Oshanthi Perera on ways to bring fortune to your home:

Luring Lady Luck

Ruwini Jayawardana

Professor Chew Ken Long in Sri Lanka

Professor Chew Ken Long will visit Sri Lanka for a seminar at the Maharagama Youth Center on March 21 from 9 a.m. to noon. This will be the first time that an internationally qualified feng shui consultant visiting the country. The participants will be able to ask questions from Prof. Long at the event. Tickets for the event will be available at Sarasaviya bookshop and Sadeepa Bookshop, Borella. Professor Long will be bringing 100 auspicious jewellery pieces to the first 100 who have purchased tickets to take part in the seminar.

Twenty-five participants will receive prizes. Another 25 will receive memberships while 25 more will get a chance to consult Oshani personally.

A workshop will also be held at the Hotel Ramada. Two books written by her titled Feng shui lokaya and Feng shui rahas will also be launched.

Oshanthi Perera had been the guardian of Lady Luck for many. She had predicted and helped many lives overcome hardships through yang feng shui, a 6,000 year-old ancient Chinese

system of aesthetics to use the laws of heaven and earth to improve people’s lives

 Five elements

* Wood

* Fire

* Earth

* Metal

* Water

These help to re-balance the competing energies in your home. Each element has its own unique personality that either enables to ‘get along with’ the other elements, or to ‘fight against’ the other elements if the balance is not right.

Feng shui tips

* Four directions are lucky for wealth, love, education and harmony . We should choose one of these directions and place your bed to face that directions.

* If you have a garden, have something like a fountain or any other object with flowing water facing the main door.

* Do not light fire in the North West because it brings ill luck to the father of the family.

Every culture embodies its own exclusive methods to lure Lady Luck into your home and life. According to the Romans Fortuna is the goddess of good fortune while the Greeks believed in Tyche being the personification of prosperity. She is also the goddess of fate and is able to change one’s fate with a wink of an eye.

“Feng shui is a form of Chinese architecture. It is not a religion or belief and differs from other forms of architecture. It is widely used to orient buildings in a auspicious manner by noting a person’s birth time. We build the house or office so that it is in harmony with its surroundings to a manner in which the person’s wealth will increase,” Oshanthi Perera said adding that if you seat the workers in an office according to their lucky direction they would be able to work tirelessly. Similarly a child seated facing his or her lucky direction would put more effort into his or her studies.

Oshanthi Perera. Pictures by Rukmal Gamage

The past pupil of St. Joseph’s Girls’ School, Nugegoda had taken interest in the art after reading up on Lillian Too, a yang feng shui expert. Later she learnt yang feng shui under Professor Chew Ken Long. She is the only woman who practices the art in South Asia.

Lucky bamboo

She says 33 percent of good fate could be achieved through feng shui but only three percent of this can be achieved through objects. The rest is reaped through fortune by birth, self effort and through the nature we roam around in. Though there are 6000 statues and images connected with feng shui all over the world luck does not come your way by merely buying a costly statue and placing it in your home.

“This has become a money spin as people are earning by selling these goods for large sums. People engaged in this business relate that an object is lucky for a specific time,” she noted.

In feng shui you follow the lunar calender which starts off the year in January or February. In 2010 the year began in February 14. Though there are 12 animal signs in the calender this is the year of the Golden Tiger. You need to know your animal sign and your kua number to judge your luck.

Tracing the roots of this simple art and science Oshanthi said the term feng shui means ‘wind water’. In Chinese culture the two elements are related with good health. Ancient Chinese aristocrats used the age old art form to sustain their wealth, power and harmony. Hong Kong, Singapore and Malaysia have developed rapidly through the years after following the craft.

Oshanthi says that there are two methods of feng shui: yang feng shui and yin feng shui. You reach yin feng shui after excelling in certain techniques in the field. She aims to come to this stage when she embarks on a journey to the rural villages in China in April.

“Professor Long had asked me to accompany him on this venture. Only a selected number of his student have been selected to visit this place where traditional feng shui masters are at work. We will be practising a lot of methods which have never been put down on text. Most are connected with the cemetery,” she revealed.