The Good Old Bad Days (Augusto Pinto)

[Frederick FN Noronha * फ्रेड्रिक नोरोन्या * فريدريك نورونيا‎]

The Good Old Bad Days (Augusto Pinto)

Goanet Reader Wed, 23 Dec 2015 00:09:27 -0800

Augusto Pinto: Afterword
pinto...@gmail.com

[From the Afterword to Paul Melo e Castro's *Lengthening
Shadows*, a two-volume set of translations of Portuguese
short stories written by Goans.]

          You could see, hear and smell Goa Portuguesa even
          as late as 1970. That was the year my parents,
          along with my nine-year-old self, returned from
          Kenya to live in our 'ancestral house' in the Goan
          village of Sangolda.

At night those sights, sounds and smells became more
pronounced. At home the quality of the light would change
depending on whether you used the simple kerosene lamps
improvised from old medicine bottles that flickered an
orangish flame; or you were rich enough to own a petromax
lamp which you had to pump every now and then to increase the
glow. Or better still you had one of those sophisticated
Aladdin lamps with the long elegant glass chimneys. Of course
in the towns electricity made everything different; but the
difference was most pronounced when one could afford neither
kerosene nor candle, but made do with a little oil in a pontti.

In the air, the whiff of smoke from those lamps mingled with
that of burning firewood in the kitchen, and the aroma of the
food cooking there. And there was also the pleasant odour of
that age-old natural disinfectant -- cowdung paste -- which
would be plastered on the floor of our houses to constitute
its flooring.

Also at night the sounds of nature could be heard distinctly:
from the staccato non-stop chirping of crickets, to the
whooey howls of the jackals in the fields whom we listened to
till we nodded off to sleep, until we woke up to the
twittering of the birds and the crowing of the cocks early in
the morning. Then, we'd encounter the sows and their piglets
crying 'oink oink', hurrying us up in the ubiquitous pig
toilets of those times.

All these sights, sounds and smells which sound romantic now
but were a nuisance then, were to disappear, at first
gradually and later rapidly, as villages were electrified and
all the modern conveniences which the West was familiar with,
from fans to fridges to fast food, started becoming
commonplaces of middle class life over the years.

          From the late 1980s onwards, change continued at a
          bewildering pace with trees and hills being cut
          down to make way for concrete jungles, first in the
          towns and beach belt parts of Bardez, Ilhas and
          Salcete (the Portuguese Old Conquests) but later
          on, thanks to the tourism and real estate booms,
          even in comparatively remote New Conquest areas of
          Pernem and Canacona.

Indiscriminate mining had begun by this time to wreak havoc.
The agrarian economy declined and Goa rapidly transformed
itself into a modern service-oriented one and mining,
tourism, the bureaucracy and remittances from emigrants
became the mainstays of Goa's economy. All these changes
affected the Goan's way of life immensely.

Imperceptibly in the meanwhile, Goa Portuguesa became history
and the quaint artefacts of the times like the grinding
stones and pestles and the bullock carts and the palanquins
from the houses of old that produced those once familiar
sights and sensations, got consigned to the museums or,
worse, the garbage heaps of Goa, when they weren't eaten by
termites or consumed by rust.

                *

But what about the people and the society of Goa Portuguesa?
What sort of lives did our parents and grandparents and
great- grand-parents live? Were they happy and contented or
otherwise?

          Myths, some diametrically opposed, abound about
          this Goa of old. There are those who look at
          Portuguese rule, beginning with the Inquisition, as
          one of undiluted horror and misery, one where civil
          liberties (especially for Hindus) were curtailed
          and one where Goans lived a life of fear from a
          police state, until the action of the Indian Army
          in 1961 regained paradise for us.

          Others think the Goa that is gone was already a
          Garden of Eden, at least in the sense that it was a
          more innocent place. These nostalgics yearn for the
          days when Goa had a very ordered if unequal
          society, and not the chaos and tumult that is the
          present. That yearned-after Goa was definitely
          greener and had a lot less of the big concrete
          boxes on the hillside style of architecture that
          exemplifies the word 'Modern'. It was also
          protected from all sorts of predators (or so these
          nostalgics thought) and everyone admitted that
          although the air was pure and the land was
          beautiful, it was poor and undeveloped.

What's the truth? And is there a single truth? Probably not,
for there probably never was any one single past, but a range
of different pasts which were not black and white or even
grey, but a kaleidoscope of colours living in the memories of
the people.

Till now we've had to depend upon unreliable stories from
grandmothers or long-winded history books to learn about
those times. However Literature can help us rediscover that
past, for among its powers is the ability to allow us to
eavesdrop on the conversations of the past and to gaze at the
word pictures it creates.

