Overview
The small-market, small-enterprise economy of your surroundings
comes as no surprise. Here are the stakeholders of many
a large metropolitan enterprise; yet, beneath it all is
the life-source of the true Sri Lankan village, holding
fast to its old ways, old days. It is here that The Manor
House awaits you – waiting to take your breath away.
It is more than a century old, but will stand for all its
days ahead, many centuries new. Let me tell you of it:
This was the proud family- and ancestral home of one of
Kandy’s greatest chieftains, Nugawela, [from whom
the entire village you are now in gets its name]. He was
acknowledged an Adiga – Prime Minister, Ratemahatyas
–Civil administrator, mediator, owing his allegiance
to the British Crown. Even after the British swept in, he
was a man who could not be ignored. His influence, his knowledge
and understanding of the people, his impartiality and legal
acumen was legendary. In The Manor House today, you will
ascend the stairway with its gleaming balustrades to the
large, sprawling first floor where Nugawela Adiga where
he met the people, listened to their complaints, redressed
wrongs. Downstairs, in the large dining-hall, he entertained
his guests from far and near.
Lawrence Nugawela Adiga built himself this great manor
house that the islanders call “Walauwa” [ancestral
home]. He was the custodian of vast acres of land where
rice, vegetables and fruit were cultivated, and his stately
home also served as a village granary were thousands of
paddy was stored, or, as locals call it, the “Atuva”-(made
out of teak wood). Departing from the traditional, he raised
two towers that hugged either side of his home, and it was
from these heights that he would look on his fields each
day.
Accommodation
The rooms – such a fragrant bouquet –
are each designed individually and differently. They each
carry the name of a Sri Lankan flower: the Ehala [ Cassia
fistula – the Pudding Pipe]; the Nilupul [the blue
of the melon vine]; the Kumudu [Citrullus – the water-melon
flower]; the Araliya [Plumeria – the Temple Flower];
the Suriya [Thespesia populnea – the Sunflower]; the
Olu [ Nymphoea lotos – the water lily]; Rathu Nelum
– the red lotus lily; Sudu Nelum – the white
lotus lily; Eramudu – the red clustered bracts of
a dry-zone tree; and Ratmal [Rhododendron arboreum]. Each
room carries a picture of the flower it claims for its own.
Of them, there are three deluxe suites, and, as you look
around, you will find it hard to take in what has been a
huge work of restoration, of many-splendour and resurrection.
The old granary is now a pool room. There used to be no
indoor kitchen for all cooking was done in an outhouse in
the days of old. There is a modern kitchen now, and, what
is more, as the chief manager, me; this is where visitors
are more than welcome. “Visitors can give us any of
their special recipes, tells of the way they like their
food prepared, and we will prepare all such dishes for them.”
