LOVE- Floods

“Two girls from different ethnic backgrounds foster a friendship between their communities in the hour of need!”

January 2019 - A decade following the end of the civil war, the citizens of Sri Lanka are working on dismantling the ethnic and cultural barriers that existed between the Sinhala and Tamil communities on the island.  While tensions still exist in some parts of the country, the island as a whole is moving forward in its journey toward peace and reconciliation, where a culture of trust and coexistence is being established between communities.

Late December 2018 marked one such incident, when five districts in the north and east of Sri Lanka were affected by flash floods caused by the highest recorded rainfall since 1983. Over 75,000 people in Mullaithivu, Kilinochchi, Mannar, Vavuniya, and Jaffna were affected by the floods with over 11,000 displaced and confined to 30 safety centers.

When this tragedy hit, Rujica Niththiyanantharaja, a young girl from Mullaithivu in the north of Sri Lanka, was miles away in the south, in the safety and comfort of the home of her MediaCorp partner, Vindya Gamage in Colombo. The MediaCorp Fellowship is implemented by the Sri Lanka Development Journalist Forum (SDJF) with the support of the International Research and Exchanges Board (IREX) with funding from USAID and aims at building the capacity of 34 young journalists and media students on multimedia storytelling to foster cross cultural understanding and reconciliation. As part of the program, each fellow was paired with another from a completely different ethnic, religious and geographic background. The pairs were expected to host each other for a week and produce stories on cross-cutting issues affecting each other's communities. 

Rujica had never had a close friendship with somebody from the south and Vindya never from the north; however, after meeting just a month prior thanks to the MediaCorp Fellowship, the pair developed a strong bond.

In mid-November 2018, before the floods engulfed the village, Vindya visited Mullaithivu and spent a week with Rujica, exploring the diversity of her community. It was during the period that Vindya hosted Rujica at her home in Colombo that Rujica's home came under heavy floods.

"When the floods engulfed my village, I was with Vindya in Colombo and I could not sit back and wait doing nothing, when my people were suffering alone. I discussed with Vindya what we could do, and we decided to make a post on Facebook asking for help. As I could not speak or write in Sinhala, the language spoken in the South, Vindya did the post and tagged me," says Rujica.  

The simple Facebook post of these two earnest friends from two different ethnicities, speaking two different languages and hailing from two corners of the country, yielded an unexpected reception. Donations flooded in. They received gift vouchers worth 25,000 LKR and cash worth 9000 LKR. After the floods had receded, Rujica returned home with the donations, and love of the people from south. The gift vouchers worth 500 LKR each were distributed to 43 students in the rural village Murippu in Mullaithivu while the balance was given to two children with economic difficulties to buy school shoes. Going further, using a portion of the cash collected, stationary was donated to 25 students in Mulliyawalei East region in Mullaithivu. With the remainder of funds Rujica is eagerly waiting to support yet another group of students. 

"When I went to Mullaitivu before the floods. I understood that even though we live in the same country we don't know crucial things about others. The north is like another island to us, and I'm sure the south is the same for them. There's no opportunity to share information or have interactions. Therefore, my heartiest gratitude goes to SDJF for connecting Rujica and I via the Mediacorp Fellowship. SDJF not only connected two people but opened doors to areas where no communication is happening even though we live in a communication age. Thank you for reminding us that ignorance is not a bliss anymore!" says Vindya.

During the MediaCorp orientation program SDJF also trained the fellows on mobile journalism storytelling (MOJO) to produce stories on the issues of marginalized groups. Applying the skill, she learned during the training, Rujica also produced a story where she documents her visit to the rural school to distribute the gift vouchers. The MOJO video, which was shared on Facebook, has received hundreds of comments from well-wishers. Speaking of the MOJO video Vindya adds, "I don't speak Tamil to understand what is said in the video, but I saw how she could bridge the gaps between north and south through her MOJO video which was amazing in a crisis like this". The MoJo produced by Rujica shared on Facebook https://goo.gl/u1V3qD

"I'm elated to have met Vindya through the MediaCorp Fellowship, my first friend from the south, and being able to support my community with her. This is also my first social service", adds Rujica.