{"id":110306,"date":"2023-03-13T15:11:25","date_gmt":"2023-03-13T15:11:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/websitedesigns.com.au\/elankanew\/?p=110306"},"modified":"2023-03-18T05:05:45","modified_gmt":"2023-03-18T05:05:45","slug":"situlpauwa-veddas-building-a-bungalow-at-thenaddi-bay-on-idyllic-east-coast","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/websitedesigns.com.au\/elankanew\/situlpauwa-veddas-building-a-bungalow-at-thenaddi-bay-on-idyllic-east-coast\/","title":{"rendered":"Situlpauwa, Veddas, building a bungalow at Thenaddi Bay on idyllic East coast"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2 class=\"mvp-post-title left entry-title\" style=\"text-align: center;\"><span style=\"color: #800000;\"><strong>Situlpauwa, Veddas, building a bungalow at Thenaddi Bay on idyllic East coast<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/island.lk\/situlpauwa-veddas-building-a-bungalow-at-thenaddi-bay-on-idyllic-east-coast\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><img loading=\"lazy\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-110304 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/island.lk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/20230309_173449.png\" alt=\"biryani\" width=\"600\" height=\"400\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">Source :\u00a0<a style=\"color: #000000;\" href=\"https:\/\/island.lk\/situlpauwa-veddas-building-a-bungalow-at-thenaddi-bay-on-idyllic-east-coast\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">island<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\"><strong>Excerpted from te authorized biography of Thilo Hoffmann by Douglas B. Ranasinghe<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\"><em><strong>(Continued from last week) :\u00a0<span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #0000ff;\"><a style=\"color: #0000ff;\" href=\"https:\/\/websitedesigns.com.au\/elankanew\/travel-and-exploration-in-the-jungles-coast-and-kataragama-by-douglas-b-ranasinghe\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">https:\/\/websitedesigns.com.au\/elankanew\/travel-and-exploration-in-the-jungles-coast-and-kataragama-by-douglas-b-ranasinghe\/<\/a><\/span><\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">Thilo continues: \u201cThe Ven. Bhikkhu Sumedha, a long-time friend who had grown up in Switzerland, spent his early hermit years as a Buddhist monk at Situlpauwa and at the top of Vedahitikanda. He later obtained higher ordination, and died in Kandy in 2006. On his occasional visits to Colombo, dana was regularly offered at our house. Situlpauwa was then a jungle-covered site with only an occasional hermit monk in residence, and wildlife roaming freely through it. Today, as a result of restoration and development, the jungle has given way to concrete, electric lights, noise and commerce.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">During his time in Sri Lanka Thilo has been dismayed to witness such change, in diverse ways, at countless holy and historical places. He adds one example: \u201cWe may perhaps record two different alterations at the famous Koneswaram Temple, on Swami Rock at Trincomalee. The entire temple has been \u2018restored\u2019 and renovated, covering under cement and plaster and layers of glossy new paint all traces of its ancient history.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">\u201cIt is also the site of an act of vandalism. There on a stone pillar was an inscription in high relief recording the death of a young Dutch woman who in the 18th century threw herself over the precipice after watching her lover\u2019s ship sail away. This was chiselled away in the 1980s, a testimony to the prevalent politico-religious chauvinism.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\"><strong>Veddas<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">In 1950 Thilo and Mae visited the Pollebedda Veddas in the company of Dr R. L. Spittel. After Thilo finished work at the office on Friday, they drove through the night to Maha Oya, via Haputale, Badulla and Bibile. In the early morning Spittel took them to Pollebedda, deep in the dry zone jungle, where a small and reasonably typical Vedda community was living.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">Dr Spittel pointed out two younger men whom he described as \u201cgood throwbacks\u201d and who, though of mixed blood, showed external characteristics of the Vedda race. He explained that the pure Veddas had ceased to exist some 20 years earlier as by then they had all been absorbed in the Sinhalese and Tamil populations. Thilo adds that other authorities with first-hand knowledge of the Veddas agree with this view. A dance was performed, and the visitors observed the families in their daily activties. Most had huts to live in, and were cultivating. There was one tent-like hut covered with pieces of tree bark. Rats were an item in the diet.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">Twenty-six years later, in July 1976, the Hoffmanns again visited Pollebedda, which is about 15 km south of Maha Oya along the Rambukkan Oya. They camped out in a vain bid to see a rare bird, the broad-billed roller, which had been reported there. The place had changed beyond recognition, the thick forest had been cleared, and chenas had turned it into a \u2018scrub desert\u2019. A school building and teachers\u2019 quarters had been put up. There was no trace of the Vedda settlement. Thilo explains:<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">\u201cToday\u2019s `show-Veddas\u2019 of Dambana (so styled by the Seligmanns even a century ago), led by the offspring of a southern Sinhalese, masquerade as true Veddas for a gullible public. There is the strong impression that an outside \u2018guru\u2019 is instructing them in some of the old Vedda facts and customs obtained from the literature, e.g. the present name of the \u2018chief, or the offering of bees\u2019 honey to the sacred Tooth Relic. If you discount the costume and appendages (axe, bow and arrow) none of the Dambana villagers even look like Veddas.