This is a blog I started writing several years ago, which I never seemed able to finish until I recently forced myself to. I’m not sure why exactly the writer’s block on this piece, but I think it relates to the sadness created by the loss of my dear friend.
(Earthrise — Arthur’s waiting area features a panorama of the famous photo taken by the Apollo VIII astronauts)
My last trip to Sri Lanka (2017) was a bookend to a very important chapter in my life. I have previously written about my friendship with my favorite writer, Sir Arthur C. Clarke. I had the great privilege of knowing and visiting with Arthur at his home in Sri Lanka. We corresponded by email and spent dozens of hours together, visiting in pleasant companionship and engaging conversation. I had not been to Sri Lanka since Arthur’s death in 2008 and wanted to return to pay my respects, meet with old friends, and see how the country was faring now that its long Civil War was ended and Sri Lanka was finally at peace. And the trip was just before Arthur’s 100th birthday.
(Arthur’s staff desks were quiet and empty, though his many rewards and certificates remain)
The journey to Sri Lanka from North America is long and tiring and I traveled through Dubai for my first time before making my way to Colombo. Colombo had most definitely changed. It was even larger, busier and nosier than I remembered, and the traffic was much worse. The large influx of foreign money was apparent. Construction projects were everywhere and many of the projects were massive. Much of the development was funded by Communist regime in China — I’m sure in the long term these projects will be very beneficial to the CCP government.
(bookcase filled with the many books Arthur had written)
(Arthur’s private office and some of his many trophies)
The downside of peace in Sri Lanka is that everything had become much more expensive. People are making more money but I don’t know if their purchasing power has increased. So the average citizen may not be further ahead and in fact may have lost ground in recent years — and that doesn’t include the era of inflation we’re currently living through.
(Arthur’s travel briefcase)
It was wonderful to see some of my friends again! I had been in touch with Arthur’s excellent secretary, Dottie, for many years and it was nice to reconnect in person. We stay in touch and talk on Skype when our schedules allow (not easy to arrange with a 12 hour time difference). I also re-visited 25 Barnes Place, Arthur’s home for so many years. Here I spent time with Arthur’s business partner and close friend, Hector, and Arthur’s office manager, Rohan. We had become friends during my travels to Sri Lanka. All of us had grown a bit grayer but fortunately the passage of years had not created a gap between us.
(One of Arthur’s greatest treasures — an inscribed book from astronaut Neil Armstrong, including a pebble from the first moonwalk)
As you can see from the photos interspersed in this blog, Arthur’s office and home were unchanged — except for the quietness and his palpable absence. Every book he’d written, paper and video were in place. But the energy and soul of the office were gone. It saddened me.
Most heartbreaking of all was the image of Arthur’s empty wheelchair sitting at his desk. When last I visited that chair was filled with intelligence, humor, kindness, laughter, and a love of sweet creamy tea. It brought a tear to my eye.
Dottie was nice enough to take me to the cemetery so that I could pay my respect at Arthur’s grave. It’s not an easy place to get to, and I’m glad to have had someone take me there because I don’t believe I would otherwise have found it.
Arthur’s is a simple grave much humbler than many in the cemetery. As Arthur wanted he is buried in the plot with his adopted Sri Lankan family, the Ekanayakas. His tombstone’s epitaph was exactly as he told me it would be decades ago — “He never grew up but he never stopped growing.
Good bye, dear friend.
For a list of DrFumblefingers blog posts on Sri Lanka, please click on this link.
