What’s the Story: The Sri Lanka Podcast

Three spices hold the key to every dish in Sri Lanka.  But which ones are they and why does their consequence stretch far beyond the humble kitchen?

Enslavement is a condition that takes time to undo.  So how did it help to make a spice garden in the jungles of Sri Lanka?

Like the cavalry of old, they raced on to rescue a stricken kingdom from itself.  But what did the Lambakanna dynasty really achieve – and why were they overthrown?

In Sri Lanka, the expert is there right next to you - on the train, in the street, everywhere in fact.  But what happens when you seek one in a doctor’s waiting room?

If you are English, do you really need sex?  Can you not encounter la petite mort simply upon waking up?

Is May the moment to forsake madness and put aside all but the best supporting gods?

“To be or not to be,” is the refrain of several Sri Lankan government departments – but how can they – or that -  free you from suffering?  From cravings?  From any need to cling to things?

Is life really what you best hear when you're absolutely still?  And if so, does knowing the names of different trees help at all?

Unlikely though it sounds, there is a Perehera still grander than that of the annual Kandy Perehera – but what has it got to do with Eve and her serpents?

She was the pin-up of her times – but was it about the island’s first queen that caused so much disquiet, even now, and where might you still find her?

If too many cooks spoil the broth, what ingredients best make it all up?  

Sri Lanka’s seven greatest wonders from ancient times include a palace to escape death, a dish, a book, and a fortress.  But what made them so fundamental – to the nation and the world – as to earn their place in history?

A tree – and a trio of stupas are among ancient Sri Lanka’s greatest wonders.  But why are any of these so important – not just to the island, but to the world?

Despite their iconic status, the original seven wonders of the ancient world pale in comparison to the seven wonders of ancient Lanka, the subject of the next three podcasts.    But of them all, why include Panda Wewa, a reservoir now lost in the jungle, not from present-day Chilaw?

Sri Lanka’s gems are as perfect a thing for first nights, Dubai dinners and London cocktail parties as they are for crowns, thrones, diadems - and even my missing tiara.  But should it be enough to merely murmur their magical names, or must you wear them too?

If walking the dogs is anything, it has to be “Ordinary Special,” especially when taken down a path of flame tree flowers.  But of all these flamboyants, which is the most recalcitrant?

Rich, salty, earthy, savoury, sharp – gorgonzola is not a cheese common to Sri Lanka, and yet its mere anticipation calls to mind on the island the seven stages of living.  And of them all,  how can you ever manage to make the last, last?

From the Red Road to the Galagedera Gap, the two dozen acres around The Flame Tree Estate and Hotel demonstrate feral gardening at its best.  So what might you encounter as you meander through its plantations and tracks?

What was it in the fatal combination of new money, old suspicions, religious strife, mercenaries and regicide that brought the last Moriyan kings to ruin?

Family dramas nearly unsettled the first Moriyan kings until King Moggallana took over.  Or so it seemed.  What was it about the choices he made that so brutally undermined his successors?

Famed for building the 8th wonder of the ancient world in Asia, what drove the great Moriyan king, Kashyapa, to plunge a sword into his own body?

After decades of occupation and state madness, a great new Anuradhapura king set about putting things right.  But how did he end up as the poster boy of the most notorious assassinations in world history?

What is it about Sri Lanka’s lion – cherished by the Moriyan kings at Sigiriya and elsewhere – that so perfectly captures one of the country's most critical national traits?

Given Sri Lanka’s remarkable facility for naturalising anything it takes a fancy to, counting its spices, is a sure way to stir debates about everything from guilt and history to life expectancy and truth.  Hear some of this, as we lay out a jungle spice garden all of our own at The Flame Tree Estate in the mountains beyond Kandy.

“A series of dreadful shrieks as if coming from a soul in great agony of torment,” wrote an anguished twitcher of the Sri Lankan Spot-bellied Eagle Owl.  But is it alone sounding so fierce?  What other owl howls might you encounter in Sri Lanka?