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">Well before the Maduru Oya National Park had been declared, large areas in it north of Dambana and Maha Oya had been cleared of jungle and settled. Village infrastructure had been established, schools and ancillary buildings constructed. \u2018Vedda life\u2019 had been greatly restricted and consisted chiefly of poaching (not with bow and arrow) as in all villages in jungle areas.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">When the Park was declared all the people living within its boundaries and in the bed of the new reservoir were given alternative land and habitations in newly developed areas. The people of Dambana, although the village itself is not in the Park, were offered irrigable land and houses below the nearby Ratkinda reservoir.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">All accepted and moved except the fake Vedda chief Tisahamy, a Sinhalese who had shrewdly adopted the name of Dr Spittel\u2019s hero, and his family. He successfully defied law and authority, lived in a large house in the midst of a banana plantation just inside the National Park boundary, and, with his young offspring play-acted the Vedda for assorted local and foreign tourists. Supported by sponsors and gurus, he even obtained an order from the District Court which forced the Wildlife Department to demolish the gate they had put up at the boundary of the Park.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">Time went by and the new Tisahamy died. Recent history was quickly forgotten, and with the help of journalists, gullible politicians, foreign and local anthropologists the Vedda race was miraculously resuscitated. The settlers from Ratkinda now returned to Dambana, as the life of a show-Vedda had become full of promise.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">Soon the motley crowd became even the internationally acknowledged representatives of the \u2018indigenous people\u2019 of Sri Lanka, and their leaders put in an expenses-paid appearance at the Permanent Forum of Indigenous People of the UN in Geneva, Switzerland. Local intellectuals and politicians recognized this set-up early as a god-sent opportunity to gain status and publicity. The highest authorities were persuaded to accord the \u201cVeddas\u201d privileges not given to any others, such as free movement and hunting, with guns, within the National Park.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">This is the story of a scrappy bunch of villagers who by ruse and the cunning \u2018PR-ship\u2019 of their leader and his advisors became the `indigenous people\u2019 of Sri Lanka, and as such are being cuddled by the State, the tourists and some of the island\u2019s elite. Others have joined the bandwagon and, true to form, new demands are being presented.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">If these, or other, villagers want to re-enact Vedda customs and habits in order to generate attention and income for themselves then that is their business. But they cannot expect nor be given special rights and privileges under the laws of the country.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\"><strong>The East<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">Few today are aware that the southern part of the Eastern Province, including Batticaloa, was virtually cut off from the rest of the country until the mid 20th century. At the time of Thilo\u2019s first visits the motorable road ended at Polonnaruwa. Then, the railway bridges at Manampitiya and Valaichchenai (which had been opened in 1928) were converted to dual rail and road use, and connecting roads built, which allowed for the first time relatively easy access to that part of the East of Sri Lanka.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">Before this Batticaloa could be reached from Colombo by road only via Beragala (below Haputale, at 3,500 ft, or 1,100 m a.s.1.) \u2013 Wellawaya \u2013 Pottuvil, or even more tediously via Badulla \u2013 Passara \u2013 Bibile \u2013 Eravur; and before the Second World War only by boat. To get to Batticaloa from Trincomalee ferries had to be used at seven places and the 80-mile (130 km) trip needed a full day.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">Until the Second World War there had been a coastal shipping service for cargo and passengers. The vessels were named after the wives of past British Governors: Lady Manning, etc. and the line was called \u2018the Lady line\u2019. The small steamboats berthed at all coastal towns of some importance: Chilaw, Negombo, Colombo, Beruwela, Galle, Hambantota, Arugam Bay, Batticaloa, Kalkudah, Trincomalee and KKS. Until recently the remnants of the old piers could be seen at Hambantota and Kalkudah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">The East thus very much led a life of its own. It was and is distinctly different from the North. Its coconut industry \u2013 this too is not well known \u2013 was pioneered by British proprietary planters who settled there in the 19th century. The transformation of the Eastern Province began with the Gal Oya Development Project in the 1950s. Even until the end of that decade there was a change in the direction of milestones near Siyambalanduwa, because the road had been constructed starting from both ends.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">The Eastern Province has a great touristic potential, but its development should be undertaken with circumspection and responsibility. Earlier attempts, especially at Kalkudah and Passikudah and to some extent at Arugam Bay and in the wider Trincomalee area, do not inspire much hope that natural and traditional assets will be suitably protected and preserved.