*Lengthening Shadows* lends credence to this assertion. The
Portuguese stories that Paul Melo e Castro has assiduously
collected and translated in *Lengthening Shadows* certainly
give a glimpse of the lives of the elite who spoke
Portuguese; but they also allude to the lot of those who did
not use that language.

Of course, like all literature, these stories can be looked
at from many perspectives: aesthetic, psychological,
ideological... But for a Goan reading the stories in
*Lengthening Shadows*, the temptation to lose oneself into
mulling over the lives of one's forebears of some fifty to a
hundred and fifty years ago is very strong. Certainly I gave
in to it, knowing for a fact that the Goa of my youth has
changed so drastically that today seems like a different
world altogether. Obviously, life before that was stranger
still.

                *

By the time these stories were written Goa had lost its
importance as an important outpost of the Portuguese maritime
empire -- capital of the Estado Da Índia which administered
places like Mozambique, Macau and Timor. In the meanwhile,
Portugal had plunged into turmoil after Brazil became
independent.

          In Goa for the most part, the Catholic Bamon
          (Brahmin) and Chardó (Kshatriya) caste elites ruled
          the political roost to the extent the Portuguese
          allowed this; although powerful Hindu business
          interests manipulated financial life behind the
          scenes. The Catholic monopoly over political
          influence continued till the First Portuguese
          Republic, which was ushered in after 1910,
          separated State and Church and bestowed equal
          citizenship rights upon the Hindus of Goa, until
          Antonio de Oliveira Salazar's dictatorship turned
          all Goans into second class citizens through the
          Acto Colonial of 1930, an Act which was only
          repealed in 1950.

                *

As a Goan these stories brought back a flood of memories, but
they also surprised me in some ways. Let me recount a few
random aspects of Goa Portuguesa in *Lengthening Shadows*
that caught my attention.

Although I was aware that in those times the upper classes
were a very pompous lot, as could well be expected from a
socially sterile, economically depressed, caste-based
society, the amusement that was generated at their expense by
authors who came from that very same class was priceless.

Satire was the genre that seemed particularly suited to their
genius and writers like GIP and José da Silva Coelho took
great delight in ridiculing the old aristocracy, although the
returning Bomboikars and Africanders who brought back wealth
from the booming British colonies also had their airs
deflated, even as the common folk were being ribbed. Although
it is clear that different castes and classes lived in
tolerance and harmony, there was a tension in their
relationships and social interaction followed certain
formalised rules of behaviour, which can be discerned in many
of the stories.

Many have the impression that there was less crime in the Goa
of old. Was Goa a crime-free place then? Not true. The
stories of the mid-nineteenth century of Júlio Gonçalves
indicate that those times could be fraught with dangers posed
by all sorts of rascals, petty thieves, kidnappers and even
murderers, as do stories of more than a hundred years later.

          Was it a less corrupt place? Perhaps, compared with
          the times we live in where corruption has taken
          deep roots it was not so bad; but there was a lot
          of nepotism and petty corruption as the casual
          remarks in various stories testify. However in an
          age of scarce cash, the bribes would probably come
          in kind as the bunch of bananas in a José da Silva
          Coelho story humorously suggests.

What made things probably different is that in the good old
bad days the common people were so poor, there wasn't much to
steal besides their copper vessels and chickens and any food
in the house, for otherwise desperate husbands might even
have been willing to rob their wives, as a story such as 'The
Married Woman's Husband' indicates.

And since the population of Goa was small, the countryfolk
managed to survive with their limited resources by toiling in
their fields or by depending on nature's bounty. But the
trend of migrating to greener pastures on board ships or to
colonies abroad, particularly among the more ambitious and
literate Goans, had already begun.

In more recent times the people have fortunately begun to see
more wealth thanks perhaps to  soaring land prices and
opportunities in areas like tourism. And the population of
Goa has increased in leaps and bounds after Liberation as
Indians from other states have come to fill in the employment
vacuum left by Goan emigrants -- an in-migration that has
been accelerated by rapid, often chaotic economic
development. But along with this the crime rates have
correspondingly and sadly increased.

One myth that fellow Indians sometimes believe in, and which
especially annoys some Catholic Goans, is that they are the
offspring of alliances between the white Portuguese and the
brown Goans as their Portuguese names might suggest. While
there was such a population known as Mestis (from the
Portuguese Mestiços), by and large the upper-caste and
upper-class Goan had a particular horror of miscegenation.
This can be seen in the Wenceslau Proença story 'A Spurt of
Blood' where a Portuguese officer's dalliance with a
nondescript spinster from an aristocratic family is firmly
stopped, although not before a child is born to her, only to
be adopted by a poor Goan family.

