Remembering Malathi, Or Care Of/For Strangers

Dr. Malathi de Alwis

By Themal Ellawala –FEBRUARY 27, 2021

Themal Ellawala

This is a story about two strangers who showed care to each other. One of them I have known my entire life. The other I knew over the last five years. Both women taught me some of the most fundamental and indelible lessons in care – what it is, how to do it, who to extend it to (everyone), and why (because).

Kumudini Ellawala (née Hendrick) is my mother. Born on November 24, 1953, she bore me on September 23, 1990. My mother was my first instructor in care. She taught first by example. Her mornings were spent working as a doctor at medical clinics in Colombo’s public hospitals (the Ministry of Health dispensed transfers liberally), flipping the script of overburdened doctors who rush through appointments by taking her time with each and every patient, learning their stories, explaining jargon, pulling strings to get them care, giving them counsel. Her evenings were spent at home, bent over the stove, bent over the washer, bent over a broom, bent. Tired as she was, she never failed to listen to her children’s worries and soothe their hurts. My mother’s side of the extended family considered her the family doctor, the pacifist, the wise sage, and the problem solver. Hers was the duty of diagnosing ailments and putting out fires; the telephone in our home was a noisy and insistent affair. There was always time to visit an elderly lady or attend a funeral, no matter how distant. To participate in this family religious affair or show up to that wedding. My mother almost never said no, regardless of back aches and leg aches and a yearning for quiet. She also taught me about care by telling me about care. Our dinnertime conversations revolved around the suffering of her patients, or a moving story she read in the papers. My mother is not perfect, but her heart is extraordinarily quick to move and melt, a rarity. She bequeathed to me that heart and a conviction that I must care for the suffering of others.

Malathi de Alwis was (ah, the grief of that tense) my mentor. Born on October 6, 1963, she came into my life on January 20, 2016. An acquaintance encouraged me to reach out to her about an incipient research project on queer erotics in Sri Lanka I had begun imagining. My impostor syndrome wrote a hesitant email that I never expected a reply to. After all, why would someone so illustrious deign to reply to a veritable stranger, a lowly undergraduate at that? Malathi replied within the day. I can imagine her reading my (what I now recognize as hopelessly naïve and bombastic) email with an amused smile, perhaps, but her reply betrayed no sign of judgment or censure. She was warm and encouraging, and sincerely so. She worked her magic from the very start, connecting me to one of her students who ended up being my friend and research collaborator. Three emails later, she was suggesting feedback on my Institutional Review Board application and writing a letter of support to convince fastidious scholars in the First World that Sri Lanka is no violent backwater of colonial fantasies/nightmares. What Malathi said then in that letter, “I have the utmost confidence in Themal’s abilities,” is what she continued to say, in so many ways, throughout the past five years.

I met Malathi face-to-face for the first time in June 2016. I was invited into her apartment, as have many students, to be served love cake and scintillating conversation. Malathi’s curiosity about the world knew no bounds, and her equally limitless generosity meant that she showed an interest in all things, on their own terms. Our conversation meandered from my parents to my family – it was quickly established that my uncle, also a doctor, had treated her some years ago; connections are not hard to find in Sri Lanka, after all – my school years, my research, my life in the US. She sent me off with the request to send her my writing. A month, a confused security officer in her apartment building, and a drama of mistaken identities (she had Ellawala relatives; it is Sri Lanka, after all) later, I dropped off two papers. Despite the avalanche of essays she had to grade, Malathi took the time to read both. One was an exploration of queer dislocations from the nation, a “queer theoretical intervention” by a Sophomore psychology major (many moons ago) who lived the myth of Western queer possibility/Third World queer impossibility. In other words: a terrible paper. Our next meeting, to discuss her feedback, transpired in the back of a cab as we hurtled down and stalled on choked Colombo roads on our way to a music festival at the International Center for Ethnic Studies (Malathi had a habit of whisking me away to the most interesting events). My apprehensions were entirely futile, for her critique was tender and forgiving. Gentle questions led me through the process of unwrapping layer after layer of conceit, distancing maneuvers, and generalizations. Such was the effect of Malathi’s company and guidance – I could never leave her presence diminished and discouraged. The mirror she held up to you showed you at your best, and filled you with the hope of embodying it.

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