THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, May 12, 1995 TAG: 9505120049
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY PHILIP WALZER, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Medium: 73 lines
TWELVE YEARS ago, Chaminie Marie Amarasinghe came here from Sri Lanka, able to say only two dozen words in English. Now she's talking about viral tests and quantitative morphometry - and medical school.
Amarasinghe (her first name, as she tells people, rhymes with hominy) is graduating from Virginia Wesleyan College today. The all-American student has great grades, a handful of awards and loads of praise from across campus.
``I have never heard any faculty member or student say anything against her,'' said Betty Jefferson Harris, the college's science division head.
Her parents, both professors in Sri Lanka, thought Amarasinghe would get a better education in the United States. So they persuaded her to come here and live with her aunt, who later adopted her. Now Amarasinghe calls her aunt ``Mom'' and her former cousins her sisters.
Amarasinghe, a slight, cheerful 23-year-old, speaks almost matter-of-factly about her transition to America. Sure, there were plenty of changes.
``Everything was really fast-paced, and there were a lot more cars,'' she said. ``Everyone's on the go. Ceylon (the former name of her country) is a laid-back type of place.''
But she adjusted quickly, she says. ``I didn't get too lonely. Mom always had me do something: Go read this, do this, play a game. I could watch as much TV as I wanted to. She wanted me to pick up English.''
That first year, she sat next to one of her new sisters, Kari, in the fifth grade at St. Gregory's Catholic School. She had instant help, instant friends. ``In two or three months, I could carry on a conversation. By the end of the year, I had friends I could talk to.''
She went on to Cape Henry Collegiate School and then enrolled in Wesleyan.
Amarasinghe planned to concentrate on math (that was the only subject she got graded on her first year at St. Gregory's, and she did well). But she got intrigued by science, thanks to Harris, and added biology as a second major. ``I just think it's a really fascinating area to study. You learn how things work, and you end up asking yourself a lot of questions about things you don't know.''
She worked for a month at a lab at Eastern Virginia Medical School and a semester at another at the Jones Institute for Reproductive Medicine. She studied viral infections in cells, learned how to cut a specimen to the length of five microns.
Amarasinghe, who has a 3.6 average, won the Molecular Biology Award at Wesleyan's honors convocation. But unlike the stereotypical pre-med, she doesn't just look out for No. 1.
She also received an Outstanding Volunteer Award for tutoring students in math and science and the Exceptional Leader Award for her work as president of the Omicron Delta Kappa honors society. Plus, she's on the college dance team.
``I don't believe in cutthroating,'' Amarasinghe says. ``Life will be good to you, but at the same time you have to be good to life.''
Her friend Sharon Fox, a senior, says, ``She does everything you could possibly imagine, and she still goes around with a smile on her face. She's always happy to see you. You ask her how she's doing, and she's got 2,000 things going on, and it doesn't faze her.''
Her biological parents recently moved to Virginia Beach, and they, along with her adoptive mother, will attend graduation. Amarasinghe plans to get a research job for a year and then go to med school. Maybe she'll go into family practice, maybe pediatrics. ``Right now,'' she admits, ``sick kids scare me because I don't know anything.''
But she'll learn. Bill Ruehlmann, the adviser to Omicron Delta Kappa, says, ``She is going to be amazing when she gets out of the academic world.'' ILLUSTRATION: Color photo
CHRISTOPHER REDDICK/Staff
by CNB