Ye Olde Lankan Bricks, Pt. 1

I have spent the better part of this week doing naught but clambering around ruined heaps of Sri Lankan bricks from a 2000-year time span. During this period, I have discovered, the art and science of brick-making did not much change. Whether they were laid in medieval times or in the days of Sri Lanka's most ancient kings, the bricks of the era looked like any damn bricks. However, I have recently realized that by strange coincidence, my itinerary thus far has taken me almost perfectly on a path backwards through time, visiting the successive centers of Sinhalese culture in reverse order. I started with the craptacular modern metropolis of Colombo, then went to the colonial-era Sinhalese redoubt of Kandy. Of these I have said enough. Most recently I have visited the medieval capital of the island at Polonnaruwa, and the mighty capital of the Sri Lankan ancients at Anuradhapura. I have thoughts, as well as judgments that could be mistaken for actual thoughts, to share on both of these. But first, time for some history.... Wooooooooooooo!!!

In the beginning there was Lanka. It was populated by shapeshifting demons, and Lord Rama came to Lanka with an army of non-demonic shapeshifters, mostly monkeys, and kicked their asses. Then a couple thousand years passed and the Sinhalese showed up. They had villages and shit. Around the 4th century B.C., they found a city called Anuradhapura, which becomes sort of important. Then Ashoka, Emperor of India, sends his son Mahindu to Lanka for the purpose of converting the people to Buddhism, which he does. Anuradhapura around this time suddenly becomes super-important and grows into one of the great cities of the ancient world, with enormous monuments, many thousands of people, and ridiculous legends. The Sinhalese make mad money trading with India and Rome. Anuradhapura is a big deal for more than a thousand years. Indian kings, who reveled in pointless conquest and also had bazillions of highly disposable Indian people for their armies, invaded Lanka like all the time. At some point the Sinhalese make the mistake of actually fucking with the Chola empire near the height of its power, and the Cholas thirst for vengeance. They take Lanka, and in 993 utterly destroy Anuradhapura, and build a new capital for their island holdings at Polonnaruwa. Then the Sinhalese somehow take Polonnaruwa and rule from there for a few hundred years. Then more wars happen and civilization in general collapses. Then whitey shows up with some boats and guns and shit gets even realer, which is as far as I am going to recount right now because while I'm typing I am also vying for the attentions of a charming young Sinhalese woman, and any time I think about history for an extended period my flirtations are interrupted by this smug-looking novice monk. I hope you understand.

So, as I said, I found myself first at Sri Lanka's medieval capital, Polonnaruwa. It is now, as are most Sri Lankan ruins, located on the edge of some hot, dry, little village with a windswept lake, no decent restaurants, and a population of mustachioed men driving around on motorcycles with heaps of vaguely Buddhist souvenirs in wicker baskets. Modern Polonnaruwa demands absolutely no attention whatsoever, unless you are particularly interested in the unusual scents carried by villagers on their way to the lake to wash off. Let us turn instead to medieval Polonnaruwa.

Medieval Polonnaruwa is much publicized as being the most fascinating old city of Sri Lanka etc., etc., due to its unique and eclectic architecture, a heritage of its founding by the Indians and later reconquest by the Sinhalese. And indeed, the various ruins do come in a remarkable variety of shapes and layouts. There are the usual gigantic dagobas (dagoba is Sri Lankan for stupa), strange circular relic-houses, towering ziggurat-style temples, and crumbling, headless Buddhas galore. However, it must be said that for all the splendor it must have once represented, it is now effectively an open-air geometry lesson conducted entirely by examining the crumbling cross-sections of various things built out of the timeless and changeless Sri Lankan brick. I shan't go into naming all the various structures I visited. That's what real tourist guides are for. If you need to know which eroded, half-toppled shrine served as the Temple of the Tooth in which long-passed decade, you can look elsewhere, because beyond a certain point even I don't care.

There is, however, a distinct category of human beings that do care about such things, and they are called the French. Polonnaruwa is crawling with French people, which is not a surprise, because this is the exact sort of thing that French people visiting in Asia love. Without fail, you will find them in large groups following some well-educated and enterprisingly French-speaking guide in front of some long-abandoned heap of rocks with faded carvings that require a short treatise on obscure episodes in the history of South Asian art to understand. I don't actually speak French, but I know enough to get the general sense of what is being said, and time after time I run into packs of squinting Gauls listening with great care to a 3-minute monologue about, say, the technological and artistic development of millstones, with particular attention being paid to the audience's Frenchness. "This millstone is a fine example of 12th-century Sinhalese agricultural technology," the guide will be saying. "This one in particular has a circumference of 273 centimeters, and weighs a full 20 kilos more than the well-known millstone at the Abbe St. Poisson-sur-Fromage!" This prompts a lot of thoughtful head-bobbing and a chorus of French whispers. "20 keelos more zan ze meelstone of Poisson-sur-Fromage! Can you belize it?"

Apart from French people, Polonnaruwa is also ovverun with other varieties of primate. Somehow, monkeys and the French just don't seem to get along. My theory is that the French object to monkeys not taking themselves seriously enough.

And now, dear readers, I am afraid I must leave you, having said almost nothing of worth about Polonnoruwa at all, and having not even begun my discussion of Anuradhapura. This will have to be Ye Olde Lankan Bricks, Pt. 1 , because I've just talked my way into a dinner date and I need to scour this village for an eatery that isn't toxic enough to kill a 130-pound woman. From what I've seen of this town so far, this could mean my afternoon is booked

Prof. G.F. Buddha
Class of 323 B.C. Chair in Subcontinental Bullshit
International Institute of Thug Life