Passing Matara and not going to Maha Maya Road, Kotuway Guda, would be the same as going to Agra and ignoring the Taj Mahal. The man responsible for placing this small town — off the road to Galle — on the world cricketing map is Sanath Jayasuriya.

Even without the postal address, it’s quite easy to find where the Sri Lankan batsman lived. Just take his name, and a busy shopkeeper leaves everything on hand and walks you half-way to the destination. A group of visibly tired school kids, heading home after class, take over the baton enthusiastically as the magic J-word is mentioned.

While the superstar has shifted base to Colombo, the rest of his family members enjoy having lost visitors escorted diligently to their street. As you meet the parents, who still live at the modest sea-side family home that has gone through extensive makeovers during the last decade, it becomes clear that being Sanath’s folks allows them several special privileges.

Mother Breeda recalls her Tsunami experience to drive home the point. “I was in the market buying vegetables that day when the place got suddenly flooded. Somehow I got hold of a tree but I was losing my grip. Then I shouted, ‘I am Jayasuriya’s mother’, and soon I was rescued,” she says, with a smile on her face even as she narrates the harrowing experience of getting unconscious and being taken to a hospital in Colombo.

Family album

The living room where she sits documents the various stages of her son’s life, starting with baby Sanath in her lap in a family photograph. From a shy adolescent to an international cricketer with a gradually receding hairline, it’s a meticulously maintained gallery of framed pictures.

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