London Mini RU, report from the staff contributor Dharma Alagaratnam

MINI UK RU 64, May 9th, 2015 
I have a great pleasure in reporting on the “Mini RU64” we had on the 9th of May 2015 at Harrow, England. The venue was a Sri Lankan restaurant called “The Meeting Palace”.

It all started when I decided to attend my brothers 80th birthday in England. I just informed CJ, Arulrajah and Sattianayagam of my plans and indicated my wish to meet many batch mates as possible. That set the ball rolling. Most, if not all batch mates in UK were contacted with usual results of responses and no responses. 15 batch mates and 10 spouses attended. The notable absentees were Arulrajah (organizer) who was down with the “Flu” and did wish to share the virus and Praxy de Saram, (aka “RU Addict”) as she was in Sri Lanka at that time. RU addiction must not be so severe as she did not cancel the SL trip!! Others could not attend for various reasons.

It was a time of great fun; I met Titus, Thillaivasan, Bigga and Sunila after about 45 years. George and Shalinee after 5yrs or so. That was great. I also found that some who lived in UK for 45 years met some batch mates residing in UK during the same period for the first time!

The event started with the usual greetings and hugs followed by drinks. Over the four-course meal, photographs taken by Yogamany and myself of the 50th RU64 were shown on a big screen TV. It was a time of reminiscence and test of memory. This was followed by the video of the skits from the 50th RU64 at Beruwela, Sri Lanka (thanks to Mahesan and Selvarani Richards for recording and sharing the copies.) There were plenty of laughs and comments! Also some could not see parts of the skits at Beruwela as they were preparing to perform. Some of us understood the jokes better the second time over. Some who do not understand Sinhala well got a better understanding. I did a bit of translation on the side.

Management At the “Meeting Palace” helped by closing the restaurant to other customers, giving us exclusive use of the 40-60-seat restaurant. This was especially good for the slides, video and dancing. They also provided DJ services that included “Baila” and live drum. The beat was great, resonating in the chest! This got many on the floor. If awards were to be given for the dancing, it would go to Titus. The food was very good, all Sri Lankan style.

After about 5 hours of fun, goodbyes were said with promises and requests to work on another RU64 without requiring major organization as we had in in 2014. “Just select a week-end and venue, inform all batch mates and they book the hotel on their own. Include a dinner and a DJ for Saturday night. No organized talks or tours. This must be sooner than later before we loose our ability to travel or as someone said, ”Before we kick the bucket”

Regional Mini RUs like this one in UK are another less complicated possibility.
How about it North America and Australia?
The attendees

CJ Amerasurya and Daya
Kathir Thillaivasan and Vasnthy
A Sattianayagam and Ianthi
Bigga Gunewardene and Sunila
David Selvarajah and Rajini
George Jayatilleke and Shalinee
Somasegaram and Indira
Sree Mathiaparanam and Maha
S. Sahadevan and Yasodara
Dharma Alagaratnam and Yogamany
Titus Fernando
Shoukat Mamujee
Gaspa Gomez
Donny Selvadurai
Kingsley Jayawardene

PHOTOS.
Some photographs to remember will be included.