On the one-year anniversary of Lasantha Wickrematunge’s murder, two weeks before Sri Lanka held its general election and Prageeth Eklinagoda, another journalist, went missing for good, after a long morning of being called a Westerner, a meddler, a bloody pest who couldn’t understand––all designations with which I agreed as I was then a white, male, twenty-four-year-old citizen of the U.S. working as a freelancer––yes, after being called many more names by a minor official at the Ministry of Defense––sudha, Americabe, big nose; I liked big nose––an official I’d asked to comment on whether there was a timeframe for when Tamil refugees in the North would be permitted to leave the teeming government camps and return to their bombed-out homes, now that the civil war was finally over, at least in theory, after thirty-five odd years––The years no one breathed, as my friend Shehan liked to say––after I focused on the minor official’s exceptionally long nose hairs that I imagined belonged to a parasite nesting in his nostrils, gorging on mucus, waving goodbye with skinny black tentacles to a world from which it preferred, sensibly, to hide, after I asked this minor official as, in his words, a Westerner, what I could understand, what traits all people could mutually agree upon as universal and necessary to lead a reasonably joyful life, after the official responded with the surprisingly wise statement, A people must feel safe, A people must feel love, after I told this official he was wise and that, although I couldn’t assure him of his safety, I could assure him of my love, after the official said, But you, Americabe, you do not know me, how can you say you love?, after I responded that it didn’t matter if I knew him or not, I loved him and everyone as best I could, albeit imperfectly, after the official told me I was not only crazy but also stupid, after I told him he was not the first person to say that, after he nodded to the security personnel standing at the door who proceeded to grab each of my arms, the barrel of one of their AK-47 rifles brushing my ear, the cold metal immediately arousing me, spawning a lump in my throat, intensifying my admiration for the guard’s delicate lips and my desire to kiss them, after the guard with the delicate lips asked me if I’d ever met Snoop Dogg as we walked down the long high-ceilinged halls leftover from the days of Britain’s imperial rule, halls charged with the colonial romance and nostalgia of a Kipling novel, after I answered, No, unfortunately, though my Dad grew up in Long Beach, after the guard responded, Oh that is too bad, I like that Snoop Doggy, after the other guard said, Shut up, Sunil, in Sinhala, after we walked from the Ministry to the first security check point wreathed in rusting razor wire, the Indian Ocean shining less than ten yards away, convincing me again of its sublimity, an observation I shared with Sunil who nodded thoughtfully and told me that he’d always dreamed of becoming a fish, or at least a sea horse, or even a stalk of kelp, in the next karmic cycle, so he could spend his next life underwater, far away from people, after I said goodbye to Sunil when the news van arrived––I didn’t recognize the middle-aged driver wearing a WWF t-shirt, but he smiled kindly––after I sat beside Gamini, my friend, who was sketching a picture of a faceless Buddha, after I said, How are you Gamini? and he replied, Oh my friend Tony, it is good to see you, after he held my hand tenderly––it’s customary for Sri Lankan men to hold hands––and asked me how my day was going, after I told him about being thrown out of the Ministry, after he laughed even though it was both funny and not funny, after I also laughed and noticed a shoeless boy from the van window, a boy throwing rocks at passing cars and clapping his hands, which made me happy, something about the purity of rebellion that, however futile or immature, always feels right, after I attempted to articulate this thought to Gamini, who nodded and said, Hmm, maybe so, as he often did when he was thinking, as he had on our recent hike into the Knuckles Mountains with his teenage daughter Mala as we walked along a green path and talked about the violin Gamini had recently been given by his Aunt Ruwanthie, an old, cheap violin, but it was still an instrument that made music if you were patient enough, after Gamini said, I do not know the right way to resist, after we talked about the weather (hot), the Conrad book I was reading (Victory), the Whitman poems I’d lent him, which he mostly liked, a Prageeth Eknaligoda cartoon he’d seen on the Internet that morning showing a giant snake attempting to swallow the egg from which it had just hatched, a snake under a full moon without a caption, after we talked about the election and I asked Gamini who he was voting for, Rajapaska or Fonseka, after Gamini said, I am not voting, I am going to stay home and play my violin, after I said nothing, after we said our goodbyes, after