AHAMED NISHADH

We are at the end of yet another year. To make it things easier for people, I've created the ICS file with all the Sri Lankan holidays as announced by the Ministry of Home Affairs through Extraordinary Gazette No. 2024/55 published on the 24th of June 2017. ( http://www.moha.gov.lk/web/images/holiday_calendar/holiday_calendar_2018_e.pdf ) PLEASE NOTE THAT THE HOLIDAYS LISTED BY GOOGLE ON THEIR HOLIDAY CALENDAR FOR 2018 IS WRONG! So dont put your trust on this! Looks like they have missed some Poya days as this year we have 13 poya days as there are two months with 2 poya days each (its a double blue moon this year) You can download the calendar from  https://goo.gl/3AXhVB Here's some interesting stats about the holidays next year.. 18 of the 26 holidays listed are falling on weekdays. But be sure to check how many of them are mercantile since your organization may be giving you only mercantile holidays. January and March will have 2 poya days each on the 1st and 3...

I've been working with TEDxColombo and the team putting together the show for 5 years now, but 2017 was a little bit different for me (may be for a few others too). I was at one point thinking to myself if I should leave as I had so many other things to be concentrating on among many other reasons.. I was not giving my 100% to the team as I had used to in the previous 4 years. Mind you, I left the hospital 3 days after having surgery for appendicitis and was in 2016 controlling the backstage 6 days after my surgery. As usual, one morning I turned up for rehearsals and I heard for the first time Aritha​ doing his first cut of the talk. After the talk, we had a really long conversation about many things related to his talk and other stuff. I've been working with different types of people throughout my life in different projects. I've talked to so many people. My ability to speak and understand Sinhala and Tamil has helped me understand the stories from both sides of ...

After the incident at #Meethotamulla recently, I see so many who are posting articles about Waste Management and how its effectively done in other countries in the world and the big question in the end being WHY CANT SRI LANKA DO SOMETHING LIKE THIS? "Waste is not waste but a resource that has value" said Chinthaka Abeysekara at TEDxColombo 2016. He showed us how countries around the world have successfully monetized waste and recycled it to produce alternate sources of energy and much more. So, again, why haven't we been able to do it yet? Well, the answer is simple. it is us. Yes, us, the people of this country! We the people of this country are stupid enough to elect the same corrupt irresponsible greedy pigs into power all the time at every election and they in-turn want bribes, commissions, favors from those who want to make these waste management plants which then discourages the private sector and the investors and today, we have over 10 innocent lives inc...

Its nearly the end of 2016 and as usual I was trying to find the Sri Lankan Holidays calendar for 2017 to add to my work and personal calendars. But unfortunately, I couldnt find one. So, I decided to make one on my own. Thankfully, some good guy out there ( I really cant remember his name) made this calendar for a few years which I've been using so I just copied the old events to a new calendar and changed their dates according to the dates published on the holidays list by the Ministry of Public Administration and Home Affairs ( http://www.pubad.gov.lk/web/index.php?option=com_latestdocument&documenttype=8&lang=en ) So, here you go. Download the ICS file from the link below and just import it into your calendars add the holidays. The calendar is set to Sri Lanka as location and GMT 5:30+ as the time zone. Download the file from  https://goo.gl/7E40Q2   Feel free to share it with others too. All credit to the original guy who made this. 

Its been a long time since i last blogged. So thought ill write something about a matter that I've been thinking about so much over the last few months. The Politics of Colombo Youth Activism. Well it may be a list of words that could look not right when put together, but hey.. its my blog, my thoughts so the title will be anything that i want it to be. So what is this Colombo Youth Activism and whats this politics im talking about you may ask. So here's the deal. Many people who know me know that over the last several years, ive been involved in some kind of youth related activities, volunteering, organizing a hell of a lot of events etc. At first, it was fun, refreshing and gave me a good feeling about what i was doing. But, over the years, ive noticed that things are changing. HOW? Well, to start off with, youth clubs have become like political parties in Sri Lanka now. Except without the part where they together form a government. ;) Every Tom, Dick and Harry (or rat...

The world goes mad when 200 girls are kidnapped. When women are raped. When USA is attacked. When UK is attacked. When a plane vanishes from earth. When journalists are jailed. But when #Gaza is attacked, no one cares about it, its not a human rights violations, its not a war crime to hit hospitals, ambulances, disability support centers, houses and kill women and children mercilessly while playing on the streets, sleeping after staying up for hours. Where are all the Human Right protectors?? Where are all the petitioners?? Where are all the human right organizations? Why is everyone silent when it comes to #Gaza?? Is it because you dont get enough $$$ to talk against these issues? Is it because your afraid your big posh offices in US and UK will be shut down if you talk against it? When girls being kidnapped, women being raped, journalists being jailed are considered crimes worth of international attention, how come killing humans, bombing houses, destroying communities, target...

Sitting on a hospital bed, going thru my twitter feed, i find out that today is some kinda remembrance day for the US Army and the hashtag #wewillnotforget was being used for this... Browsing thru the hashtag tweets, i find more negative tweets from people around the world on how they will never forget what the US army has done for their lives by destroying their families, killing their children, siblings, parents, friends etc instead of not forgetting their service to the nation of the so called US of A.. Taking a step back, i was just wondering is this all right. How is killing innocent civilians, children, women etc in the name of national security and world peace going to help protect your country? Isnt it only going to help create more enemies who want to take revenge on you and your countrymen? Then your child takes revenge then their child takes revenge.. Tit for tat n it goes on eh? Leader of the free world they call him.. But what is this so called free world? Are we living...