Due to some traffic issues we arrived at the university of Peradeniya Department of Geography at 10.15 am to greet Dr. Arularasi Balakrishnan. Her lecture begun with an overview of the social landscape in Sri Lanka where she noted that Sri Lanka is ranked 78th on the Human Development Index. More so she went over the traditional settlement setup- which includes a river, a tank system and a paddy. Her discussion primarily focused on the causes, impacts and future of the economic crisis in Sri Lanka. Dr. Arularasi Balakrishnan gave some of the causes as follows: unsustainable debt accumulation, decline in foreign reserves, policy mistes, structural economic issues, external shocks and more. Later she went on to explain how these causes contributed to inflation and a foreign reserve crisis, including a comprehensive analysis of the political impacts of economic crisis. Lastly, she informed us about the response and recovery measures to taken to resolve the economic crisis. She left us to ponder the question of what Sri Lanka's economic future will be
After our lecture we went to an NGO called Women Development Center and their store called Sthree Shop-Social Enterprise. While we were there we got an introduction from the women working there about what their organization is working towards and for whom. The main goals of the organization is to support and equip women-led community groups with the knowledge, resources and skills necessary for them to be able to challenge the social injustices they face. gender-based violence. They were invested in helping women, children and disabled people with their (3/4) facilities around the city Kandy and with their trainers being well-trained in caring and helping the disabled. After their introduction they served us lunch, a traditional Sri Lankan meal consisting of dahl, rice, papadam, mango curry and more. After a while we got to explore their store that contained many of their hand-made items of clothing, accessories and more, including cultural items.
In the evening we went to a cultural dance show at the Kandyan Cultural Center. There we were able to see many different types of dances. For example, the Mayuranatum (peacock-dance) and the Ginisisila (fire-dance). In addition to the dancing were both drums and traditional clothing and masks. The performers were dancing with fire, balancing plates and doing acrobatics. It was a great cultural experience for us and a good way to end today's program.
Group 1 - Andrea, Julia, Kaja, Lorelei