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\"><strong>Thenaddi Bay<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">In the 1960s Thilo purchased a piece of land on the beach at Thenaddi Bay, a few miles north of Valaichchenai. For several years he had been searching for a suitable site on the East coast between Panama and Trincomalee. Then one day Mr S.V.O. Somanader of Kalkudah, who knew of his interest, drew his attention to a plot available at Kayankerni. Thilo had a look at the one-inch map, and instantly bought it without having seen it!<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">It proved to be a \u2018dream\u2019 location, alone in the centre of the wide bay with sandy, tree-fringed beaches and with crystal-clear blue water, except during the north-east monsoon when the sea is rough.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">The tiny village of Kayankerni is a stronghold of the so-called Coast Veddas, a group of people who Thilo says are \u201cas racially mixed as their forest-dwelling relatives, who deny any connection\u201d. Here also is a small and simple temple in which the mysterious Kapal-Theivam (Kapalpei) ceremony is celebrated. The powerful deity is a foreigner who arrived in a ship. In the temple compound the wooden model of a ship is displayed atop a high pole.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">First, the basic unit of the holiday home was constructed: a fortress-like large rectangle of 15-foot high white walls, roofs sloping inward, an open inner courtyard with a well in its centre, and a wide seaward veranda. Thilo received enthusiastic and active assistance from his friend Lalith Senanayake.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">In the following years, sporadically, many additions were made: bedrooms, a roof-top veranda with a spiral staircase; a guest-house, separate but connected by a covered passageway, with `meda midula\u2019 and kitchen; a boathouse, a water tower, a garage, and eventually a two-storied rear wing.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">Xavier Jobin and Stanley Gnanam, both of Baurs\u2019 Palugaswewa Estate, with their wide experience in building, contributed greatly, also to necessary alterations and repairs; and Mr S. M. Sathiacama, then an engineer at Baurs, was very helpful. The very extensive roofs were covered with country tiles, which were frequently damaged by playful monkeys \u2013 who also \u201charvested\u201d all the coconuts, well before maturity, on the 20-odd palms near the house!<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">Geoffrey Bawa, who was a friend of the Hoffmanns, called it \u201cthe best non-architect house I have seen\u201d. There was no electricity. Kerosene fuelled the lamps at night and the refrigerator.For Thilo, working and sweating in the house and land was a regular and satisfying recreation. There was always something needing repair or maintenance or development. The first and often exasperating task on arrival was to start the fridge and the motor of the water pump. One of the most exhilarating moments of Thilo\u2019s life, he recounts, was when he struck water some 10 or 12 feet down a hot and narrow cement tube. It was the first well on the property, and the main house was then built around it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">In the rear of the property Thilo developed his own little jungle from \u201cthe most thorny and impenetrable thicket in the world\u201d. Along the beach he planted wind and salt resistant shrubs and palmyra palms.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">For many years the Hoffmanns and their friends spent the most memorable weekends and holidays in this \u201cmagical\u201d place, considered by some as the best times of their lives. There were marvellous coral reefs at the northern end of the bay, and others several miles long fringed the bay towards the open sea. These were rich in marine life, and comparable to the Maldives. There was fishing, diving, and snorkeling as well as underwater photography.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/island.lk\/situlpauwa-veddas-building-a-bungalow-at-thenaddi-bay-on-idyllic-east-coast\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><img loading=\"lazy\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-110304 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/island.lk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/20230309_173609.png\" alt=\"biryani\" width=\"600\" height=\"400\" \/><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">They did excursions up and down the coast to Trincomalee, the Baron\u2019s Cap area \u2013 Toppigala, later of LTTE fame, locally called Kudumbi Kanda \u2013 and other remote inland wildlife areas. In most of these elephants were numerous. There was a fibreglass boat with outboard motor, which was later seized by the LTTE. They often went to Tamankaduwa, where elephants congregate in large numbers at times; up to more than 200 together have been observed by Thilo in that area1. Occasionally elephants even visited his property.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">Thilo knew all the unique villus along the Mahaweli Ganga, which are fed and maintained by water from the river. They are part of the great biological diversity in the neglected Flood Plains and Somawathiya National Parks and adjoining protected areas; some of these form beautiful, wide landscapes, known to few. Their restoration now as effective conservation areas is a national duty.