons.
You
don’t get contracts for cutting down trees every day, because of government approval
processes and also trees take long time to grow. The approval process for cutting down trees
and transporting the logs to timber mill is so cumbersome many people just
don’t bother, they allow trees to age and die.
So
our wimale gets a contract to cut a tree like once in a fortnight. And depending
on the dangers involved especially how close the tree to houses the charges
range from 2500- 15000 Rupees. He doesn’t bring an assistant so the customer
will have to find a guy to hold ropes etc if the owner himself is not willing
to do that. I decided the sacred fig to is too sacred to cut.
He wouldn’t back down from
any tree unless it is infected by Dimiyas(Oecophylla smaragdina) but increase the fee if tree is precariously
placed. Other sole reason that he would not accept a contract is if the subject
tree is a sacred fig tree, but his refusal in this case is conditional , once
he told me he has to perform a 7 day puja before he cuts it and it would cost
me 30000 rs for the puja alone.
He had two
sons and elder son became a brick layer
and the younger joined navy. The younger
son died in action in the war. When a son dies like that his full salary until
he reached the age of 55 if he was alive , is paid to parents 50% each. And then
his retirement benefits the same way. Nowhere in the world, including USA ,has
this kind of generous compensation scheme in the world. I think it was
president Premadasa who introduced this .But later the parents learned that a
month before the son died he had married a girl from a nearby village and the
total salary will go to her lock stock and barrel. The girl at the beginning
agreed to give them half of the salary but later decided to cut it down to 5000
Rs.I wonder whether she has cut it down further.
Wimale has
weakness for arrack. When he gets a good contract he buys a bottle of arrack and
a KG of beef and drink to finish both the bottle and beef I have heard. But he doesn’t
smoke.
He has another vice. That’s horse races. He rides
his bicycle everyday to the bookie in the morning and in the evening. Morning to
speculate and evening to see whether he had speculated right and if so to
collect the reward I suppose.
he also dabbles in faith healing . in these occasions he wears a white sarong and a shirt goes to the house of the family who invited him to bless a family member who has been sick , because of an angry god, the family feels. he blesses the patient for about one hour with many orisons and family pays about 500 rs for his service.
one day I asked him why isn't he using his ability to communicate with the deities to elicit the results of the races beforehand to win at the bookie , and his answer was that the deity that he communicating is a local god and he influence is limited to Dumbara area and turfs in UK are way out of his jurisdiction.
he also dabbles in faith healing . in these occasions he wears a white sarong and a shirt goes to the house of the family who invited him to bless a family member who has been sick , because of an angry god, the family feels. he blesses the patient for about one hour with many orisons and family pays about 500 rs for his service.
one day I asked him why isn't he using his ability to communicate with the deities to elicit the results of the races beforehand to win at the bookie , and his answer was that the deity that he communicating is a local god and he influence is limited to Dumbara area and turfs in UK are way out of his jurisdiction.
## His influence is limited to Dumbara area and turfs in UK are way out of his jurisdiction.##...No, he is wrong...there are three branch offices in UK...connected to network !.
ReplyDeleteare you sure sarath? Pitiye Bandara is just a provincial god , I dont think ha has brnches in UL, even colombo for that matter
ReplyDeleteSomedays ago, I have written a short story about a arborist, who victimized after uprooting a sacred diyathalliya tree.. Good to see you often presenting in English..
ReplyDeleteදියතාලිය
can I read the short story, I write in english these days because my wife is busy otherwise in the mornings, and i cannot type in sinhala
Deleteඇයි සිංහල ටයිපින් ට්රයි නොකරන්නේ.. ඉතා පහසුයි.. ඕන නං සිංග්ලිෂ් සිංහලට කන්වර්ටර් තියෙනවා.. නැතිනම් කෙලින්ම විජේසේකර කීබෝඩි් එකෙන්ම ගහන්න පුලුවන්. මම කියන්නං මුලින්ම ෆෝන් එකට හෙලකුරු ඇප් එක දාලා ට්රයි එකක් දාන්න..
Deleteආහ්.. කියවන්න පුලුවන්. අර දියතාලිය කියල ලින්ක් කරල තියෙන්නේ ඒකට.. ජය