This is America: Sri Lanka is in crisis, and Sri Lankan Americans are standing in solidarity
Sri Lanka, the small teardrop-shaped island where my parents are from, is facing an unprecedented economic crisis.
The Sri Lankan rupee has plummeted in value, and inflation is soaring. Prices of daily necessities have skyrocketed, and shortages of fuel, food and medicine are leaving many households scrambling to stay afloat. Routine power blackouts are plunging the country into darkness for several hours each day, and two of our elders died while waiting amid searing heat in miles-long lines for gas.
Niranda Perera, a 32-year-old Indiana University Ph.D. student from Nugegoda, a suburb of Colombo, told me he feels lucky that his mostly upper middle income family has avoided the worst effects of the crisis. The crisis has been brewing for years but was worsened by the pandemic. Even his family is struggling to find basic necessities.
“You may have money but then if there aren't any things to buy in the store, then what can you do?” he said.
His wife, Dilhara Gunaratna, said her friends can’t find baby formula or milk powder for their babies and have resorted to giving them warm water instead. And as power cuts converge with the hottest season of the year, her friends are laying their children on tile floors, hoping to keep them from overheating.
Poor people and ethnic and religious minorities with reduced access to resources due to systemic barriers are worse off, she added.
“I wonder how many children are starving,” she said.
My aunt has told our family about them throwing now precious food out of refrigerators during power cuts, waiting in long lines for fuel, and struggling against the heat. Many students, including my cousins, who are in the midst of high-stakes college entrance exams, are studying by candlelight.
The situation has ignited nationwide protests demanding systemic change and the resignation of Sri Lanka’s president. There were more than 100 demonstrations from the country’s southern coast to the Tamil-speaking north since last week, Reuters reported.
My name is Christine Fernando, and I'm a breaking news reporter at USA TODAY. I’d like to welcome you to this week’s This Is America, a newsletter about race, identity and how they shape our lives.
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A familiar fear and hopelessness
As I’ve read news stories from Sri Lanka this week, I’ve felt a familiar mix of fear and helplessness. It’s the same fear and helplessness I felt as a child, hearing my parents’ hushed voices as they talked about the decades-long civil war that ravaged the country. The same fear and helplessness I felt when my kindergarten teacher ran to ask me about my family after the devastating 2004 tsunami. The same fear and helplessness I felt while sitting on the floor of my partner’s apartment, gripping my phone and waiting for my dad to call me with news on whether our family members were alive after the 2019 Easter bombings.
“We feel like we are powerless,” my mom told me this week.
But on Sunday, I saw my parents and many Sri Lankan Americans in my community in Indiana do something I’d never seen them do before: exercise their right to protest.
Perera, who spearheaded the demonstration, said he only expected a handful of people. But then he sent an email the morning of the protest, and it was forwarded from one Sri Lankan American to the next until over 50 people had gathered.
“We want to stand in solidarity with the people back home and say, ‘You are not alone,’ ” Perera said.
I’ve long watched my parents help from behind the scenes amid tragedies in Sri Lanka, tapping into community mutual aid networks to collect money and supplies to send home. But while protest culture has long been alive and well in Sri Lankan communities, I’d never seen my own community step forward in such a public way.
Generational trauma from government efforts to quell protests in past decades have made it difficult for our older generations to step out of their comfort zones and publicly demonstrate, Perera told me. I see that especially in my mother, who was trained to keep her head down and was horrified when she found herself raising a loud, opinionated daughter. Seeing photos of my mother holding signs declaring “Pray for Sri Lanka” and “Stand up: Sri Lanka Deserved Better” brought tears to my eyes.
My mom, Renuka Fernando, told me her favorite moment was seeing the diversity of the crowd during the demonstration.
“We had people from all communities of Sri Lanka: Muslims, Christians, Buddhists, Tamils, you name it,” she said. “Even the younger generation came from all over Indiana. ... It was kind of like seeing our family during a crisis.”
Gunaratna, who was a lawyer in Sri Lanka and is now a paralegal in Indianapolis, said she is frustrated by how the Sri Lankan government is responding to protests back home.
Law enforcement agencies have arrested protesters, enforced a curfew, stationed soldiers armed with assault rifles, and used tear gas and a water cannon. The president declared a state of emergency last week after tens of thousands of protesters gathered near his home.
Meanwhile, Gunaratna said politicians have been insulated from the struggles of the rest of the country and not held accountable for their part in the crisis.
A push for systemic change
Gunaratna and Perera both said they want to see systemic change, including reducing corruption and for power to no longer be consolidated in the hands of a few politicians.
“People back at home are struggling, and we're seeing that there is a grassroots-level movement among the people across race, religion and class,” Perera said. “People are seeing that there has to be a radical overhaul of the entire system.”
Perera also said he hopes protests organized by expats garner the attention of the international community, despite limited media coverage. He said international pressure can go a long way.
“We're not asking for anyone to save us,” he said. “...But citizens of the U.S. and other countries have power to demand that the (Sri Lankan) government listens to its people and to help make sure their voices are heard.”
As I looked at photos of the demonstrations sent by uncles and aunties, I realized I’d never seen a Sri Lankan flag waving beside Indianapolis’s iconic Monument Circle.
“We wish we could make that flag fly on a happy occasion,” my mom said. “But even in a sad moment, it gave us some kind of a relief.”
I am scared for the future of my country. I am tired of watching my people suffer from afar. I’m not sure what will happen and know there is no easy fix, but I am proud of my people. While I worry about things beyond their control, I know Sri Lankans are strong and resilient.
I want them to know that our hearts are breaking, too, and that we see their despair, their anger and their strength as we stand in solidarity with our homeland.
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Contact News Now Reporter Christine Fernando at cfernando@usatoday.com or follow her on Twitter at @christinetfern.
Contributing: The Associated Press
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This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Sri Lanka economic crisis: Sri Lankan Americans stand in solidarity
