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Buddhist Flag in Sri Lanka

The Buddhist flag was created and hoisted for the first time by Venerable Thera Migettuwatte Gunananda to celebrate the Vesak festival in 28th April 1885. By the Buddhist leaders under the patronage of Sir Henry Olcotte. The flag was published for the first time on “Sarasavi Sandarasa” Newspaper, and since 17th April 1885 it has been used.

Since on that day it has been hoisted Buddhist festival in the flag there are five colour stripes. Which are represented as follows.

  • Blue : Universal compassion
  • Yellow : The middle path
  • Red : Blessings
  • White : Purity and Liberation
  • Orange : Wisdom

Vertical lines represent the harmony of the world people and horizontal lines represent the world peace. The collection of the colours of flag indicates the transcendencey the Buddhism assists for the Buddhist also shown by the Buddhist flag.

 

 

 

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Kanneliya Forest in Sri Lanka

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Location: Kanneliya forest Reserve is located in the galle District in the Southern Province about 125 km away from Colombo. It is one of the largest forest reserves with a high bio-diversity in Sri Lanka.

Waterfalls:Inside the forest there are many streams adding life to the vegetation. Although deforestation has affected them, these streams create several beautiful cascades. There is a high rainfall in Kanneliya from May to July and again in the months of October and November, making it an ideal time to see waterfalls. The anagimale falls is the closest waterfall to the entrance of the forest reserve. It is just 2km away from the entrance. You need to go a little deeper into the forest to see the beautiful waterfall called Narangas Ella.

Bio-diversity: there are 301 plant species at Kanneliya forest reserve, some 133 animal species and 59 species of birds making it very rich in biodiversity.

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Sinhala & Tamil New Year Festival in Sri Lanka

There are many cultural festival is can be seen both religious and traditional festivals. The one is New Year which is celebrated by Sinhala and Tamil people. It falls 13th and 14th of April (also known as the month of Bak) in every year. Some special events are connected with astrology.

According to auspicious time the kindling fire on hearth, Trans action, anointing and leaving for professions are some of them. New year seasons cold the spring time, some of the main objectives are the peace and harmony among the people and the prosperity in the country.

Some traditional milk rice, bunch of banana and other sweet meats are prepaid and offer to the visitors and share with the relations and the neighbors with this their anger and the enmity can be forgotten and renew the relationships. There is special time is called “Nonagathaya”(Neutral period). The astrologers introduce this because of the changing sun from the Meena Raashi (House of Pisces) to the Mesha raashi (House of Aries).

Unusually, both the end of one year and the beginning of the next occur not at midnight but at separate times determined by astrologers with a period of some hours between being a time where one is expected to refrain from all types of work and instead engage solely in relaxing religious activities and traditional games.

During the New Year festivities, both children and adults will often dress in traditional outfits. But the clothes must be washed and very clean because it should be pure.