The Mourning After centres around the experience of Shekar, a Kiwi-born Tamil Sri Lankan, who visits his father’s village in Sri Lanka after the 2004 tsunami that devastated many countries connected to the Indian Ocean. The setting is a rectangular plot of sand placed in the centre of the stage with a large clay pot to one side that collects a constant stream of sand that falls from the ceiling, as if it was falling from an hourglass.

The solo actor, Jehangir Homavazir, warmly greets the audience by smiling towards them and interacting with the four-piece band that accompanies him. Homavazir’s dynamic performance weaves through the different elements of this performance. He easily moves through enacting multiple characters, moments of description and a lively and comedic interpretation of Harrison Ford’s performance in Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. The four piece band plays alongside him and allows the movement between characters and scenes to easily flow, providing an ambient form of direction.

Audience members are asked to take off their shoes for the duration of the play. This gesture is referred to at various points in the show, and by using shoes and feet as a recurring motif, the audience is reminded of their presence in the room and that these stories are being spoken to them.

The sand within this production is used as a tool to aid the storytelling. For a small island nation, a relationship to the ocean and the sand is commonplace, which is metaphorically shown at the end of the play through the trailing of what looks like ashes onto the sand.

The plot of sand ends up as a rough map of the village, etched out by the narrator from a rough memory throughout the duration. Playwright (and director) Ahi Karunaharan describes a land that is overflowing with character and history, even though his recollection of that land is foggy due to living in the diaspora.

As a Sri Lankan New Zealander myself, there are several specifics that only a Sri Lankan person would immediately recognise: the description of spirits in our folklore told to us by our elders, the detailed account of eating straight from a jambu tree, the distinct walk of the kabaragoya and a mock drunken rendition of one of our country’s most popular songs ‘Surangani’.

It is exciting to see contemporary Sri Lankan storytelling in Aotearoa. It is equally exciting to see these stories told with humour and sincerity, two traits I associate closely with Sri Lankan people. Karunaharan manages to incorporate so many facets of a Sri Lankan New Zealand experience without it becoming complicated or over explanatory.

Interpretations of our history as seen through a Western lens is often described as a place that was once beautiful but is now damaged. As explained in one of the monologues, global media attention of the tsunami was incredibly brief. The same can be said for the coverage of the bombings that took place in the country’s capital in 2019. This way of describing sorrow by focusing on the disappointment that followed it, is an experience that resonates with minority cultures, as our pain is often quickly dismissed. Portraying this experience is rewarding, as it allows me to connect with the grief that our globally spread out community felt. It also allows for others to reflect on that grief outside of news coverage, but on a human level from the perspective of people from this land. 

As stated in the script, the attention given to these moments also primarily focused on the damage to abandoned and forgotten people who were lost to the ocean and to time. Also, quickly abandoned by the world after a short-lived acknowledgement as the filming location of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. Thankfully, this piece of work attempts to reverse the erasure of our stories by bringing forward the parts of our country’s history that do not solely focus on grief, and narrating the complicated, mysterious and alluring nature of Sri Lanka.

The Mourning After criticises the erasure that global racism can cause for countries like Sri Lanka and prompts the audience to face this issue through a personal retelling of Shekar’s experience. Though this subject matter is weighty, it does not create a sense of melancholy within this work, but that might be my personal experience, since a lot of this subject matter is already familiar to me.

In fact, I find that it shares a sense of optimism. By bringing these stories to light, Karunaharan and Homavazir ensure these characters are not forgotten and nostalgically praise our cultures’ eccentric way of storytelling. 

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