 Nihal de Silva is no more. He had his last round of life in the fairways of the Wilpattu National Game Park, a place he loved so much.
Was there a meaning to his tragic death? Why did he have to die so cruelly and brutally?
A man who had nothing to do with the ethnic conflict that has plagued us all for so long?
He was only an ordinary human being, like the rest of us; played his lousy golf and sold water and wrote brave and beautiful prose.
Nihal won the Gratiaen Award and the State Literary Award, writing courageously about political parasites and their terminal torture of a nation and its helpless masses.
His death has no direct connection to anything ethnic or anything political. That is the absurdity of it all.
Why a man gets wiped away from the face of the earth for going to look at elephants and stepping on a land mine that has been placed to demark the boundary between sanity and insanity.
Nihal was my friend, Shirley is my friend and Shanik and Shamal are my friends. What do I tell them?
I tell them the same as I would tell anyone, that Nihal de Silva was a wonderful human being who walked this planet in steps that bothered none; an adoring husband and a loving father and a wonderful friend to all.
One thing he knew well was to laugh, and he laughed and we laughed. The last time we met we went to eat 'oppers and 'ot curry in Nawala and talked about going to Bali to a writer's festival in September for which we were both invited.
Now there is no more Bali, no more Nihal and no more laughter for me to share with him.
Good-bye Nihal, my dear friend of the risibility we wrote and idiocy we planned to write. Sometimes I wonder whether you ever knew how much I appreciated you as an author or for that matter how much I will miss you as a friend.
Good bye ABVB - this is from BVB - the line is only for us, where ever you maybe.
The sadness swallows me and the absurdity is almost insane.
I cannot write anymore, the key board is wet." - Elmo Jayawardena
Elmo Jayawardena is an award-winning author. A Singapore Airlines pilot, he also runs the charity - Association for Lighting a Candle or AFLAC in Sri Lanka.
About the tragic incident
 Nihal De Silva, was among eight people killed in a landmine explosion in the Wilpattu National Park in Sri Lanka.
They were tracking wild elephants in the park.
The location of the explosion, about 50 kilometres from the main gates to the Park, is close to the northern border of the park, the geographical beginning of rebel Tigers held stronghold of Vanni.
The area saw intense fighting before the 2002 Ceasefire Agreement.
While officials say the Tamil Tigers laid the landmines, the rebels have denied any hand in the incident.
The Director General of Sri Lanka's Wildlife Department Dayananda Kariyawasam believes the mines were newly laid, because they were on a main road through the park that has been used regularly since it re-opened in 2003.
More about Nihal de Silva
He is the author of 'The Road From Elephant Pass', 'The Far Spent Day' and 'The Ginirella Conspiracy'.
'The Road From Elephant Pass' which won De Silva the Gratiaen award in 2003, is largely about the Wilpattu National Park.
The book tracks the journey of Captain Wasantha Ratnayake of the Sri Lanka Army and female LTTE cadre Kamala Velaithan from the Elephant Pass to Colombo.
The LTTE's 1999/2000 attack on the Elephant Pass base forces the two to make their journey on foot across the National Park.
He ran his own business dealing in water purification and the supply of bottled mineral water.
In his own words he turned to writing fiction to keep himself occupied in his impending retirement.
The author was a keen amateur naturalist. He is survived by his wife and two sons.
(With inputs from AFP and Reuters)
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