ABOUT SRI LANKA

Sri Lanka is a small island almost like a tiny tear drop that lies in the Indian Ocean which is sometimes known by other names such as “The Lost Paradise”, “The Land Of Serendipity”, “The Resplendent Land ” and ” The Pearl Of The Indian Ocean” among others by non-natives. Sri Lanka lies to the southwest of the Bay of Bengal and to the southeast of the Arabian Sea. The island seperates itself from the Indian subcontinent by the Gulf of Mannar and the Palk Strait (named after James Palk ). According to the Indian epic poem Ramayana, written thousands of years ago in Sanskrit and an important Hindu text, states how Rama, with the help of an army of vanaras, built a bridge of stones across the sea to Lanka to rescue his wife Sita from the Asura king Ravana.

The name Adam’s Bridge is a later play than Rama’s bridge and derives from the story that South India or Sri Lanka was the site of the biblical earthly paradise (and hence the lost paradise), and that Adam’s Bridge was created when Adam was expelled from paradise. However the Rama’s/Adam’s bridge is now only a chain of limestone shoals above the sea level. According to colonial British reports, this is a natural causeway which was formerly complete, but was breached by a violent storm in 1480. The width of the Palk Strait is small enough for the coast of Sri Lanka to be visible from the furthest point near the Indian town of Rameswaram but is not big enough for large ships to pass through so these ships have to make a detour around Sri Lanka to reach the East Asian countries. The island consists mostly of flat-to-rolling coastal plains, with mountains rising only in the south- central part.