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During the past two decades Sri Lanka had been going through a remarkable metamorphosis. My conclusion was reinforced following a few most unusual of circumstances. These incidents may not matter so much to many, but taken cumulatively, they are a reliable reflection of how good or bad we are doing. Skeptics may not see it this way. But I am optimist. In 1982 while stuck in traffic on Santa Monica freeway in Los Angeles, I pulled alongside a flat bed truck. Its cargo was a 4 x 4 crate wrapped in clear plastic sheets.

This was the time when J. R. Jayewardene's export oriented market reforms were taking the roots. My eyes couldn't believe it, but the 2-inch letters printed cross its side were unmistaken and clear: LANKA WALL TILES. I was overwhelmed with joy, and through my tears I could almost see the palm prints of the quarry workers who packed this crate. There is no doubt, spread across a polished living room of a Hollywood villa today, those tiles must be quietly validating the workmanship of Sri Lankan craftsmen.

Then in 1999, sitting in my home in Los Angeles, I was chatting on line with my brother MB who lives at Maradankalla in the headwaters of Mahakanadarawa tank. He typed that it was a windy night. In the middle of the chat session, he asked me to pause as he had to go and check the agitated dog barking at some shadows behind the house. A moment later, the following sentence appeared on my computer screen: "We have six visitors by our water tank. A couple of banana trees already gone and a few rolled up in their trunks. There is a baby jumbo too!"

Next day, I had an e-mail from my brother. My heart sank as I read the memo. "The matriarch of the last night herd was electrocuted by a downed high tension power line above our tank. Wild Life and the CEB are on the scene." We have had elephants pass by and through our village before. We have had tuskers felled by irate villagers, but no news made me sadder than this. As progress enveloped all around us, we marginalized these utterly remarkable creatures who shared this land with us. Only a computer keystroke separated my brother and me with half a world between us. But for the matriarch who perished at the edge of Maradankalla and her clan who marched across the village just last night, their once free domain had become most illusive and as far as never before.

At Mihintale, a university is blooming on a field spotted with Divul trees and rotten logs of a buffalo kraal. This may be a poor analogy, nevertheless, when New Yorkers began building high rises, west of the Mississippi was called the "Wild West". If you look out into the night sky today, the tiny speck of light moving through the stars is the space vehicle that was built in the same 'Wild West' just a decade ago. An international consortium just signed a contract to build an expressway from Colombo to Kandy. In the mid 90s, Central Bank had to use only decimal points to report Sri Lanka's growth rate. It's hovering near 5% now. The boss of all the world's diplomats, Kofi Annan is flying in to Colombo next month.

I am writing this from our community we still call our 'Gammedda' when you have begun calling yours a 'lane'. Folks, we can see down from here the progress as it inches towards us. It is slow, but we are an enduring bunch. Progress has the same certainty as the postman. He delivers, ever at dusk. All we need is the Colombo government to let us have our fair share, and to keep us included in its greater scheme of things.

And now I like to end this letter with a recent anecdotal experience.

Just last week, our family went on a camping trip to Catalina Island, which is 22 miles off the coast of Los Angeles in California. My wife and daughter know this, but this was in fact not a trip I wanted to make. But when your family consists of a wife and a teenage daughter, they rule! At the end of the day, we unpacked and set up our camp on a bluff overlooking a little cove.

We erected the tent, and there I was, sitting at the door observing the golden rays of the sun setting over the Pacific. As I adjusted the door flaps of the tent, my eyes caught a small white label sewn to the seams of the canvas. There was a paragraph of tent specifications printed on it and, at the end was the following three words: Made in Sri Lanka.

These three words made that night the best sleep-out (except of course under the Konegaha at Maha Akkare!) I had had in a long while. When I showed it to my family, a quiet ambience of pride swept through the tent.

That night, as I lay awake listening to the waves of the Pacific gently rolling on to the beach below, I knew I was not far from the blue waters of the Indian Ocean Riding in the breeze stroking the sides of our tent flaps was the chirpy murmur of the mermaids who put this tent together in a factory at the end of a coconut grove somewhere in my paradise - Sri Lanka.

- Lokubanda Tillakaratne, Los Angeles

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