Saralanga 2022 – By Wipula Dharmasooriya
Source : Dæhæna – Monthly e-Newsletter November 2022 – Queensland Sri Lankans
Saralanga, the annual cultural festival of the Sinhala Association of Qld (SAQ) was held last month at St. John’s Anglican College Auditorium on October 1, 2022. Its primary objective is the preservation and promotion of the Sinhala language and Sri Lankan culture within the Sri Lankan community in Queensland. The Saralanga concert is held every year with two objectives, the first is to promote Sri Lankan traditional arts and culture among new generations of Australians having Sri Lankan heritage and share with the Australian multicultural community, and the other is to showcase the creativity of the Sri Lankan community in Queensland.
It has continued for 28 years except in 2020 and 2021 when Covid intervened. The Saralanga 2022 cultural festival included wonderful performances by Sri Lankan sons and daughters, their creative skills developed in the community stage, combining the dancing traditions of Sri Lankan Upcountry, Lowcountry, Sabaragamuwa with Indian, Malay, Portuguese and Latin American. Although 23 performances including dancing, singing and
drama, trained by dance institutes or individuals, were included in this year’s Saralanga, the excellence of the concert was shown by the fact that all of them were presented in a well-planned manner. It must be said that the selfless dedication and contribution of more than 10 choreographers led to its success. The youngest child who participated in a dance in the show was 4 years old. It is with humble pride that we say that Saralanga 2022, which performed not only singing, playing and dancing, but also compering, was a truly cultural concert that demonstrated the real goals of the show.
Wipula Dharmasooriya
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