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A Sri Lankan soprano is shattering stereotypes. Tharanga Goonetilleke tells NPR’s Scott Simon about being an opera singer and the first Sri Lankan woman accepted to The Juilliard School.
SIMON: What was the reaction of your parents when you, I guess – and maybe you didn’t put it to them quite this way. But when you had that conversation where you had to say to them, well, maybe I won’t be going into medicine. Instead, I’m going to go into show business, or music, at any rate.
GOONETILLEKE: Right. Well, first of all, we didn’t even have the conversation about – mom, dad – may I leave? May I consider this option? I didn’t even think that it was an option until my dad himself, to my greatest surprise, he said, well, looks like this is real, and what do you think? And I never expected my dad to say those words because I never even had stayed over at my friend’s homes or anybody else’s home. I was – I grew up in a very sheltered home.
I always was with my parents and my sister. And then he just said, you know, it was almost overnight, he said, well, if you want to give it a shot, maybe we’ll both go together and check this place out. And also, it was a plus point that since the college that accepted me was a liberal arts school, I had decided that if I did go there, I’m going to take some classes in the sciences in case I have to fall back on something, you know. What if I didn’t really like it after all?
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