Features
“THERE WERE ONCE THREE SISTERS HERE” – Anton Chekhov

Sunday Short Story
BY ERNEST MACINTYRE
John Hobbs a middle aged London actor was on holiday in Sydney Australia, all by himself. He ordered an early breakfast to his room at the Four Seasons Hotel at the harbour end of George Street. The coach to Katoomba in the Blue Mountains, for a viewing of the famous ancient rock formation, was leaving at nine that morning.
John’s long journey to the land occupied by his English ancestors over two and a half centuries ago had its strange beginning after John’s last performance. It was Three Sisters by Anton Chekhov, a month ago at the Olivier Theatre. John had a minor part, Vladimir Karlovich Rode a soldier of the regiment stationed close to the home of the three sisters.
Because his was a minor part, he spent much time in the wings absorbing this great play. When the run was finished the play continued to haunt him. He went to his laptop computer to search for, maybe, things about it he had yet to know, and then by accident struck on a mountain formation called Three Sisters, in faraway New South Wales, Australia.
He also read on his screen how the aboriginal people of Australia were not only dispossessed of their land by his ancestors, but how their culture was dismissed. This despite English research scholars unearthing evidence of a culture of humanity, long secluded. After breakfast John read the aboriginal legend behind the rock formation of the Three Sisters and made a print copy to read again on the coach.
The coach arrived at a quarter to nine and all the tourists, mostly English, were settled in. The driver then introduced their tour guide, who stood by the driver, to be seen. He was tall, well built and very dark in skin colour.
” Yes, my name is David Dalaithngu, Dala -ith-nugu”, he repeated. You may find it a little difficult to pronounce, so just call me David. The name David has deep roots in the Bible and means “beloved.” It is derived from the Hebrew name Dawid, which evolved from the Hebrew word dod, meaning beloved which was given to your English culture as David, from the New Testament. Then your culture gave it to my culture, an even older testament. That’s how the world goes on, backwards and forward, all spinning.”
The tourists laughed.
I am an actor in Australian theatre and film, but occasionally take on this role of tour guide to Katoomba, because I like telling you about us.
They laugh again, but more softly.
John’s interest was aroused, as a fellow actor. He introduced himself, as the coach began moving and managed to sit next to David Dalaithngu. John soon pulled out his paper with the printed aboriginal story of the Three Sisters of Katoomba. David said he knew it. John told David that somehow, he couldn’t shake out of his mind the famous play Three Sisters by Chekhov, when he read the Aboriginal story.
“Oh yes I saw that play at the Belconnen Theatre last year. I was too dark skinned to get a part. That play is of three white skinned sisters and their community I know the play well. Let me think about what you say, how it accidentally connected you up with our three sisters.
After more conversation and long silences, the coach arrived at Echo Point . They were soon, all seated on the viewing platform. A silence fell over as they all gazed into the distance at the three rock formations.
The Three sisters, each about nine hundred metres tall and standing shoulder to shoulder, towering over the Jamison Valley had stood there, ever evolving, for over two hundred million years.
The silently gazing people did not even notice that David Dalaithngu, their guide, had positioned himself microphone in hand to the side of the congregation.
David sensing the capture of the audience by the distant sight of the sisters, suddenly brought their attention back to him.
“Your brochures tell you that the three sisters came into being by wind and rain constantly sculpting the soft sandstone of the Blue Mountains. Our people of the Katoomba and Nepean tribes have known geography, like the tourist department people who wrote that. And my people also know our Dreamtime, which is the word your people gave to the religion of my people. But let us call it Dreamtime for this is a tourist excursion.
The Aboriginal dream-time legend has it that three sisters, ‘Mohini’, ‘Wimalah’ and ‘Gunnedoo’ lived in the Jamison Valley as members of the Katoomba tribe. These beautiful young ladies had fallen in love with three brothers from the Nepean tribe, yet tribal law forbade them to marry.
Yes, my people also had law for thousands of years.”
There was laughter.
“The brothers were not happy to accept this law and so decided to use force to capture the three sisters causing a major tribal battle. As the lives of the three sisters were seriously in danger, a folk priest from the Katoomba tribe intervened. I call them priests for convenient cultural crossing: They had supernatural abilities, but distinct from gods and were only revered. This priest took it upon himself to turn the three sisters into stone to protect them from any harm.”
David broke off from the dreamtime story, for a moment.
” I was converted to Christianity by your people and I’m as happy as I was with our ancient dreamtime religion. I thought of it just now because I remember the story in the Bible, in Genesis and in Luke, in the New Testament, how Lot’s wife was turned into a pillar of salt for looking back at Sodom.”