Incidentally many Goans once tweaked these problematic names
to their advantage to claim Anglo-Indian status and
consequent privileges during British times. However racism
was rampant as Augusto do Rosário Rodrigues suggests in
'Risen from the Ranks', although the Portuguese were willing
to mingle socially and sexually with their colonised peoples,
unlike the British ladies and gentlemen of colonial India who
were expected to be more stiff-upper lipped or at least more
discreet. Caste of course, as Melo e Castro points out, was
the idée fixe of the Goan and indeed Indian nation and still is.

The status of women has changed quite dramatically since
those times especially for Hindus. Those were times when to
be a respectable bride, she had to be married before she
attained puberty: if that happened today it would make their
husbands guilty of statutory rape! Few girls were educated.
But things were only just a bit better among the Catholics,
who like the Hindus were cursed with the problems of securing
a dowry for their daughters.

Those who could not make it in the marriage market due to the
lack of a suitable groom of the right caste or due to
insufficient dowry, were at best forced to live a second
class life in their parents' home. Some became concubines and
prostitution was commonplace. Many stories allude to temple
dancers. Among the Hindu community it seems that quite a few
rich families were ruined by the infatuation of men with such
women who were locally called kolvonts, a corruption of the
word kalavants meaning artistes.

Some Portuguese laws and administrative procedures such as
the codification of uses and customs, the Common Civil Code
of 1867 and the Decree of 1880, which established women as
inheritors on par with the male may have resulted in the
betterment of some women's status in society. This is
evidenced by the story 'My Sister is a Rich Man' by Ananta
Rau Sar Dessai, where a Hindu woman who had independent means
decides to adopt a son and put her foot down and stop funding
her brother's drinking habit.

Goans, especially Catholic Goans, have always protested that
they have been unfairly stereotyped as sots by the Bollywood
film industry. They argue, probably correctly, that the
percentage of alcoholics in Goa is as high, or as low, as in
any other place in the rest of India. But this book attests
that alcoholism has been a problem in Goa for a long long
time among all communities including Hindus.

Over the last few years mining has been castigated for the
environmental depredations and corruption it has wrought upon
Goa. But the corruption of this industry was evident at least
as far back as the 1940s as Epitácio Pais's stories foretell.

It is clear that *Lengthening Shadows* can be read as a
social exposé although it may have limitations in that all of
the writers are middle or upper-middle class. And most are
male, although Maria Elsa da Rocha and Vimala Devi make up in
quality what the anthology lacks in numbers. Also, with the
exceptions of Anantha Rau Sar Dessai and Laxmanrao Sardessai
(more known for his Marathi stories having reputedly written
some 700 of them) the writers are Catholic.

It was the First Portuguese Republic from 1910 till 1926 that
gave at least the Hindu elite an equal standing in society.
It seems the voice of the Hindus belonging to the lower
castes and classes had few outlets throughout this period.
And yet between and through the crevices of what these elite,
male and mainly Catholic authorial voices have to say, one
can also discern the world of women and the subaltern.

All said and done if the people of those times could come
back and see the changes that have taken place, they would be
shocked, pleasantly or otherwise depending upon their
outlook.

                *

The stories in *Lengthening Shadows* are written by different
authors, yet to me the anthology is more than the sum of the
individual pieces. It reads like a compendium of the lives
and mores of Goa Portuguesa in the last century or so of its
existence. It also represents a range of writing styles from
the Romanticism of the early writers to the Existentialism of
Walfrido Antão.

And although readers of the original Portuguese might
quibble, the translated stories feel like originals and would
read even better still if the footnotes in the text were
confined to a glossary at the end, or even better to a wiki
page or website.

How does Portuguese compare to the other languages of Goa?

          Konkani, the language of the land was neglected by
          the elite; and in some eras was ferociously
          suppressed by the Portuguese. However to be fair to
          the Portuguese some Christian missionaries under
          their watch like the English Jesuit Thomas Stevens
          did pioneering work in the language. Also the
          Portuguese civil servant Joaquim Heliodoro da Cunha
          Rivara (1808-1879) in 1858 made the revolutionary
          proposal that primary education in Goa be imparted
          in Konkani, a proposal which was assiduously
          opposed by the elite of Goa who weren't especially
          interested in allowing the lower castes a chance to
          become educated. In fact Cunha Rivara's thought as
          well as his writings on the Konkani language can be
          seen as the forerunner to the work of both Msgr.
          Sebastião Rodolfo Dalgado and Waman Raghunath
          Shennoi Varde Valaulikar aka Shenoi Goenbab,
          fountainheads of modern Konkani language and
          literature respectively. But the brutal fact
          remains that Konkani literature remained in a
          nascent stage until fairly recent times.

