Lanka's Princess Quotes

She had got what she wanted—Kuber’s disgrace. Here was a man without his power and pomposity, Meenakshi flicked him a scornful gaze.

You know me well, brother,’ she said. ‘But have you been grabbed by your arm viciously while you struggled, overcome with fear and uncertainty at what would happen next and lived the terror of being snatched away? Looking out frantically as you were dragged out of your own home whilst your parents are watching helplessly?’ she hissed, her thin nose flaring. ‘I had no one to call for help but myself and it was that brute Kuber who did that to me!’ Her eyes were blazing, her voice glacial.

You have to allow yourself to be happy but not without letting go of pain and anger. Or you start believing that unhappiness is your destined happiness. In your sorrow, you consider yourself a victim and every victim prefers to believe they were innocently persecuted. But few realize that they are their own tormentors. You tormented yourself with your refusal to submit to a larger truth.

Interestingly, the lion plays an important role in the Mahavamsa, a Pali epic, that is the foundation myth of the Sinhalese people of Sri Lanka. According to the Mahavamsa, the Sinhalese people are the descendants of Prince Vijaya and his followers who sailed down to Sri Lanka in the sixth century BC from what is now Orissa and West Bengal. The story tells us that Prince Vijaya was the son of a lion and a human princess, which is why the majority population of Sri Lanka call themselves the Sinhala—or the lion people—and the country’s national flag features a stylized lion holding a sword. Equally significant is the fact that the Tamil rebels of northern Sri Lanka chose to call themselves the ‘Tigers’. The ancient rivalry between the two big cats remains embedded in cultural memory even as the animals themselves face extinction. Excerpt From: Sanjeev Sanyal. “Land of the Seven Rivers A Brief History of India's Geography”. Apple Books.