“Anyway, to get back, while our ancient folk priest had intended to reverse the spell when the battle was over, the folk priest himself was killed. As only he could reverse the spell to return the ladies to their former human state, the sisters remain in their magnificent rock formation as a reminder of this dreamtime happening, up to this day for you, and beyond, as long as time.
That is enough for you to think about. And now I will call upon a friend I made during the coach journey this morning. He is English, but an actor, much in theatre, like me, so we are ethnically apart but culturally together. He had some interesting comments about another three sisters from your European culture and our Australian three sisters.
Laughter again.
“John, please” John Hobbs came up and took David Dalaithngu’s place.
“This I did not expect, I only made some comments to David while in the coach. Well, now that I’m standing before you let me blurt out a few strange and stray thoughts.”
He told them how Google of his laptop played an exciting trick on him throwing up the Australian story instead of the Russian, when he searched Three Sisters and that’s why he’s here now. He then made a short aside. “The ship I came on stopped for a day in Colombo, Sri Lanka, and there I came across that the names of two of these three sisters, Mohini and Wimalah are common amongst Sri Lanka women. Maybe a very distant connection.”
“Anyway, to get back, as the computer trick suggests, it is possibly mere coincidence that there are two families of three sisters separated by thousands of physical and cultural miles, and more staggeringly, by about more than a million years, but both time and cultural distance did not obliterate for me the human condition.
“I thought of Chekov’s Three sisters, and how that story ends.”
“The years will pass, and we shall be gone for good and quite forgotten… our faces and our voices will be forgotten and people won’t even know that there were once three sisters here..”
“These words from Chekhov came to me…. mystically……I don’t know …. Thank you”
David Dalaithngu closed the session with a light remark. “And now before lunch, we move to the pub, walking distance from here, for some good Aussie beer, also cultural, and I love it.”
The congregation arose, not responding immediately. They all turned to look again at ‘Mohini’, ‘Wimalah’ and ‘Gunnedoo’ Three sisters, still here.
Features
The Rohingya question and states’ international obligations

The presence of Rohingya refugees in Sri Lanka has prompted sections in the South of the country to raise some concerns in connection with it but The Human Rights Commission of Sri Lanka’s (THRCSL) recent report on the issue, if received and read in a spirit of reconciliation and humanity, should put their minds at ease.
To be sure, there is considerable substance in the objections and worries of the relevant Southern quarters but the majority of the refugees in question need to be seen as victims of complex political circumstances in their countries of origin over which they do not have any control.
Those Rohingyas who are now literally adrift in the seas of South Asia and beyond, are strictly speaking stateless. Most of them are escaping endemic political turmoil and runaway lawlessness in the Rakhine state of Mynamar and the spillover of such tensions into the Myanmar-Bangladesh border and beyond.
There has been playing out in the Rakhine region over the decades a Rohingya armed struggle for autonomy but the majority of the Rohingyas are not in any way supportive of this armed struggle which is an expression of the Rohingyas’ awareness of their separate identity as a community, although they possess a wider Muslim identity as well.
But there has been an influx of Rohingya refugees to several neighbouring countries from this conflict, including very significantly Bangladesh, and this has been triggering concerns among the wider publics in those states which are compelled to manage the Rohingya refugee presence amid economic pressures of their own.
The problems arising from the Rohingya refugee presence have been compounded by the rise of Islamic militancy in South Asia and the tendency among some of these militant groups to exploit this presence for the propagation of their causes.
However, this does not take away from the fact that the majority of Rohingyas are helpless victims of circumstance. They are caught up in the metaphorical ‘exchange of fire’ between mutually suspicious states that are compelled to contend with issues growing out of the rise of Islamic militancy. But for the majority of Rohingyas such endemic conflicts among states translate into displacement, statelessness and growing powerlessness.
For an enlightened understanding of what states need to do in connection with the refugee crisis and connected questions it would be necessary to read the THRCSL report above mentioned. States that are members of the UN family are obliged to ratify and implement a number of conventions related to refugees and the THRCSL mentions some of these. They are: The 1951 Convention on Refugees; 1954 Convention Relating to the Status of Stateless Persons; 1961 Convention on the Reduction of the Stateless and the Rights of Refugees and Stateless Persons within Sri Lanka.
If Sri Lanka and other countries facing a refugee influx have not adopted these laws they would need to do so without further delay if they are opting to remain within the UN fold. In this connection, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights should be seen to be of fundamental importance. The Declaration is the fountainhead, so to speak, of international humanitarian law and UN members states have no choice but to adhere to it.