Still, journals were published since the nineteenth century
mainly from Bombay, and mainly in the Roman script used by
Catholics, and the first regular Konkani periodical
*Udentichem Salluk* (Lotus of the Orient) started in 1889.
Its editor was Eduardo José Bruno de Souza who also wrote the
first Konkani novel *Kristanv Ghorabo* (A Christian Family)
published posthumously in 1911. It is fair to assume there
was a fairly large output of short stories too, but these do
not seem to have been collected or studied so far.

Similarly Marathi which was the literary language of the
Hindus at that time has an archive of at least 20 weeklies or
monthlies published between 1870 and 1910 and many more after
that. Most were extant for perhaps a year or two, and each of
these probably is a lode worth examining. However like
Konkani, this too is little studied.

Comparison is left to those works which have either been
written in English or translated into English from the local
languages. Although these translations have begun to appear
only fairly recently, not too many stories have been
translated. At first glance it seems that the pieces in
*Lengthening Shadows*are more insightful in their depictions
of colonial society and also more sophisticated in form,
perhaps because the models for their art came from the best
of European and American stories in Portuguese translation.

So how did Portuguese become a better mirror of society than
other Indian languages or even English? One reason could be
that it could connect the educated classes from all strata as
everyone was obliged to study it at least till the primary
level.

Secondly compared to the Portuguese writers, those who wrote
in English lived in other parts of India and could only view
Goan society from a distance; worse was the case of the ones
based in Africa and other parts of the diaspora who did not
have a sharp enough understanding of the caste-based life of
Goa to write about its society confidently enough. Their
insights regarding the colonies where they lived most of
their lives are more enlightening though.

          Modern Goan Konkani and Marathi stories which have
          begun appearing in English translation are fairly
          recent and tend to be centred on the milieux of the
          society in which their authors grew up. For
          instance the stories of Pundalik Naik, doyen of
          modern Konkani literature, dwell upon the lives of
          the subaltern Hindu classes (the Bahujan Samaj)
          with an insider's knowledge which Portuguese
          language writers do not have.

Other modern Konkani writers like the late Chandrakant Keni
and Damodar Mauzo do write about Catholics, but then they are
not as much concerned with the colonial experience as for
instance Maria Elsa da Rocha. She is very empathetic to her
Hindu characters, although her prime achievement was to
record the woes and fears of the bhatkar classes before and
just after Liberation.

          To conclude, I envy Paul Melo e Castro. He comes
          from thousands of miles away to our backyards in
          Goa and digs out these gems that the Goa-Portuguese
          encounter had left for us. He cannot be thanked
          enough for what he has done although the question
          may arise as to why someone from the West will come
          researching material which our own scholars have
          studiedly ignored. In doing so he has indicated the
          need for similar work to be done in Konkani and
          Marathi before the old journals crumble to dust.

--
Augusto Pinto is a Goa-based critic and translator, book
reviewer and associate professor.

*Lengthening Shadows* is available via mail-order from
goa...@gmail.com at Rs 400 within India (post-free) or Euro
12 overseas (inclusive of postage).

ᐧ

[Selma C]

Lovely, Augusto thanks for this. I will have to order the book from Frederick.

I disagree that the upper class had a horror of miscegenation. They welcomed it; it transformed a middling family into one of political and social status. When such elite emigrated to east Africa, in the early years when biracial mingling was not yet taboo, they happily married British officials. In fact, some of the families I have interviewed of East African Goan pioneers, are somewhat aware that there was mestizo blood flowing through the veins.

As for what Goa has become after the Portuguese, let me just say when I go into Panjim or Margao, I have to resist the urge to weep. Rot, rack and ruin is what India gifted to Goa. Viva re viva. 

Best wishes,

Selma

Sent from my iPad

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[antonio CABA]

What a nice STORY Augusto has written as an afterword!

RC

--

[Leonard Fernandes]

On 7 January 2016 at 12:25, 'Selma C' via The Goa Book Club <goa-bo...@googlegroups.com> wrote:

Rot, rack and ruin is what India gifted to Goa

​Although much of it is the doing of Goans, no?

