Sri Lankans are everywhere? what??

Right after completing the admission process at the University, my father and I were going to pay the admission fee at the bank near by, we heard a woman speaking to her children in Sinhalese! Coming from Kandy, and knowing no one who was living in Italy we were surprised to hear our language spoken so randomly in a foreign country. So we asked “Oyala Lankaweda?”, and she seemed very surprised by the question. However after learning where we were from, she said, “mehe lankawe aya godak innawa, ara athanath thiyenne lankawe kadayak”. My father and I couldn’t believe it, after a short while we met another Sri Lankan near the bank, who helped us to make the payment in the bank because the cashiers barely spoke any English.

Crossed the road after paying the university fees, there were two Sri Lankan restaurants and a Sri Lankan mini market. After spending an entire week without eating rice and curry we couldn’t help it but enjoy some Sri Lankan cuisine, we couldn’t believe our eyes when I saw that they had “polos” (baby Jack curry) in this restaurant, and from that moment we started forgetting that we were actually in a foreign country.

Later that day, the person who helped me at the bank also helped me to find a cheap accommodation as well, a house that belongs to a Sri Lankan family, lodging with meals!!, what more could I have asked for when my cooking skills were limited to frying an egg at the time.

After a few weeks living in Naples, I found my first job as an English teacher giving private lessons to Sri Lankan students, hours were flexible, the money wasn’t bad, I finally was able to become independent.

If it wasn’t for the help and support from our Sri Lankan community in Naples, my life would have become much complicated for sure.