Contentious issues are likely to grow out of the implementation part of the mentioned conventions but it is best that signatory states take up these matters with the relevant key agencies of the UN rather than grouch over matters that surface from their inalienable obligations towards the stateless and homeless.
It was encouraging to note a Southern group in Sri Lanka mentioning that the Lankan government should draw the attention of the UNHRC to the fact that the state is not a signatory to some of the mentioned refugee conventions. This is the way to go. A dialogue process with the UNHRC, which does not happen to be very popular in Sri Lanka, on such issues would perhaps throw up fresh insights on Sri Lanka’s obligations on refugee issues that may then convince the state to sign and ratify the conventions concerned.
There needs to be a flourishing of such positive approaches to meeting Sri Lanka’s obligations as a UN member state. The present most unhappy existence of being a UN member state and not implementing attendant obligations needs to end if Sri Lanka is not to be accused of ‘double speak’ and ‘double think’.
Meanwhile, identity politics and connected problems are bound to remain in South Asia and bedevil all efforts by states of the region to see eye-to-eye on issues such as the stateless. The yawning ‘democratic deficit’ in South Asia continues to be a formidable challenge.
But all efforts should be made to reduce this deficit through collaborative efforts among the concerned states. This is so because increasing democratization of states remains the most effective means of making identity politics irrelevant and the latter is a primary cause for the break-up of states, which process throws-up troubling consequences, such as statelessness and refugees.
Fresh initiatives need to be undertaken by the ‘South Asian Eight’ to end the continuing ‘Cold War’-type situation between India and Pakistan, since they hold the key to re-activating SAARC and making it workable once again. It ought to be plain to see that it is only the SAARC spirit that could help in ushering a degree of solidarity in South Asia which could go some distance in resolving issues growing out of nation-breaking.
Once again, South-South cooperation should be seen as a compelling necessity. If vital sections of the South come to this realization and recognize the need for such intra-regional cooperation, the coming back to power of Donald Trump could be considered as having yielded some good, though in a highly negative way. Because Trump has made it all too plain that he would not be considering it obligatory on the part of the US to help ease the lot of the South any more.
The South would have no choice but to fall back on strategies of self-reliance. No doubt, this situation would accrue to the benefit of the world’s powerless. Self-reliance is the best option and the only key to unravelling external shackles that bind the South to the North.
Meanwhile, those sections of Southern Sri Lanka that are tending to cheer Trump on need to put the brakes on any such idle distractions. The message that Trump has for the world is one of division and strife. By rolling back almost all the progressive ventures that have come out of Washington over the years, Trump is plunging the world into further ‘disorder’. The international community needs to brace for stepped-up nation-breaking.
Features
Effective and non-effective methods for mitigating human-elephant conflict

by Tharindu Muthukumarana
tharinduele@gmail.com
(Author of the award-winning book “The Life of Last Proboscideans: Elephants”)
“We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them”.
-Albert Einstein
When we examine the records of funds spent in the years beforehand to mitigate human-elephant conflict (HEC), it is evident that the expenditure has been growing. For example, in 2010, USD $505,001 was spent, but in 2018, USD $1,068,021 was spent. So, this shows that expenditure had been over double within a period of less than one decade. But in the same way, the HEC had always been rising throughout the years. So, what went wrong? The answer is that the funds were expended mostly on ineffective mitigating strategies rather than effective mitigating approaches. Henceforth, let’s look at a glimpse of what are the non-effective methods and effective methods.
Non-effective methods Translocation
Elephant translocation involves capturing elephants from one place and moving them to a safer environment. Sri Lanka had done this for many decades. One of the earliest translocations occurred in 1979, when 10 elephants were relocated from Deduru Oya to Wilpattu National Park (NP). So, it was a new experience for the Department of Wildlife Conservation (DWC), and they even had to get a foreign veterinary surgeon named Dr. Ian Hoffmeyr from Etosha NP in Namibia to sedate the elephants.
Unfortunately, radio tracking collars were not put on those elephants to monitor updates of those elephants. So, ultimately what happened was that those translocated elephants’ status never got documented. However, in recent translocations, the GPS tracking collars were fixed on them and have given accurate updates on their whereabouts. According to those data, 3 conclusions are probable: (i) The translocated elephant got killed in the new home. (ii) Left the new home and returned to the initial home. (iii) created conflict with neighbouring villagers in the new home.