I'll stop now before I am accused of an off-topic topic.​

Warm Regards,

Leonard Fernandes
-----------------------------------------------------------------

Co-founder, Publishing Next

Co-founder, CinnamonTeal Publishing

Tel: +91 98503 98530

[augusto pinto]

On Thu, Jan 7, 2016 at 12:25 PM, 'Selma C' via The Goa Book Club <goa-bo...@googlegroups.com> wrote:

Lovely, Augusto thanks for this. I will have to order the book from Frederick.

Dear Selma

Thanks. I'm sure Frederick will be happy to oblige - and who knows reading this he might begin to ask me to write not only afterwords but even forewords and backwords.

I disagree that the upper class had a horror of miscegenation. They welcomed it; it transformed a middling family into one of political and social status. When such elite emigrated to east Africa, in the early years when biracial mingling was not yet taboo, they happily married British officials. In fact, some of the families I have interviewed of East African Goan pioneers, are somewhat aware that there was mestizo blood flowing through the veins.

 

I wasn't thinking of Goans outside Goa when I wrote that and you have a valid point. In fact in East Africa even when they didn't have any Portuguese or White connections (Black was a different kettle of fish altogether) some tried to say that they did in order to justify their different status  - and in British India I did mention that we often altered their surnames. After they went to England and other places, nowadays the kallokh zatoch rupap'pa'dupa that goes on is of all hues I'm told.

In Goa I believe that the upper castes didn't really like the idea, although I guess that the Pakles had their way whenever the door was open. As they sang: Paklea teka choi naka re, choi naka re, cheddun nhoi re -  tem rand'du.

As for what Goa has become after the Portuguese, let me just say when I go into Panjim or Margao, I have to resist the urge to weep. Rot, rack and ruin is what India gifted to Goa. Viva re viva.

 

What better can be expected when all you people emigrate en masse?

Bah!

Augusto

[augusto pinto]

On Thu, Jan 7, 2016 at 12:03 PM, antonio CABA <ant...@gmail.com> wrote:

What a nice STORY Augusto has written as an afterword!

RC

Patrao,
Is that a pat on the back or a kick in the backside?

Thanks either way.

Augusto

[Cecil Pinto]

What a delightful afterword. I will definitely buy and read the book.

When I do eventually my write my book I will ask Augusto to write the afterword so people will read it and buy my book.

Augusto responds later, as regards mestizos, "Black was a different kettle of fish altogether". I too don't know of any statistically significant number of Goans, of any caste, marrying blacks. Is it about race or caste, or a mixture of both? Did many Indians in general marry blacks back then? And now?

Also I think before Liberation the mestizo descendants from the upper castes were quite proud of their mixed blood but, post 1961 they denied any mixed blood and claimed to be pure Saraswats or whatever. .

Cheers!

Cecil

=======

[Nazareth, Peter]

Augusto,

I think Leonard (Patrao) has paid you a compliment in a few words.  I have just read your piece and it is very good.  When I write literary (and music) criticism, and teach literature, I like to  do it in the form of stories.  And you have told a complex story in the form of a short story, covering a lot of ground that others may choose to take in different directions, as you suggest.  Another way of seeing it is that you have written an introduction to the volume of short stories, including your own story as a template.

I would only one quibble, as follows.  You say

worse was the case of the ones
based in Africa and other parts of the diaspora who did not
have a sharp enough understanding of the caste-based life of
Goa to write about its society confidently enough. Their
insights regarding the colonies where they lived most of
their lives are more enlightening though.

The implication here, though this may not be what you intended, is that Goans elsewhere must
write about caste.  I don't agree.  Writers must write about
what they want to write about: or rather about what their abilities are.
My maternal grandfather in Kuala Lumpur told me his story in 196)because
wanted me to tell his story.  And I tried, in my first novel "In a Brown Mantle"
but as my friend Tova Raz (from Jerusalem) told me, it did not work
and I had to delete it.  My gift and passion was political.  I told this story
later within my fiction "Rosie's Theme" and in an essay entitled "Telling
Grandpa's Story", which was published in Confluence.
I have said many times that I am an African writer.  But I also have
something to offer Goa and Malaysia and also, since I am 
living in the US, America and beyond that the Third World and also
Britain since I had a British education.  
I have been trying to nag you over the years into writing literary
criticism--did you realize this?--and this piece by you shows that
you are in fact a good critic.
Peter

---

From: goa-bo...@googlegroups.com <goa-bo...@googlegroups.com> on behalf of augusto pinto <pint...@gmail.com>
Sent: Thursday, January 7, 2016 5:13 AM
To: goa-bo...@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: [GOABOOKCLUB] The Good Old Bad Days (Augusto Pinto)

 

[Jose]

On Jan 7, 2016, at 10:07 AM, Cecil Pinto <cecil...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Also I think before Liberation the mestizo descendants from the upper castes were quite proud of their mixed blood but, post 1961 they denied any mixed blood and claimed to be pure Saraswats or whatever. .

