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Every year, the villagers of Panama carry out a unique, 15-day ritual called an keliya in Sinhala or kombu vilaiyadu in Tamil. Men use the horns of sambhur or wooden hooks to perform a tug-of-war, a bawdy ceremony that ends with a symbolic “turning back of the wrong”. In this turning-back, the victorious side, which had hooted down and hurled obscenities at the losing side, sings songs seeking forgiveness to assuage the hurt and shame.This is something the country could think of using in a national context, in the opinion of Ms de Alwis. The government need not look very far if it wants to find a way towards post-war reconciliation; the path was laid centuries ago.Via http://www.economist.com/blogs/banyan/2014/03/sri-lanka-after-warsource: www.economist.com