What is the Water Cutting Ceremony (Diya Kepeema)?

The Diya Kepeema ritual is the closing part of the daybreak ceremonies by the Mahaweli River, where a chief priest symbolically strikes the water with a sacred sword to take up pure water.

It is meant to show the leaving of bad influences, and to call for fruitfulness and rain, for the farming year that comes next. The new river water gets gathered in a golden goblet, and it stays at the temple until the festival arrives again, the next year. Meanwhile, the water from the previous season is let back into the river, and then the whole spiritual cycle is put to rest, gently.