I sometimes wonder about Divar......and the 'Brahmins' there. Tiswadi having been noted, surely there was external genetic input during the siege by the Idalcao.

Then....there is the genetic origin off the Chitpawans of the Konkan whose DNA has been sampled, studied and published by Dr. Jagannath Dixit (US)

and what about the DNA profiles of the Saraswats and the so-called Rajputs...et the elevation of the 'caste' status of Shivaji ?

jc

[Selma Cardoso]

Goans had sexual relationships and cohabited with blacks in East Africa. They seldom took responsibility for these relationships, which were with very young girls. Some of course did, possibly when there was a bun in the oven.

Best,

selma
 

---

From: Cecil Pinto <cecil...@gmail.com>
To: "goa-bo...@googlegroups.com" <goa-bo...@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Thursday, 7 January 2016, 15:07
Subject: Re: [GOABOOKCLUB] The Good Old Bad Days (Augusto Pinto)

[Frederick FN Noronha * फ्रेड्रिक नोरोन्या * فريدريك نورونيا‎]

On 7 January 2016 at 19:43, Nazareth, Peter <peter-n...@uiowa.edu> wrote:

I think Leonard (Patrao) has paid you a compliment in a few words. 

That's a good one, Peter! Henceforth he shall be known as Leonard (Patrao) :-) FN

PS: Sorry if the humour got lost in translation!
--

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ᐧ

[Frederick FN Noronha * फ्रेड्रिक नोरोन्या * فريدريك نورونيا‎]

On 7 January 2016 at 21:51, 'Selma Cardoso' via The Goa Book Club <goa-bo...@googlegroups.com> wrote:

Goans had sexual relationships and cohabited with blacks in East Africa. They seldom took responsibility for these relationships, which were with very young girls. Some of course did, possibly when there was a bun in the oven.

I do not know if we have any factual basis for saying this, or are just extrapolating current trends onto the past and making our assumptions.

Keep in mind that in pre-widespread contraception days (before the 1960s, that is, around the time most of our generation was born), having sexual liaisons involved very intense risks. Or pregnancies. Of course, someone is going to bring in the human-nature-is-human-nature argument. But still...

The hierarchy of colours and/or relationships is an accepted fact. A Goan would prefer to marry a lighter skin colour over darker. One can understand (but not justify) why this happens. It is also co-related to centuries of bias which makes us believe that lighter skin goes with affluence, power and the ruling class. My Saraswat friend Prakash once put it well, when we were riding a scooter on the way to visit the home of a Dalit friend. "Rico," he said, "if the Dalits were the rulers, we would be prepared to eat their sh*t." And he was merely stating a truism, even with dismay over our bias and attitudes.

So race often gets mixed up with class, and such biases get strengthened.

Episodic evidence, by its very nature, can be marshalled to make any point we want to. There are other examples we can point to. In my extended family itself, one girl has married a Nigerian, another a Libyan (though this doesn't exactly fit in with what we are discussing) and another cousin's son is dating a Malaysian Tamil. Because our nuclear family spent some of its formative years in Brazil, when we pray at home, it is often to a Black Virgin.  The Nossa Senhora da Conceição Aparecida.

I'm not trying to project a particularly enlightened or race-free network, but I guess the equations one develops depends on the kind of setting one has been in. I also know of Goan women or guys who find marriage partners from among tribal guys or women from Chattishgarh or Jharkhand. This may be among a poorer social class, which might be seen to have fewer options, but it does happen. (The more affluent women seem to have a marked preference for Sindhis or other economic communities, and there's again a clear economic reasoning behind this obviously.)

All this apart, I think we're distracting ourselves with a rather stray point that Augusto has made, among his many, in the Afterword. To me, the wider point he was making was about the lack of translations of our own work (in different languages that Goans write/wrote in) and also the lack of awareness of our own literary traditions. Both very, very valid, I feel.

FN

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ᐧ

[Mervyn Maciel]

I know one Goan who did the honourable thing and married

an African(a Gabbra from the Northern Frontier), had children

with her and brought them up well. One of his daughters lives

in Kent, one in the States and a son is still in the Northern Frontier(Kenya).

He never went back to Goa as he felt his people would not 'accept' his

African wife.

