She was the life of any party

Vijayalakshmi was born in 1941, the second child of the illustrious lawyer, G. G. Ponnambalam and Rose Alagumani, in Colombo, Sri Lanka. She went to Ladies’ College in Colombo, where she is remembered for her mischief by her classmates. As a youngster, if a teacher sought to reprimand her, she would burst out with some hilarious comment that even made the teacher chuckle, recalls her sister-in-law Premala.

In her last year, Viji was a school prefect, and as her junior schoolmates, we were always petrified of her. She gave us one hard look and that would quell the noisy and rambunctious line as we proceeded to the chapel. As we saw her, we all dropped our eyes to the ground; and knew enough to behave when Viji was in charge of the corridors outside our classroom.

In the summer of June 1960, Viji got direct entrance to Medical College at Kynsey Road in Colombo, starting medical school. The students worked in groups of five in the Anatomy Lab. Her friends recall a batchmate looking for Viji and telephoning her at home and speaking to her father. Viji’s father, needless to say, went up in smoke when he was informed that her “body partner” was calling!

After graduation and internship, she married Dr Brahman Siva pr aka sa pill ai, an engineer with an esteemed intellect. They were married for 53 years. She had three children, Narayani, Sanjeevan and Darshana. She was a doting mother and raised three loving children. She subsequently moved to the UK and worked there for one year, and acquired her membership in Pediatrics.

In 1977, Brahman moved to the USA and was joined in 1978 by Viji and the children. Brahman had a posting with the UN in New York City. Viji started her Residency in Radiology at Bridgeport Hospital in Connecticut, which was within commuting distance of her home. We reconnected within a few days of their landing in NY city.

Viji and Brahman lived in the suburbs of New York City. She loved to garden and took care of roses, her Karapincha plant and ferns. She loved dinner parties and getting dressed up, like most women do, and attended so many christenings, birthday parties, graduation parties and weddings. Thanksgiving was always in our home in Connecticut, followed by a second celebration in New Jersey. Christmas was in New Jersey with much singing and celebrating.

After her residency was completed, Viji started a private practice in Radiology in Bronx, NY. Some years later she joined a group of hospital radiologists in Binghamton,NY where she was a consultant.

Eventually she retired, after years of dedicated service at Lourdes Hospital in Binghamton, NY. She sold her second home in Binghampton and settled down in Westchester County outside NY city. She has two delightful grandchildren, Neel and Vaishnavi and her three children have grown up to be responsible and caring individuals.

A few years later she moved to Florida for the winters and to be closer to her son, Sanjeevan and daughter-in-law Maya, a gastroenterologist, and their son Neel. Brahman enjoyed Florida and the turquoise blue waters around him, but Viji hankered for her friends and came back to the Northeast of the USA for the summers. Her party schedule would have overwhelmed anyone else, but you could always rely on Viji to honour the invitations and to attend the function and make people laugh.

In her last few years physical ailments slowed her down, but she still revelled in the company of friends and also continued her philanthropic ways. Viji had a stroke in July 2018 and valiantly dealt with ICUs and daily physical therapy but eventually succumbed to her illnesses in January this year.