Recollections of Cambridge and graduating at age 21

(Excerpted from the memoirs of business leader Lalith de Mel)

“Cambridge University is a collection of individual ancient colleges. My college, Peterhouse, was the oldest and founded in 1284. Every student is a member of some college. That is where they lived, ate, were guided in their studies and played games for the college if good enough. I played badminton and hockey for Peterhouse and I boxed for Cambridge University. All students attended the same university lectures and sat the same exams.

The academic staff attached to each college were called Fellows and they were all teaching academics of the university. A student’s life was guided by a triumvirate – a tutor who played a godfather type of role, you went to him if you had a problem and you were summoned if he had a problem with you; a director of studies who guided one on the lectures to attend (attendance at lectures was not compulsory) and arranged appropriate supervisors after assessing your needs; and a supervisor who saw you once a week in a group of two and set you a piece of work to do every week.

About 20% of the lectures recommended by my director of studies had no connection with economics. There were many famous academics in different disciplines at Cambridge and he rightly felt that one should attend some of their lectures. It indeed left me much richer for the experience.

Cambridge was full of traditions, rituals and rules. A gown (similar to the graduation gown) had to be worn to lectures, for supervision, for dinner in Hall, and anywhere outside the college after dark. Dinner in Hall was compulsory, students had to be back in their College by 10 p.m. and permission had to be obtained to leave Cambridge. And there was one daunting rule. An undergraduate could sit only once for an exam. If they failed the exam, they had to leave the university. This applied even to the final exam. This was referred to as being sent down.

Sherry played an important role in university life. If the supervision was late in the afternoon, most supervisors offered you a glass of sherry. The head of the college, called the Master, had a grand house in the college premises, and invited students in groups to the Master’s Lodge for sherry. Most students had a bottle of sherry in their rooms and would ask a friend to drop by for a glass of sherry before going into Hall for dinner.

Cambridge had myriad societies, ranging from drinking societies, to cultural, musical, religious and political societies. They were an important component of life at the university, and helped to develop one’s interests with like-minded people.

I was an active member of three societies. The Union Society, which was primarily a debating society, and two political ones, the Liberal Society and the Communist Society. It had been said by some wise man and often quoted that ‘if a man had a soul he would have been a Marxist in his youth’. I passed the test. I was even accepted as a communist sympathizer and invited to spend six weeks in Russia. A few of us fellow sympathizers armed with a special passport given by the Russians sauntered through the usually-impregnable Iron Curtain and got to Moscow.

There was a vibrant social life in Cambridge ranging from ‘bring a bottle and a girl’ parties to long evenings in pubs with friends. All of that combined with the everyday atmosphere of one’s own college with its ancient buildings and wood-panelled walls adorned with large oil portraits looking down on candle-lit dining tables where we dined daily and where grace before meals was said in Latin by a scholar, and the Fellows (the only ones allowed to do so) sweeping across the lawns to Hall in their flowing black gowns, and many more such things, were all a part of the montage of rituals, traditions, activities and rules that made Cambridge a special experience. Learning all about some subject of study was just one piece in the montage, which in its totality created a rich experience.

For some students it was lectures, the library, dinner in Hall, back to the room, and books. They indeed gained knowledge but as for experience, they left with what they came and did not add to it. Fortunately I dived with enthusiasm into the full montage of activities and let them create a mindset that set a high value on experience. New friends, and with them to think and probe new frontiers of knowledge and to make discussion and debate an essential and routine part of one’s life.

Photograph teken after Graduation in his Graduation robes

There were many Sri Lankans at Cambridge. Ranjith Wijewardene, now boss of Wijeya Newspapers and son of the famous D.R.Wijewardene, founder of Lake House, came up to the same college, Peterhouse, a year after me. His cousin Upali, the famous entrepreneur, also came up the same year as Ranjith. Upali and I had many interests in common, including racing cars, and remained very close friends. He was my bestman when I got married. Sunimal Fernando, a cousin who became a Senior Advisor to Mahinda Rajapaksa during his tenure as President, was at Cambridge in my time and there were many others.

My father, as he said goodbye on the boat, said it would be better to spend my holidays traveling rather than coming back to Ceylon (as it then was). I did just that and did not return home for three years. I traveled extensively all over Europe, stayed in youth hostels, which was the cheapest accommodation, and met many students from all over the world. It was an enriching experience.

Every December I stayed with an English friend in Reigate. His parents were well-to-do but encouraged the son to find his pocket money. He and I worked for two weeks in the pre-Christmas period at Redhill Railway Station loading and unloading parcel post sacks. It was hard work but as I was boxing at the time this helped to keep me fit. We always worked the 11.00 in the night to 7.00 in the morning shift as it paid triple time. Then it was off to Paris or somewhere. Had I gone to university at Peradeniya (as I desperately wanted to before being pushed off to Cambridge by my father), I would not have had the benefit of this great experience.

Time passed quickly. It was then final exams, nervously going to read the exam results (I had got my Economics Tripos) and then it was the convocation. Everybody walked to the convocation with mum, dad, grandma, etc. In this informal procession I walked alone. Nobody had come for my graduation. This did not bother me, but what did leave me depressed was that the many friends I saw around daily and who were walking to the convocation with me would disappear in different directions and from my life.

Most of them I never saw again as I did not go back for any length of time to the UK for 20 years. Thinking of old friends, now I find the mind has erased the sharp definition. It is difficult to picture that smile and the mind does not recall the timbre of the voice. Old friends are now like faded black and white photographs. Strangely though, the mind recalls in great detail some perfectly useless incidents. I can vividly recall my friend saying that he was hurrying back on his bicycle and took a short cut through a one-way street when he was stopped by a constable for not having a rear light and he in a pained voice had asked the constable why one needed a rear light when going the wrong way up a one-way street.

I had a good think about life after Cambridge, about politics in Sri Lanka, business, further studies, etc. My Director of Studies convinced me that I should do a post-graduate degree and research on price stabilization schemes for primary products. He arranged for me to go to the London School of Economics.

The primary source of income in most developing countries was some primary products and the wild price fluctuations of primary products made economic planning very difficult. At that stage of one’s life, one was very idealistic and the idea of solving this crucial problem for all developing countries was exciting. I returned to Sri Lanka with the plan to go back at the end of the summer. Shortly after I arrived, there was an opening for a Research Economist at the Coconut Research Institute in Lunuwila. The attractive feature of the job was they would fund the post graduate education abroad. I was happy to take away from my father the burden of paying for another three years of study in the UK so I took the job.

From Cambridge to rural Lunuwila was quite a change. I had a little flat at the institute, I was happy there with a group of people so completely different to those I had associated with in the previous three years. I learnt to drink arrack in the evenings and enjoy a good natter about trivial things with my new friends.

I used to belt down to Colombo on Friday evening and do a lecture on Friday and Saturday at Aquinas for students studying for the BSc Economics London University external degree. It all went well until I wrote my first research paper. Then, like a dark cloud, reality descended. The local industry neither understood the issues nor had any commitment or even a vague interest to pursue price stabilization schemes. The experience in Sri Lanka was not going to help my research in London, and I saw no purpose in continuing as a Research Economist at the Coconut Research Institute. I resigned, gave up my ambitions to be a great economist, and went in search of money and the excitement of the cut-and-thrust of the commercial world. I joined the Shell Company of Ceylon.