Sri Lanka or Ceylon as it was known in the period between 1948 AD -1972 AD, which is an island country located in the north of the Indian Ocean, specifically in the south of the Indian subcontinent in South Asia, on an area of approximately 65,610 square kilometers, and its land inhabits about 21.48 million people of various religions and ethnicities, It has maritime borders from the north with India, which is approximately 31 km away, and borders to the southwest with the Maldives.
Sri Lanka is one of the first strongholds of Buddhism, in which the well-known texts of this religion are written, the state system is a presidential and centralized republican, and its capital is Sri Jayawardenapura, and Sri Lanka has two official languages: Sinhalese spoken by three quarters of the population, and Tamilism spoken by approximately 26% of the population, and Sri Lanka is characterized by its tropical climate throughout days the year.
What is Sri Lanka famous for?
- It is famous for producing and exporting tea, coffee, coconut and rubber.
- It is famous for its natural beauty of landscapes, beaches, coral reefs, tropical forests, and its biological diversity.
- It is famous for its rich cultural heritage, which has made it the most important tourist destination in the world.
- Sri Lanka is famous for its teardrop of India, due to its geographical location, as well as the land of the smiling people.
- It is famous for its nature reserves; a Buddhist king established the first nature reserve.
The most famous tourist cities of Sri Lanka
- Colombo: It is the largest city in Sri Lanka, and its economic capital, located in the southwest coast, and is characterized by a mixture of hills, plains and swamps, as the city is distinguished for its many water channels.
- Nora Elia: Away from Colombo about 190 km, it is characterized by beautiful lakes, waterfalls and green mountains that are covered with tea plantations, and there is a natural reserve that embraces the mountain of the end of the world, a mountain that is very high and the land cannot be seen from its summit.
- Candy: It is located in the middle of Sri Lanka, and it is considered a tropical agricultural region famous for growing tea, as it is considered a world heritage site, and it contains the remains of the sacred tooth of the Buddha
- Ancient ancient cities: Anuradhapura and the ancient city of Polonnaruwa, a golden temple painted in stunning gold is located in Dambulla, and an ancient town in Galle that includes more than fourteen huge fortresses as evidence of the city’s many wars.
Ethnicities in Sri Lanka
Sinhalese is the majority ethnicity in Sri Lanka based on the statistics of 2001, where they constitute approximately 74%, while the Tamils constitute about 18%, and the Moro about 7%, and minorities such as burgers, Vedas, and Malaysians constitute approximately 1%.Read:List of the most beautiful tourist places in the Philippines for families
Religions in Sri Lanka
Most of the population owes Buddhism, while the Tamils convert to Hinduism, the Moro and Malaysians convert to Islam, and a large minority of Sinhalese and Tamil convert to Christianity.