Boiling milk and worrying about the Iran war: A New Year dawns in Sri Lanka

Global Health Boiling milk and worrying about the Iran war: A New Year dawns in Sri Lanka April 16, 20261:22 PM ET Diaa Hadid A New Year began on April 14 for Sri Lankan Buddhists and Hindus. One custom is to boil fresh milk in a new clay pot and allow it to overflow, seen as a way of invoking blessings. Sanka Vidanagama/NurPhoto via Getty Images hide caption toggle caption Sanka Vidanagama/NurPhoto via Getty Images COLOMBO, Sri Lanka — In her home in a tidy working class alley, Shiranti Rambukkana has set up a literal bonfire in her narrow living room. At precisely 10:51 a.m. she strikes a match to get a fire going under the wooden kindling on a metal pan in her living room. She throws fire starters to feed the flames, and soon a clay pot of milk resting on bricks boils over — to bring on prosperity and good fortune in the New Year. The day that marks the New Year differs from culture to culture. In this island tucked at the tail end of India, the Buddhist majority and Hindu minority celebrate on April 14. The date marks the end of on solar year and the start of another, according to local astrological traditions. Sponsor Message On this day, tradition holds that there are auspicious times to perform certain rituals to bring prosperity in the new year. Those times are different each year –- astrologers decide when they should be, the Ministry of Culture announces them. So for the New Year, nearly everyone does the same things at the same time. And that's why Rambukkana lights her hearth for the boiling of the milk, facing southward and wearing red at exactly 10:51. Then her husband, Kasoun, covers his hands in towels and picks up the metal tray with the kindling, bricks and clay pot and places it outside. Time for the next ritual: she rushes back to the kitchen — a nook behind the staircase — and squeezes shredded coconut that she's been soaking to extract the milk. It goes into her rice cooker. That's for a traditional coconut rice dish that's eaten at 12:06 p.m....