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Everyone endeavours to go back to his village home around this time of the year. Traditionally salaries are paid early in the month of April. The shopping malls do brisk business and vendors who occupy every sidewalk have a field day. City Police too wear the festive mood with greater attention paid to pickpockets in the shopping areas during this season of 'Avurudu in Sinhala or Puthaandu in Tamil. The customs and traditions associated with New Year are followed religiously in the villages. These include stopping all work and spending over 12 hours in meditation and religious observances. The first meal for the New Year is cooked at 4.16 a.m. on April 14, when the hearth is lit by a person in clothing of mixed colour, facing the south. The national New Year in Sri Lanka is a time of joy and festivity. All those who observe the customs would stand on leaves of the Banyan tree with leaves of the Imbul tree on their heads while an elder would annoint their heads with Imbul juice. Then, they would bathe dressed in red and yellow clothes. Traditions will always be traditions. They give colour to social life and keep alive a culture, which is fast being enveloped by technology and development. Strict adherents of tradition will leave for work facing the North on April 19 at 6.33 am, dressed in yellow clothing, after partaking of a meal of jaggery, bees honey and skimmed milk with milk rice.
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