2017 Jul 6
The tragic story of the British ‘Shirley Valentine’ circled all major newspapers worldwide in late June. Here’s an insight into all the gruesome details of her tragic holiday romance that are sure to give us nightmares over the once coveted concept of an exotic summer fling.
The beginning of a not-so-beautiful relationship…
Lazing under the Kalutara sun on the tropical paradise that is Sri Lanka, overlooking the azure Indian Ocean, the British council worker, Diane Peebles, 59, first met Priyanjana de Zoysa, 26, the hotel worker whom she was unaware was soon going to become her husband.
Diane warmed up to the room boy’s attentiveness and left him money and chocolates every day as a ‘thank you’ for his service. He proceeded to return the gesture by bringing her flowers. Despite being unable to string so much as a sentence together in English, he even dared to ask for her mobile number. This was the beginning of the whirlwind holiday romance that would soon turn into the tragedy that we all came to know of.
Six months later, Diane joined hands with Priyanjana in holy matrimony. He proposed to her with a silver and amethyst ring – makes one wonder now if it’s real or fake – and even got her name tattooed on his arm. The ceremony wasn’t the typical conventional, dream-like ordeal at the altar, either.
Priyanjana was “very affectionate”, Diane said, revealing the nature of the early stages of their relationship. “He was always holding my hand and kissing me.”
He also seemed to be unfrazzled by the fact that his new wife was older than his mother.
“Age is just a number,” he had said, in an attempt to dispel her concern for their 33-year age gap.
Eventually, she sold her house in Scotland, pooled all her assets and moved to the coastal village of Ahungalle to be with her husband. Diane then proceeded to spend £31,000 to buy her husband a minibus and gave him the remaining £60,000 to build a three-bedroom villa for them to live in.
But disaster struck when the new Mrs. de Zoysa’s exotic romance quickly turned bitter…
After packing up, moving halfway across the world to be with her husband, and handing over all her savings, she has now found herself in the worst situation imaginable.
“It hasn’t been the life I thought it would be,” Diane said, expressing her thoughts on her wedded life as Mrs. de Zoysa.
After using up all her money, she soon found herself struggling to survive on her pension of £350. However, Priyanjana still continued to pester her for more money, despite her efforts to explain to him that she was, in fact, penniless.
Speaking to Mail Online, she said: “I should have realised it was just about the money.”
After marriage, the once affectionate room boy disappeared for weeks at a time, while she sat at home, all alone. She revealed that even on the rare occasions he was at home, he often abandoned her and attended parties by himself, convincing her that the music would be too loud, or the food too spicy for her liking.
In late 2016, she found a marriage certificate with Priyanjana’s signature on it. Diane now believes that her husband had another wife, presumed to be 18-years of age.
“The last few months were very hard as we argued all the time and he would get angry and smash things,” Diane said. “It was quite volatile towards the end. I wanted to leave him but I had nowhere to go and no money.”
The situation was so unfavourable that she briefly returned to Scotland in 2016 in the hopes of returning to her old life, but failing to find accommodation or employment, she returned back to Sri Lanka, determined to make her marriage work.
But the worst was yet to come…
Things took a turn for the worse when Priyanjana was shot dead on May 31, 2017, whilst visiting a friend, as a result of a blackmail plot. Even after suffering through her short-lived marriage that was both unpleasant and deceptive, Diane still expresses sentiments of affection for her late husband.
“I’ve never loved anybody the way I loved him.”
The aftermath…
She is now desperate to return to Scotland and rebuild her life, but has no money left. Diane is also unable to sell her villa, which she had foolishly allowed to be registered under his family’s name, or the minibus, which Priyanjana had leased behind Diane’s back.
“I thought he really loved me…”
To the average Sri Lankan, the whole ordeal would seem fishy right from the start. But Diane claims that “the path of true love is, more often than not, a bumpy one.”
“If there was a chance at happiness, I was going to take it,” she said.
Despite family and friends expressing their concerns over her sketchy relationship, she obstinately proceeded to marry him, in order to “prove them wrong.”
Having never found lasting love, and after living with her parents for over four decades, it’s understandable that she was desperate for a chance to love and be loved. The Mermaid Hotel of Kalutara, with all its scenic beauty and tranquillity, was the perfect tropical setting for the budding of their romance, and Priyanjana, the unconventional Prince Charming. Her happiness at finding the love she had yearned for her whole life blinded her to the sketchy aspects of the affair, including Priyanjana’s ulterior motive to get his hands on her money.
Diane is now left with nothing but a plateful of shame and embarrassment.
