There are no concrete remnants of Jewish life on the island country of Sri Lanka — but legends hint at an intriguing, hidden Jewish story
JUNGLE SECRETS The testimonies of a researcher and a local Holocaust survivor the path to the door of a Jewish monk and a mysterious discovery in the local cemetery seem to have unearthed Jewish roots in this remote tropical paradise (Photos: Yitzchak Carmeli Angelo Sagiv)
O ne thing I figured out on our excursion to Sri Lanka an island country off the coast of southeast India is that it’s a country of monkeys — no I mean real ones. These primates are everywhere slipping onto train tracks climbing onto rusting bridges leaping between the buildings in the capital city of Colombo or strolling leisurely through the shopping centers. When I settled on a city bench with some sandwiches a cheeky little monkey grabbed the bread out of my hand climbed up a nearby tree and looked back down at me as he sank his teeth into my lunch.
It seems like Colombo’s half a million residents — a collage of beggars and busy passersby — don’t even notice. And that’s not surprising given that the city is a stark mix of old and new backwoods village and modern metropolis all fused together. Most of the houses are old built during the Dutch and Portuguese colonial eras but the building boom that began after the country’s 35-year civil war ended in 2009 has contributed dozens of modern skyscrapers to the city.
My travel partner Angelo Sagiv and I came to Sri Lanka to see if we could find the remnants of a Jewish community that had apparently once been here. The country’s documented history spans 3 000 years and its geographic location and deep harbors made it a strategic juncture from the time of the ancient Silk Route. But for all its rich history the country — known as Ceylon until British colonial rule ended in 1972 — contains little documentation of any Jewish community.
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