As for example, in 2007, a tusker named Ravana that was crop raiding in Anuradhapura got translocated to Udawalawe NP. He then got into conflict with neighbouring villages of Handapanagala, Aluthwewa, and Buttala. Due to this, Ravana got shot in the leg, and as a result, Ravana got re-translocated to Lunugamvehera NP. Again, Ravana raided crops on leased land in the park, and a few months later, Ravana got shot in the jaw and had an agonising death after suffering for a few days.
Another tragic event happened when a young bull elephant named Homey that frequently foraged at a garbage dump in Hambantota got translocated to Yala NP Block II, which took a journey of 75 km. Within a few days, Homey was back at the garbage dump. Astonishingly, when data from the collar was downloaded, it was shown that the route Homey took to return contrasted with the route Homey was taken. For the second time, Homey was translocated to Udawalawe NP, but as time passed by, he created conflict with neighbouring villages. Subsequently, Homey left the park and again returned to the garbage dump. For the third time, Homey got translocated to Maduruoya NP, almost 300 km away from Hambantota. At times, Homey tried to come back to the garbage dump but was unsuccessful due to compact human settlements. So, he continued to stay at Maduruoya but started to create conflict with neighbouring villages. This resulted in him getting shot frequently. One day he got shot in the head and died in a paddy field.
Elephant Drives
Elephant drives involve chasing elephants from one area to another area, and for this, firecrackers or thunder flashes would be used. This procedure can take days to get completed. These drives had happened as early as the 1970s, and the latest to be 2024. From a scientific perspective, the decades of elephant drives that have been done are one of the key reasons for Sri Lanka having the highest level of HEC in the world. Records have clearly shown that after an elephant drive, some or all driven elephants returned. Also, in every location where elephant drives took place, HEC still persists. In many cases, the problem-causing males don’t get driven because those males usually avoid it. Instead, non-problem-causing female elephants get driven. In such incidents, after those driven elephants got enclosed in a restricted home range, those elephants did face starvation and malnourishment that eventually made them die. For this, there are examples coming from Lunugamvehera NP and Yala NP.
Removing the problem elephants
Removing problem elephants could be done in two ways: one is domestication and the other is culling. Such acts can enhance the risk for elephants’ extinction. Problem elephants are usually male elephants, and elephants that raid crops are risk takers. Emerging research shows that risk-taking behaviour contributes highly to their reproductive success. So, if such elephants are removed from the gene pool, it weakens the elephant population.
In modern days, there is a popular misconception that the elephant population has risen, and it is immoderate. In fact, scientifically, there is no way to explain whether the elephant population has risen or plummeted. Because the first legitimate elephant census was done in 2011. Before 2011, elephant population numbers were given as guesses or estimations. After 2011, last year an elephant census was done, but still the results haven’t been published. There are many who think that the elephant population has increased because, around the country, there are places where locals are newly experiencing HEC. This happened because of habitat loss and the blocking of elephant corridors that occurred due to poor development planning done by various governments. So, as a result of it, new places experience HEC.
Still, the Sri Lankan elephant is classified as “Endangered” by the IUCN Red List due to its high risk of extinction and declining population. Also, we must remember that though culling or capturing of elephants is not done, yet annually, in the last few years, over 350 elephants have died due to HEC. This is only the documented data, and the undocumented figure can give a higher value. A mother elephant usually gives birth to a single calf with a two-year gestation period. They have 4-5 years of interval until the next calf is born. Females become less fertile after 40 years. In Sri Lanka only 6,000 elephants are left. So, such a high mortality rate due to HEC is critical.
Biofencing and Geological Barriers

A victim of the human-elephant conflict
Palmyra Palm fencing: This involves planting palmyra trees (Borassus) as a fence to restrict elephants’ movements. Though it has some positive effects, practically there are problems to call it a solution. This project is expected to take a longer time to achieve its anticipated outcomes and could take even a decade. Even so, the germination rate is lower, and by any chance, if at least one tree fails to grow, the fence becomes ineffective.
Thorny plant fencing: Plants such as agave, cacti, and bougainvillaea had been used to deter elephants, but those had been unsuccessful because of elephants’ thick skin. Besides, elephants even feed on thorny plants such as Acacia eburnean that have sharp thorns that can grow up to 1 inch.
