Ellum Gaha Lyrics by Daddy

The days of hanging out with money-minded girls are over
With the broke boys who never had a cent, we’re at peace now
Don’t talk nonsense now, baby
Set them aside, leave them be
The boys who take the knocks and the bruises
They’re the best of all

Under the gallows tree we played our games
Our court case too says we’re twenty-six
We’re not too late, we’re still the players here
Woowww… www
We fooled around and eyed the Vaikala girl’s boy
Not that it came without its sorrows
This is the time to set the heart straight

We dodged and ducked along with them
I remember the tough girls who were there
Worn one on each foot
I still remember that pair of slippers

All sneaky and puffed up, we don’t need hats anymore
That disco we threw, all clumsy and half-baked, is it over now I wonder

Under the gallows tree we played our games
Our court case too says we’re twenty-six
We’re not too late, we’re still the players here
Woowww… www
We fooled around and eyed the Vaikala girl’s boy
Not that it came without its sorrows
This is the time to set the heart straight

Under the gallows tree we played our games
Our court case too says we’re twenty-six
We’re not too late, we’re still the players here
Woowww… www
We fooled around and eyed the Vaikala girl’s boy
Not that it came without its sorrows
This is the time to set the heart straight

This is a cheeky, nostalgic baila number, the kind of song a group of old friends sing when they look back at their rowdy younger days and laugh at themselves. Nobody here is pining or heartbroken. The voice is a grown man remembering the gang he ran with as a teenager, the broke boys with no money in their pockets, the sharp-tongued girls, the dodging and ducking around the neighbourhood, all of it now safely in the past.

The “ellum gaha”, the gallows tree, is the anchor image. In old Sinhala village and town life it was a real landmark, the bare tree at the edge of a place, and here it stands for the corner where the boys loafed and got up to mischief. Playing “under the gallows tree” is the song’s wink at how reckless and carefree they were, hanging about in the one spot a respectable person would avoid. The line about “our court case is twenty-six” is the same kind of self-mocking humour, half boasting that they are still young enough to be up to no good, half admitting they have a bit of a record. Small concrete memories carry the whole thing: the “money-minded girls” they grew tired of, the single pair of slippers worn one on each foot (a poor boy’s only footwear), the boys who take their knocks and bruises and stay loyal anyway.

What gives the song its warmth is the half-line that keeps slipping in, that none of this came “without its sorrows”. Under all the swagger about discos and dodging and chasing after the Vaikala girl’s fellow, there is the quiet truth that growing up rough left a few scars too. So the refrain that “this is the time to set the heart straight” lands as both a joke and a gentle nudge, the moment to settle down, make peace with it all, and laugh.

It leaves you the way good party songs do, grinning at the foolishness of youth, a little tender about the friends and the lean years, and oddly comforted that those wild days, slippers, broke pockets and all, were worth remembering.