Around 7:30 in the morning, a girl in her late teens or early 20s, nicely dressed, was sitting on a bench in the lake-round. She was looking at her phone. One passer-by (middle-aged) looked at her and turned to another random passer-by and said, "ඔය එනකන් ඉන්නෙ" ["She is waiting for someone"], the implication being that she was a prostitute.
Two days ago, I went to Dinapala Pvt Ltd and bought myself a gas cooker. The conversation that I had with the salesperson was strictly sales related. After I selected the cooker, the salesperson said, "ඒගොල්ලන්ට කියන්න මේ කෑලි දෙක ගලවලා සතියකට සැරයක්වත් බුරුසුවකින් පිරිසිදු කරන්න කියලා." ["Ask them to take these two parts out and clean them with a brush at least once a week."]
A father of three girls (all under 5 years of age): "Girls are not like boys. There's always unity among boys. They don't betray each other. Girls are different. They have no sense of unity. They are always competition minded. We always need to keep an eye on them."
A respected University professor who is a father of one daughter, making a joke: "When I ask my wife to read the map she always holds it upside down and claims that I am going in the wrong direction. Then I have to tell her maybe you are holding it upside down." (The listeners the majority of whom are women laugh their heads off.)
A respected Peradeniya University academic (in his 40s; father of one daughter who is the only child) at a teacher-training programme where the majority of the participants were young female university lecturers: "The percentage of the female students in the University of Peradeniya is increasing every year. This is the situation in other universities as well. The same trend could be seen in many of the professions as well. If this trend continues there will be serious consequences." (By consequences, he meant negative ones.)
Two days ago, I went to Dinapala Pvt Ltd and bought myself a gas cooker. The conversation that I had with the salesperson was strictly sales related. After I selected the cooker, the salesperson said, "ඒගොල්ලන්ට කියන්න මේ කෑලි දෙක ගලවලා සතියකට සැරයක්වත් බුරුසුවකින් පිරිසිදු කරන්න කියලා." ["Ask them to take these two parts out and clean them with a brush at least once a week."]
A father of three girls (all under 5 years of age): "Girls are not like boys. There's always unity among boys. They don't betray each other. Girls are different. They have no sense of unity. They are always competition minded. We always need to keep an eye on them."
A respected University professor who is a father of one daughter, making a joke: "When I ask my wife to read the map she always holds it upside down and claims that I am going in the wrong direction. Then I have to tell her maybe you are holding it upside down." (The listeners the majority of whom are women laugh their heads off.)
A respected Peradeniya University academic (in his 40s; father of one daughter who is the only child) at a teacher-training programme where the majority of the participants were young female university lecturers: "The percentage of the female students in the University of Peradeniya is increasing every year. This is the situation in other universities as well. The same trend could be seen in many of the professions as well. If this trend continues there will be serious consequences." (By consequences, he meant negative ones.)