GOANS around the world
have a lot in common. There is one trait we would rather not have and that is
the ability of putting crap on fellow Goans, the age-old crabs in a bucket
(when one tries to climb out of the bucket, 12 others pull it down). It is a metaphor
that used apply in the old days in most aspects of Goan life. I have been accused
of that often, especially when writing the facts as they are, or bringing to
light an unsavory fact. As a journalist, I never abuse my profession using it to
personally attack any human being. I would rather the facts speak for themselves,
as a commentator, critic, observer, I have that right.
In the Epilogue of my debut novel Yesterday in Paradise I wrote:
I am a Goan. I am a Kenyan. I am British. I am Australian. I am a
man of many parts from many places, but right now the whole of me is Australian.
Yet, the punchline was quite simply: The Goan in me will only die with that
final (last) sunset.
So, I was quite mortified when I read another one of those
opinion pieces (usually reserved the rubbish bin) entitled Identifying a
true Goan (The Goan) by someone called Aires Rodrigues, thankfully I have never
met the man. Thank God for small mercies.
In a sub-heading he wrote (or the subeditor did) A Goan worth
his salt should at least have basic knowledge of the mother tongue (Most of Goan children who went to school in East Africa from around 1953, were forced to speak English only at home by the Colonial Government which mandated that Asian parents (including Goans) should speak to their children in their vernaculars because it was hurting the children's ability to speak proper English. Somehow for the Goans it was no problem. We spoke Konkani at home regardless of the edict. In years to come, my siblings used to speak to my mother in English, broken Swahili and broken Konkani to dying day. With that
one sentence, I would suggest that Mr Rodrigues has wiped more than 80 percent
(just a guess) of the East African Goans of my generation from being a Goan in
his way of thinking. What a load of crap. In most of, generations of Goan DNA
runs through out blood. In the case of my own children, two
Goan-Kenya-British-Australians and third a Goan-Kenyan-Australian and they the
Goan DNA running through from the generations of two sets of parents. To
suggest that our children cannot be called Goans, is idiotic to say the least.
I would suggest, because of the attitudes of the likes of Mr Rodrigues, many of
children would be bothered about the Goan way of thinking.
“There are large numbers of people residing outside the State
abroad, whose ancestors migrated from Goa but they cannot automatically be
classed as Goans unless they are proud of their Goan heritage.” Who appointed
him God? How could we be anything else but Goan.
“… On the other hand, a person can be born and resident
outside of our State and acquire roots by subscribing to the Goan ethos. Roots
can develop in any part of the world, sink deep, traverse the oceans and
terminate in the ancestral villages of Goa”. Make up your mind, you are
contradicting yourself. What the hell do you think we have been doing for the
past 80 years and many more still continue to do. I hope they do not run into
the likes of Rodrigues otherwise their holiday will be spoilt.
The rest of the article is a bit of diatribe, he really does not
his own mind because he finishes of with “A true Goan will always root for Goa.”
We all do that when required.
It won’t be long before the church is asking Catholic Goan women
to have more babies because the Catholic Goan population is dwindling. I would
suggest that the threat may be real that the traditional Roman Catholic Goan in
Goa is a vanishing tribe and when the last of them is away in Heaven, why would
anyone want to call it Goa? I mean the Goan we all knew and loved.
He also mentions that “Goan food is unique and any Goan will be
proud of it,” on my last two trips I had to ask friends to take me to some authentic
Goan restaurants, not those that have fashioned their cuisine to suit tastes
from other parts of India or Europe. Incidentally, in some restaurants, Food
really is not Goan. I cook better Goan food in my kitchen and so do thousands
of Goans in Australia, New Zealand, UK, Canada, USA, Europe and many parts of the
world.
Why do I get the impression that the editor could not have read this
diatribe, if he had he would have spiked it.
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