Have you heard people saying like Raigamaya and Gampolaya when speaking about crafty men. This saying came to be due to two crafty men of yesteryear.
Raigamaya and Gampolaya were two crafty men who lived many, many years ago in our country. Raigama and Gampola were two ancient Sinhala capitals. Gampola was in the central hills of the country, fairly close to the Royal Kingdom of Kandy. Raigama was in the low country bordering the Western province. Today, this area is known as Raigam Korale.
Now, Raigamaya was a man who lived in the ancient capital city of Raigama and got his name from the name of the city. He sold bulath kola (bêtel leaves) which the people enjoyed chewing with puwak (arecanut) chunam, and spices such as cardamoms and cloves. Women loved to chew betel as it made their lips rosy red. Gampolaya lived in the olden capital of Gampola and his name too was derived from the name of the city. His job was selling puwak (arecanuts) – a kind of nut which people eat with the betel leaves.
The two men travelled to far off villages to sell their bulath and puwak but returned to the same ambalama (wayside rest) at night. Thus, they were friends and chatted far into the night about various topics.
One day, Gampolaya made up his mind to play a trick on his friend and strangely enough Raigamaya too thought that he would play a trick on Gampolaya at the same time. This is how Raigamaya and Gampolaya played their tricks on each other.
Gampolaya filled his bag with iriyanuts and not the usual puwak or arecanuts. Raigamaya too did the same thing by filling his bag with gammiris leaves (pepper leaves). Instead of the usual bulath leaves. Pepper and betel leaves look very much alike.
They met at the ambalama as usual and after a long chat went to sleep. The next day, Gampolaya woke up bfrore his usual time and stealthily picked up Raigamaya’s bag and quickly went away from the ambalama. Actually, Raigamaya was awake but pretended to be asleep. He saw Gampolaya leaving with his bag.
Both men were happy thinking they had fooled each other.It was only when they were about to sell their goods that they realised they had fooled only themselves.