Classic buses, spices and moma

CULTURAL NOTES

Richard Kinnud

KANDY, Sri Lanka – One of the very first things that came to my notice the moment the light of day shown Sri Lanka to us is their buses.  Those plying the roads looked similar to classic models of buses we have rode on in long trips back in my childhood up to when I was going to college before the luxury models took over.  As nostalgia set in, I wished my companions would agree that one time we will ride the buses even just for some kilometers here.
    The flight we took arrived in Colombo at about midnight and so our jefe decided that we take some rest first at some lodging near the airport.  In the morning, we took a stroll at a nearby town center.  A very conspicuous merchandise at the streetside is the areca nut (moma) and its accompanying ingredients for chewing to include tobacco, the betel leaf, and lime.   
    I saw mostly the mature nuts and are sold either peeled or unpeeled.  A piece costs between fifteen to twenty rupees.  The betel quid are sold in bundles with three pieces of leaves each and sold at sixty to eighty rupees. And a pack of the lime is at twenty rupees.  Altogether, the costs in rupees would approximate between fifteen to twenty pesos. 
    The amount comes close, I guess, to the price of the “taluwan”, a term back home to refer to a pack of the nut, quid, and lime.  (The word taluwan originally refers to the small bag or kit that a chewer tags along containing nut, quid and lime and other essentials for chewing.)
    Our first lunch was at roadside eatery.  It was of rice, lentils, some vegetables, chicken, and fried fish all in one platter.  The set-up reminded me of Jack’s Rice, the menu at a well-known restaurant back home that had “all” in one plate, which was copied several times over by other diners.  A manifest difference of what we had here in Sri Lanka is that except for the rice and the fried fish, everything else on the plate were very spicy.   Every other meal we would later have were comparably spicy.  One of those who hosted us said, people here do not eat without spices.  This reminded me of friends back home who would say that they also don’t eat without a chili.  I think they will love it here with all those spices in every meal.
    I would soon have my wish of a bus ride from visiting the city center of Kandy to were we were staying in Peradeniya.  The bus we rode one was the classic one – non-aircon, two rows of seats (three-seater row on one side and the two-seater on the other side.   The ride was short though at it is about five kilometers.  The fare is fifty-five rupees (approximately nine pesos).
    The next day we had a longer bus ride to another city which is about three to four hours journey.  This time, our host who was university professor made sure that we take the aircon bus. As luck would have it though, one hour into the trip, the bus had some trouble in its heating components.  We were told to wait for a second bus. 
    Unfortunately, or perhaps happily in one angle, the next air-con bus was full.  The next aircon bus would be in an hour, the conductor said, but we told him we can take the non-aircon or the classic one, which he translated to us as the “normal bus”.  The bus was full but luckily, we had some seats. 
    The curtains flew as the wind gushed in when the bus moved.  It brought the whiff of the countryside to accompany the view of rice fields, grasslands, the mountains, trees, palms to include the moma, small shops, temples, and many others. 
    The conductor would soon inform us that we now got to the junction where we are to take another bus to our final destination.  The next ride was a coaster, an aircon one, but was so jampacked that it took some time before we can have a seat as passengers alight. 
    The experience brought back memories of connecting bus trips back home especially when transportation was difficult in those past times.  When one missed or cannot be accommodated in the limited trips from the province to the city, the option is to take some “cutting trip” as commonly referred to. 
    But even as this bus trip became a multiple ride, there was cheerfulness as we reached our final destination especially when our host had us to experience a bit of rural Sri Lanka.
    The official purpose of our coming here is a meeting for a project that endeavors to develop a curriculum and enable involved universities to offer a graduate degree in agro-ecology.  The end in view is the development of professionals for “design and management of a sustainable agriculture,” according to the project website, fitting-in “ecological rationality” in cropping and farming systems.
    As I write this piece, I played on the thought of where might classic buses, the spices, and moma fit in to ecological rationality.  To me, these are language of the simpler way of life.  But is economic rationality actually lording over?  If ways of life that doesn’t take too much toll on ecology are already part of the past, I hope the agro-ecology curriculum is a sign that it is a very recoverable condition.