I picked up a jackfruit and pumpkin curry packet from by favorite kadé where the man never said a word but kept his head meticulously shaven and always made a little bow when he handed me the curry neatly folded inside the cream-colored butcher paper, after I bowed, after I thanked God for this food, after I sat down in the dusty storage room that also served as a cafeteria and kitchen, after I listened, licking my fingers sticky with pumpkin and rice, to Nisthar, one of my editors, answer my subeditor Miriam’s claim that he was a coward for not joining her and Nizla and Deepal and the many other journalists at the candlelight vigil to honor Lasantha, the journalist who had been murdered exactly a year ago for his relentless honesty, after Nisthar said, Well, of course, I am a chicken, after Miriam told him she wasn’t impressed, after Nisthar said, I do not ask you to be impressed, after Miriam said, I hope not, after Nisthar said, Do you really want to know what I think?, after Miriam––who, I must add, was quite pretty and always democratic with her sharp tongue; she often handed me back my articles, calling them shit––said, Yes, why don’t you tell us what you think for once?, after Nisthar, who was good-natured but also guarded as many are who have been badly hurt, said, Lasantha … the stubborn romantic bugger … you want to know what I think? after Miriam said, Yes, coward, tell us, after Nisthar said, We worked together at The Bottom Line then at The Nation … he was a lawyer first, you know … he came from a lawyer family … he had a bit of Dutch blood … or maybe Portuguese … the ones with power always do … always a drop of white … me, I am a brown bugger … no white in me … Allah be praised … no offense to our American friend … but Lasantha was a good sort … had the right sort of heart, as they say … he tired of corruption … became a journalist … he thought words might do some good … maybe they did before the windows were broken by bricks … before the presses were bombed to pieces … Lasantha, the bloody joker … he loved his chocolates … he loved his little boys … his wife was bit of a nag, but he loved her too … he used to hide behind doors and scare buggers in the newsroom … BOO … a mad joker … a bloody little kid to think he could have changed a thing … Allah be with him … the sun was shining when they shot him … it usually is … Lasantha … there’s a joker for you … just like me, after Miriam said she didn’t agree, after Nisthar said, That is fine, dear, after Miriam left, after Nisthar told me I needed to write an article about a Red Bull-sponsored motorcyclist from Germany demonstrating stunts at Victoria Park, after I told him about being kicked out of the Ministry, after he laughed, and said, What did you expect?, after I said, Right-o, after he said, Get out of here, you joker, after I said, Right-o, Right-o, Right-o, after Nisthar left and I walked the few blocks to Victoria Park with my hands in my pockets, whistling that perfect Jay Reatard song, It’s So Easy––It’s so easy / When your friends are dead / It’s so much easier / When you don’t even care / All these faces mean nothing to me / All these faces mean nothing to me––Jay Reatard, the Memphis punk who used to live in boxcars and who would die five days later––1/13/2010––of an overdose from alcohol and cocaine, the same blissful combination that took away River Phoenix and my Aunt Rose, after I climbed the thick branches of a nuga tree to get a better view of the motorcyclist––there was a larger crowd than I expected––after I thought about all those times my Aunt Rose had taken me to the beach or to the arcade or to the supermarket when I was small and then left me there to wander while she got high, which I didn’t blame her for, not even a little, this life isn’t easy, I thought, after I opened my notebook while waiting for the motorcycle show to start, after I sketched a picture of Sisyphus, my favorite lost soul, poor Sisyphus, hidden in some cold corner of hell, sentenced to roll his boulder up his forgotten hill even though he still hasn’t reached its apex because the boulder continues to roll back down right before he gets there, and Sisyphus will have to do his best to make it to the top again even though the boulder will continue rolling back down, over and over, forever and ever, after I made sure Sisyphus was smiling at the rock he was chained to, that his eyes were filled with the strange light of recognition, as if he saw that his curse was a door––the only door––by which to exit history’s obscene comedy, after pondering the obvious similarities between Sisyphus’s fate and our own, after laughing at the leafy branches of that nuga tree on which I sat, after watching two teenagers kissing in the shadows below me, after listening to a man––his face was so tired––on a branch beside me whistle a sad song that, like most songs, was probably about some kind of loss, I decided that I would be happy for the rest of my life, no matter what.