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">The coast northward of the bungalow to Panichchankerni, Vakarai, Verugal, and especially from Ichchilampatai to Foul Point and Seruwawila, was little affected by any modern influences. Thinly populated \u2013 with a temporary migration during the south-west monsoon of fishermen from the west coast \u2013 it appeared as it would have centuries ago: lagoons, mangroves, a vast extent of jungle in the hinterland, rocky outcrops in forests and along the shore sticking out of the sea like monuments, coral reefs, the white beaches, venerable old trees, lonely temples and holy places.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">From February to October there was almost permanent good weather, turning hot in May with the strong blowing of the warm kachan wind from the land. Blue sky, blue water, wide sandy beaches and the green fringe of ancient forest trees exemplified here the wonder of nearly untouched nature with man a small, well-fitting part of it \u2013 man and nature in balance. To add to all this, remarks Thilo, there is a wonderful smell of the flowering goda ratmal (Ixora arborea).<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">Seasonally the warm and calm water teems with tiny fluorescent organisms. At night the shallow waves running along the smooth shore light up like a moving illumination, and a swimming person is outlined with brightness in the clear water. Again, seasonally, the coastal jungle would be alive with swarms of fireflies sparkling at night, larger than elsewhere in the island.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">At times, depending on climate and wind, the coastal water would be invaded by vast numbers of jellyfish. These beautiful, translucent creatures make swimming virtually impossible, not so much because of their sting but the unpleasant sensation of touch. Some, of course, are dangerous such as the Portuguese man-of-war which Thilo has observed on both the west and east coasts.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">Also dangerous to bathers are the estuarine stingrays which seasonally bury themselves in the sand along the shallow shore and so become nearly invisible. They can inflict very painful wounds when trod upon.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">In the 1970s much fuss was made about the sudden proliferation of the crown-of-thorns starfish, a beautiful blue and black inhabitant of tropical coral reefs. It was feared that the reefs would be destroyed. Panicked countermeasures were taken. The very people who were exploiting the reefs for the live fish trade were employed at great cost to spear and kill the starfish. The effect was the opposite of what was desired. The \u2018blue stars\u2019 were everywhere and visibly depleted the corals. In the early 1980s it all just died down, and in 1982 Thilo could not find a single crown-of-thorns in the extensive reefs around Thenaddi Bay.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">During the north-east monsoon interesting items were washed ashore, for instance ambergris, a fatty grey substance, derived from sperm whales, and worth its weight in gold. On one occasion the part skeleton of a whale shark was left behind by the tide.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">Twice, large fishing boats or rafts from Burma, across the Bay of Bengal, had been washed up on the wide beach near the bungalow. They were made of bamboo well tied together with string. A hut-like upper structure held a fireplace. Thilo found them unbelievably sturdy, intact after being storm-driven thousands of miles across the sea. Eventually both of them disintegrated on the wave-battered beach.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\" align=\"LEFT\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">But, increasingly, ugly waste is also being swept ashore. Blobs of tar from boiler waste illegally discharged from passing ships, and literally millions of pieces of plastic in all colours and shapes originating from garbage on land and at sea now litter the sandy beaches.<\/span><\/p>\n<div class=\"mvp-author-info-wrap left relative\">\n<div class=\"mvp-author-info-text left relative\" style=\"text-align: justify;\"><\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Situlpauwa, Veddas, building a bungalow at Thenaddi Bay on idyllic East coast Source :\u00a0island Excerpted from te authorized biography of Thilo Hoffmann by Douglas B. Ranasinghe (Continued from last week) :\u00a0https:\/\/websitedesigns.com.au\/elankanew\/travel-and-exploration-in-the-jungles-coast-and-kataragama-by-douglas-b-ranasinghe\/ Thilo continues: \u201cThe Ven. Bhikkhu Sumedha, a long-time friend who had grown up in Switzerland, spent his early hermit years as a Buddhist monk [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":110307,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"aside","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[51697],"class_list":{"0":"post-110306","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-aside","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-articles","8":"tag-situlpauwa","9":"post_format-post-format-aside"},"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v25.7.1 (Yoast SEO v25.9) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Situlpauwa, Veddas, building a bungalow at Thenaddi Bay on idyllic East coast - eLanka<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Excerpted from te authorized biography of Thilo Hoffmann by Douglas B. Ranasinghe(Continued from last week)Thilo continues:\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"noindex, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Situlpauwa, Veddas, building a bungalow at Thenaddi Bay on idyllic East coast\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Excerpted from te authorized biography of Thilo Hoffmann by Douglas B. 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