> ## Content Index
> Fetch the complete content index at: https://www.examiner.media/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover other available public pages before exploring further.

# Where to go and what to read
- URL: https://www.examiner.media/where-to-go-and-what-to-read-16/
- Published: 2026-01-23T07:04:04.000Z
- Updated: 2026-01-23T13:15:13.000Z
- Author: The Examiner
- Tags: Diary, maintag-Diary, Week-03-2026

[Colomboscope](https://www.colomboscope.lk/%5Ffiles/ugd/08c6d3%5Ff4d855a9a73d46319cc5e7aed9fcbddd.pdf?ref=examiner.media)’s event descriptions rival Sajith in their dictionary rummaging. Care for "transdisciplinary, immersive performance that explores pluriversal localities, memory work, entangled temporarily, and cultural frequency through collected, imagined, and recorded sound?” 

In a case of the blind leading the blind, we parsed through their schedule so you don’t have to. 

Since the uninitiated like us may need a little handholding, they’ve graciously organised curated [walk-throughs](https://www.colomboscope.lk/%5Ffiles/ugd/08c6d3%5Ff4d855a9a73d46319cc5e7aed9fcbddd.pdf?ref=examiner.media) of their exhibitions. On Friday, at Colpetty Town House. On Saturday at Barefoot, and on Wednesday at the mausoleum that is the old Rio cinema. 

Arulraj Ulaganathan’s pensive exhibit on Malaiyaha Tamil childhood and life at the Curado is a powerfully poignant lament. Catch the [tour](https://www.instagram.com/p/DTuxYvbCCOB/?ref=examiner.media) on Saturday. Tashyana Handy’s magnum opus is, of course, our logo. But her poetry may be a close second. She leads a [workshop](https://www.colomboscope.lk/%5Ffiles/ugd/08c6d3%5Ff4d855a9a73d46319cc5e7aed9fcbddd.pdf?ref=examiner.media) on Saturday at Radicle. Fittingly, Duran Duran’s *Hungry Like a Wolf* was shot there many moons ago. 

Colombo university is organising a [session](https://web.facebook.com/share/p/1CXJjT63XT/?ref=examiner.media) for kids on bird migration. Be a soccer parent and throw in a campus tour — you know, for the future.

Something is rotten in the state of Dematagoda - Hiran Abeysekera as [Hamlet](https://web.facebook.com/DramaSLanka/posts/pfbid035cq7TDFkbFSz98mqtUXwPXBf7QweJWAGMPRrc1nygvNSVbVdmPkjZjGH1cbYzLGVl?ref=examiner.media), takes the screen at Regal on Sunday. Keeping with the quietus mood, listen to some “doom folk” at a Colomboscope [concert](https://www.colomboscope.lk/%5Ffiles/ugd/08c6d3%5Ff4d855a9a73d46319cc5e7aed9fcbddd.pdf?ref=examiner.media) by Perera Elsewhere. The enlightened ones tell us this is not to be missed. 

On Tuesday, synthesize your teenagers’ dreams of a cool, creative career with your hopes of a financially sound one — Colomboscope is putting on a storytelling and game development [session](https://www.colomboscope.lk/%5Ffiles/ugd/08c6d3%5Ff4d855a9a73d46319cc5e7aed9fcbddd.pdf?ref=examiner.media). 

We may be trying to revive the press, but those before us kept it going. Remember slain journalists at the ‘January is still Black’ [seminar](https://web.facebook.com/share/p/1DdYcJztHt/?ref=examiner.media) on media freedom. 

Wednesday [dances](https://web.facebook.com/share/p/1DdYcJztHt/?ref=examiner.media) with a performance by Chitrasena and reVerb. Then be a smartass, gradually getting drunker at the Colomboscope x Barefoot pub [quiz](https://www.colomboscope.lk/%5Ffiles/ugd/08c6d3%5Ff4d855a9a73d46319cc5e7aed9fcbddd.pdf?ref=examiner.media).

Quickly nurse your hangover, because the next day is unmissable. The dynamic Kehelmala is putting on a [film](https://www.colomboscope.lk/%5Ffiles/ugd/08c6d3%5Ff4d855a9a73d46319cc5e7aed9fcbddd.pdf?ref=examiner.media) about coming of age during the economic crisis. ICES [screens](https://www.colomboscope.lk/%5Ffiles/ugd/08c6d3%5Ff4d855a9a73d46319cc5e7aed9fcbddd.pdf?ref=examiner.media) Neelan: Unsilenced. There’s also a [lecture](https://www.instagram.com/stories/thenationaltrustsrilanka/?ref=examiner.media) on design and gardens of Sri Lanka by the National Trust.

Tickets might sell and you had better save the punches for the professionals, [Karma Fight League](https://web.facebook.com/karmafightleague/?%5Frdc=1&%5Frdr&ref=examiner.media) is coming up. So is the Matara arts [festival](https://www.instagram.com/mataraforarts/?ref=examiner.media), which gloriously still stands. 

![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/56/2b/562b4f8e-9dd1-43bb-a213-bc1615650661/content/images/2026/01/data-src-image-ef2b5a98-5d6d-4501-b15b-dde31bc6bdc8.png)

*What to read*

The island gets hazy and coughy as crop-burning kicks off in the Gangetic plain. The World Bank has some [ideas](https://www.worldbank.org/en/region/sar/publication/a-breath-of-change-solutions-for-cleaner-air-in-the-indo-gangetic-plains-and-himalayan-foothills?ref=examiner.media) for coordinating solutions at scale. Meanwhile, a Kolonnawa resident [writes](https://polity.lk/from-living-with-to-drowning-under-floods-a-village-transformed-shashik-silva/?ref=examiner.media) about how the village of Welewatta, which always flooded, now floods differently as there are no more *welas.*

Another ‘who guards the guardians’ problem, this time the authors of Environmental Impact Assessments. The Centre for Smart Future [finds](https://www.csf-asia.org/new-report-analysis-of-social-impacts-reported-in-environmental-impact-assessments-eias-in-sri-lanka/?ref=examiner.media) that environmental impact assessments, for the most part, flop. Tech bros will want more sensors, lawyers better procedures and policies and economists more random audits. Us mere mortals just want integrity and competence. The Smarties have been hard at work: they [survey](https://www.southcentre.int/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/SV304%5F260121.pdf?ref=examiner.media) Lankan exporters and find that uncertainty arising from Trump’s tariffs (and TACOing) affects three quarters of them. 

PEARL’s latest [report](https://pearlaction.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/PEARL%5FSinhalization-as-an-anti-development-machine%5Freport.pdf?ref=examiner.media) makes the case that Sinhalisation is anti-development, retarding the economic development of Tamils, and the Sinhalese themselves. The war, as photojournalist turned academic, Shyam Thekwani [reminds](https://newlinesmag.com/review/sri-lankas-civil-war-and-the-limits-of-literature/?ref=examiner.media) through pictures and words, is still a reality for many: “not every photograph must be shown. Some must remain in the dark, not because they are hidden, but because they are still grieving.”