Mervyn

[Frederick FN Noronha * फ्रेड्रिक नोरोन्या * فريدريك نورونيا‎]

Out of curiosity, Mervyn, were Goan-European liaisons/marriages happening in those times? If so, how rare or common? (I know it's tough to expect figures on a question like this.) FN

On 8 January 2016 at 01:42, Mervyn Maciel <mervynels.w...@gmail.com> wrote:

I know one Goan who did the honourable thing and married

an African(a Gabbra from the Northern Frontier), had children

with her and brought them up well. One of his daughters lives

in Kent, one in the States and a son is still in the Northern Frontier(Kenya).

He never went back to Goa as he felt his people would not 'accept' his

African wife.

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_/  Frederick Noronha | http://about.me/noronhafrederick | http://goa1556.in
_/  P +91-832-2409490 M 9822122436 Twitter @fn Facebook: fredericknoronha
_/  Goa,1556 CC shared audio content https://archive.org/details/goa1556
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ᐧ

[Mervyn Maciel]

My own feeling, Fred, is that Goan-European liaisons/marriages were pretty rare

in those times; the only incident which may well have ended in a marriage

is the tragic case of young John Dias of Nakuru, Kenya, whose love affair with the

daughter of a White settler ended in tragedy.I think you may well have heard about this case?

 Sorry not to be able to provide any figures on this subject.

Mervyn

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[Selma C]

I'm researching 1890-1910. I can give you instances of Goan-European marriages as well as Goan-African miscegenation but I won't. You'll have to wait. I don't make statements without factual basis. You might be surprised as to how tight the European-Goan connection was, even more than previously thought.  I spend on average 2 hours a day researching. Sometimes you have to give people the benefit of the doubt...or does FN build his own hierarchies based on his own prejudices? Of course he does.

But this is Augusto's post so back to Augusto.

Best,

Selma

Sent from my iPad

[Selma C]

PS: I'm proud to say, I'm responsible for uniting John Dias's progeny with their Goan family. Now there's a story. 

Best,

Selma

Sent from my iPad

[FM N]

Augusto,
Your review is worthy of the prof you are. Many thanks.
More!
Fatima

On 07/01/2016, Frederick FN Noronha * फ्रेड्रिक नोरोन्या * فريدريك

نورونيا <frederic...@gmail.com> wrote:
> The Good Old Bad Days (Augusto Pinto)

> <http://t.sidekickopen32.com/e1t/c/5/f18dQhb0S7lC8dDMPbW2n0x6l2B9nMJW7t5XX45v_-llW8qSvLR1q0TblW5v79jl56dC-jdVBdRW02?t=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.mail-archive.com%2Fsearch%3Fl%3Dgoanet%40lists.goanet.org%26q%3Dsubject%3A%2522%255C%255BGoanet%255C%255D%2BThe%2BGood%2BOld%2BBad%2BDays%2B%255C%2528Augusto%2BPinto%255C%2529%2522%26o%3Dnewest&si=4919571444137984&pi=9de6781c-710b-4c5b-a5a7-d61c32a959d6>
>
> Goanet Reader
> <http://t.sidekickopen32.com/e1t/c/5/f18dQhb0S7lC8dDMPbW2n0x6l2B9nMJW7t5XX45v_-llW8qSvLR1q0TblW5v79jl56dC-jdVBdRW02?t=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.mail-archive.com%2Fsearch%3Fl%3Dgoanet%40lists.goanet.org%26q%3Dfrom%3A%2522Goanet%2BReader%2522&si=4919571444137984&pi=9de6781c-710b-4c5b-a5a7-d61c32a959d6>

> Wed, 23 Dec 2015 00:09:27 -0800

> <http://t.sidekickopen32.com/e1t/c/5/f18dQhb0S7lC8dDMPbW2n0x6l2B9nMJW7t5XX45v_-llW8qSvLR1q0TblW5v79jl56dC-jdVBdRW02?t=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.mail-archive.com%2Fsearch%3Fl%3Dgoanet%40lists.goanet.org%26q%3Ddate%3A20151223&si=4919571444137984&pi=9de6781c-710b-4c5b-a5a7-d61c32a959d6>
>
> Augusto Pinto: Afterwordpinto...@gmail.com

> fromg...@gmail.com at Rs 400 within India (post-free) or Euro

> 12 overseas (inclusive of postage).
>

[Jeanne Hromnik]

Do you have any documentation of the Goan 'elite'  in 'east [sic] Africa' marrying 'British officials'?

This is very interesting!

And did the mixed blood flow before as well as after such inter-marriage? Perhaps only those of already mixed blood were acceptable to the siad officials.

