Kandy city becomes alive for one week every August for its crowning event, Esala (August) Perahera. We joined the multitude to watch it on the last day that falls on Full Moon day of August, when this centuries old pageant reaches its peak.
True to its tradition it has not changed much since D.H Lawrence witnessed in 1922 and wrote “It was night and flaming torches of coconut blazing, and the great elephants in their trappings, about a hundred and the dancers with tom-toms and bagpipes, and half naked and jeweled, and then the Kandyan chiefs in their costumes, and more dancers and more elephants and more chiefs, and more dancers, so wild and strange and perfectly fascinating, heaving along by the flames of torches in the hot, still, starry night…. It was wonderful and gorgeous….”
This time there were 80 elephants, some dancing!
