Sinhalese & Tamil New Year

There is no better opportunity than a national festival to showcase the wonderful food of Sri Lanka. New Year is a chance to taste an array of delicious traditional dishes, most of which are packed with an alarming amount of sugar and deep-fried. Called ‘sweetmeats’, these are enjoyed as part of the first meal of the New Year and throughout the celebrations. At New Year, sweetmeats are to Sri Lankans what champagne is to Westerners.

Known as ‘Aluth Avurudu’ in Sinhala and ‘Puthandu’ in Tamil, New Year is celebrated in mid-April and does not fall at midnight, but at an auspicious time calculated by astrologers. Celebrations last for over a week, with most businesses closing for a well-earned break. A few days before New Year, there is a flurry of last-minute shopping as people flock to the streets to buy gifts and clothing. Public transport becomes packed as people leave the cities to return home to their villages.