Beehive fencing: The fence is erected at chest height with beehives fixed to it and spaced every ten meters. This method had high success in deterring crop-raiding elephants in Africa. In addition, the produce from hives provided economic benefits to farmers. This project was introduced by Save the Elephants Organisation (SEO). From 2014-2019 SEO collaborated with the Sri Lanka Wildlife Conservation Society (SLWCS) to do a pilot project in Wasgamuwa. Unfortunately, results showed it was ineffective due to the reason that African honey bees (Apes mellifera scutellata) and Asian honey bees (Apes cerana indica) behaviour contrasts. Asian bees cannot scare away elephants, and those bees are not active at nighttime.
Trenches: Soil erosion had made trenches ineffective, and also the construction and maintenance cost is very expensive. According to past experiences, it had impeded wildlife movement, and a lot of other smaller animals had died after falling to them. Also, there is a potential of hydrological impacts that would have a negative effect on villages.
Effective methods
Before touching this topic, it is important to mention that the strategies put forward here are science-based projects, and these projects had been put into experiment as pilot projects with successful results. The villagers state that after the implementation of the project, HEC had been solved or mitigated. These projects had been done by the Centre for Conservation and Research and SLWCS.
According to research, it has been proved that the electric fence is the most effective to deter elephants. But it depends where the electric fence is erected. If it is erected in the boundary of a protected area, it can be ineffective, but instead, if it is erected at the border between elephant habitat and human-use areas, it can be successful. This is what is called community-based electric fencing and proved to be successful in mitigating HEC.
Another method is the paddy-field electric fences. These fences are installed seasonally. During cultivation the fences are installed, and during harvest the fence is removed and stored in their houses until the following crop season. So, during the fallow periods, elephants would forage the leftover harvest and other vegetation. By 2020, approximately 50 village electric fences and 25 paddy-field electric fences were active in the Kurunegala, Hambantota, Trincomalee, and Anuradhapura districts for up to 12 years. Feedback from the villagers is positive.
It needs to be mentioned that in 2020 a National Action Plan for the Mitigation of HEC was made by a committee of wildlife experts. Strategies included in the National Action Plan were chosen based on their demonstrated effectiveness, capacity to be executed on a suitable geographic and temporal scale, and cost-effectiveness. Stakeholder discussions were performed with the public and relevant agencies, and their feedback was integrated into the Action Plan as needed. So, if that action plan gets implemented, HEC could be mitigated!
Features
Congratulations…and celebrations

Twenty-one years in the news, in Toronto, Canada, and that certainly calls for big time celebrations!
Dirk Tissera, Editor-in-Chief and Publisher of The Sri Lanka Anchorman, is working on making it a big scene.
He says the 21st Anniversary celebrations will take the form of a gala dinner dance, scheduled for Friday, 30th May, 2025, in Toronto, Canada, adding that there would be plenty of surprises!
In fact, The Sri Lankan Anchorman’s 20th Anniversary, ‘A Night To Remember,’ held on 31 May, 2024, at the J&J Convention Centre, in Toronto, turned out to a resounding success.
Dirk mentioned that last year’s event was sold out long before the scheduled date.
“We generally work on our anniversary celebrations months in advance to ensure that the audience got their monies worth, and there was plenty of variety in the music we provided last year, led by veteran singer, the legendary Fahmy Nazick, along with the band Déjà Vu, guest singer Cherry Deluna, and DJ Chami.
- Dirk and Michelle welcoming guests to The Sri Lankan Anchorman’s 20th Anniversary celebrations
- Fahmy Nazick
What is special about The Sri Lanka Anchorman, a tabloid newspaper, is its wide and varied content which Sri Lankan-Canadians eagerly look forward to reading.
In fact, Dirk Tissera received a top Toronto press award from the National Ethnic Press & Media Council of Canada (NEPMCC) for excellence in editorial content and visual presentation.
An old boy of St. Mary’s College, Dehiwela, he had his early grooming, in journalism, right here, in Colombo, and then moved to Canada, and is now based in Toronto.
Dirk Tissera is efficiently supported by his wife Michelle in the publication of The Sri Lanka Anchorman.
-
News7 days ago
Musk reveals ‘crazy waste’ of USAID funds in Sri Lanka
-
News5 days ago
SLAS senior to be HC in London, several new dpl appointments
-
Features5 days ago
Ken Balendra’s impact on John Keells
-
Life style5 days ago
Polished to Perfection
-
Features5 days ago
The Ceylon Journal’s Second Issue: A Captivating Dive into Sri Lanka’s Rich History and Culture
-
Midweek Review2 days ago
How USAID influenced Sri Lanka
-
Editorial5 days ago
Cat out of the bag
-
Editorial3 days ago
Needed: ‘Ministry of Excuses’