‘I was in shock and then in tears’

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 21/04/2019 (2517 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Members of Winnipeg’s Sri Lankan community are shocked after more than 200 people were killed and hundreds more injured when eight bombs exploded on Easter Sunday in churches and luxury hotels in or near Sri Lanka’s capital.

Gishali Gamage, president of the Sri Lankan Association of Manitoba, said she first learned about the explosions when she received a call from a friend there on Saturday night just after midnight Winnipeg time.

“We are deeply saddened about it,” Gamage said on Sunday. “But we don’t know what is going on or who did it.”

Referring to the 26-year long civil war between the government and the Tamil Tigers, a rebel group from the country’s ethnic Tamil minority, where numerous bombings were carried out before ending a decade ago, Gamage said “Sri Lanka has been very peaceful for 10 years.

“It has been coming along very well and now it has happened again.”

Gamage said as far as she knows nobody in the local Sri Lankan community have any family or friends killed or injured.

Six bombs went off almost at the same time at a Catholic church in the country’s capital of Colombo and three hotels there. A few hours later, more explosions occurred at a catholic church in Negombo, a town north of the capital, and a Protestant church in the eastern town of Batticaloa.

Gamage said the association will be holding a moment of silence during this Saturday’s New Year celebrations at a local hotel in recognitions of the victims of the latest violence.

As well, the association planned to hold a special prayer ceremony, or puja, at their temple on Cadboro Road on Sunday at 7 p.m.

“We extend this invitation to all members of the Sri Lankan community to join us,” a statement from the association’s board of directors says.

“For many of us it is hard to fathom why such horrific things happen to innocent people. While such incidents are disgraceful stains on humanity… these are testing times when we need to stick together and stay strong.”

‘It is very tragic. We thought it was all over, but now it seems to be happening all over again’ – Thambirajah Balachandra, Manitoba’s former chief medical examiner and former Sri Lankan

Thambirajah Balachandra, the province’s former chief medical examiner, who was born in Sri Lanka and came to Canada in 1984, said “I just don’t know what is going on in the world.

“It is very tragic. We thought it was all over, but now it seems to be happening all over again.”

Balachandra said family members he has in the South Asian island country are okay.

Kusum Weerathunga said she learned about the violence when she woke up on Sunday.

“I was in shock and then in tears,” Weerathunga said.

“It baffles my mind and I cannot understand who would perpetrate such senseless and heinous acts.”

Weerathunga said she doesn’t know yet how her family and friends are doing because the government there has shut down the Internet in the wake of the violence.

“I cannot get through to them by telephone because I think everyone around the world must be calling Sri Lanka to check if their loved ones are okay,” she said.

“I am very worried.”

Meanwhile, hundreds of worshippers at the annual Easter Sunday service at St. Mary’s Roman Catholic Cathedral heard prayers from Archbishop Richard Gagnon for the people of Sri Lanka.

After the service, Gagnon said he didn’t know much about the bombings, but “it sounds like it was on a large scale.”

Noting that churches were some of the targets of the bombings, Gagnon said cathedrals in Egypt have been the targets of bombers in recent years, as well as a Catholic church in Baghdad.

“This has become unfortunately all too frequent,” he said. “But this sounds particularly bad with a number of churches targeted.

Gagnon said faith will not only help people in Sri Lanka, but also Sri Lankans watching what’s happening from Canada and others.

“For Christians, and everybody else, these things aren’t easy, but we have the knowledge and the awareness of Good Friday followed by Easter Sunday,” he said.

“When we have tragedies like that all of us, any human being, is struck deeply by it. But it’s not the end of the story. There is hope and the world has many good people and the Lord has come amongst us in spite of our troubles. He suffered and so that helps us to go on.

“It helps us to move forward and not to get filled with hatred and resentment but to be hopeful people.”

kevin.rollason@freepress.mb.ca