I don't know what this has to do with books, apart from the one Augusto reviewed and which he used as a platform for his views.

Thanks

Jeanne

PS Your tears (wept on the banks of the Mandovi?) are appreciated but not needed by those who hope to build on the best that the rest of India has gifted to Goa.

[augusto pinto]

Dear Peter

Thank you for your very generous remarks for I merely set out to state the obvious in order provide some context for the stories in Lengthening Shadows as I saw it to praise of what amounted to months of poring through dusty volumes of old newsprint by the intrepid Paul Melo e Castro . 

No I didn't mean that Goans from the diaspora should write about caste, merely that they don't usually have the necessary background to make sense of it, although manifestations of it do pop up in their backyards at times. And you're spot on when you say that writers must write what they want to write and of course Rosie's Theme is the most beautiful and wise observation of Goan life of a bygone era that one will ever come across (which incidentally doesn't actually mention anyone's caste although give it to an Indian and s/he'll probably write a thesis about what is not said).

BTW Rochelle Potkar who I met at GALF recently and who I believe took your course on creative writing at Iowa was saying nice things about you. Good of you to have written and hope to hear from you more often in the new year.

Best,

Augusto  

[augusto pinto]

Dear Cecil

Let's do an exchange agreement and let's both promote each other's books - when they do get written and published!

Cheers

Augusto

[augusto pinto]

Wow!! Attagirl - a catfight! Will they bite and scratch? Will they gouge out each other's eyes? Whatever the case - may the worst woman win! Would anyone on GBC like to wager?

Best

Augusto

 

(Psst - Selma! I'm secretly putting my money on you - and anyway this uppity Moidekann deserves some fajiti - and I'm trusting you to deliver!) 

(Psst, psst - Jeanne!! What say we show them what a couple of clever Moidekars can do - what say we fix this contest?)

[augusto pinto]

Dear Fatima,

The more I try to escape from being one the more it comes back to haunt me - but thanks anyway.

Cheers

Augusto

[Eugene Correia]

Augusto, you have the cats on a hot tin roof. Let them claw, claw.. hahaha

Eugene

[Belinda Viegas]

Augusto, I really enjoyed reading this.

Looking forward to an entire book by you!

Cheers,

belinda

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[augusto pinto]

Dear Belinda,

Thank you very much for the nice message. I also look forward to the same thing but it hasn't been happening 🙅

So in the meanwhile I am translating Konkani short stories into English, a collection of short stories by Dr Jayanti Naik being the first planned. This also needs to be done by someone, and since the demand for translators far outstrips the supply I may as well do it.

Best wishes,
Augusto

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[Braz MENEZES]

Dear Augusto,
Please accept my congratulations as well, on your excellent 'afterwords' to Paul Melo e Castro's *Lengthening
Shadows*. I had the pleasure of reading most of the stories contained therein. Nearly all were charming translations  that brought out the nuances of an era that needed recording, and that so much reflected the social structure of that period. Please convey my congratulations to Paul.
That said, I could not understand why in an otherwise excellent bit of writing, you chose to go back to your pet peeve of caste and outcasts, or why the penile pursuits of Goans in East Africa should be highlighted, as against say, the issue of miscegenation in general in the context of Portugal and Goa, especially contrasting the thrust (no pun intended)  of such efforts in Mozambique and Angola as compared with British East Africa.
Please write more extensively, as it was a pleasant surprise to read this on GBC.
Regards,
Braz Menezes

---

Date: Sun, 10 Jan 2016 19:51:07 +0530

Subject: Re: [GOABOOKCLUB] The Good Old Bad Days (Augusto Pinto)

From: pint...@gmail.com
To: goa-bo...@googlegroups.com

Dear Belinda,

Thank you very much for the nice message. I also look forward to the same thing but it hasn't been happening

[Jeanne Hromnik]

Sorry, Eugene. No cat fight, provocation notwithstanding. 

I was only asking for documentation on mixing in the 'east' (eastern?) African context, which Selma has, in fact, said she will release -- at the right time. 

A wise decision, bearing in mind the general inclination to look for a fight!

Best

Jeanne

[Oscar de Noronha]

Hi Augusto,

Thoroughly enjoyed reading your afterword to Paul’s stories in translation. Congratulations! All the best to you in the New Year.

Óscar

[Sushila]

Augusto, I bet you will write a book in the next five years. I want to read  Paul's soon and yours........?
Sushila

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From: Oscar de Noronha
Sent: ‎13-‎01-‎2016 21:39
To: goa-bo...@googlegroups.com

[The entire original message is not included.]