It is rare, and for this very reason important and urgent, to recognise and celebrate the achievements of any individual who devotes himself beyond his own personal needs to meet the needs of others. Such individuals are not born heroic, but make themselves heroic, and need to be emulated as beacons that can assist the society at any given point of its history to veer itself away from self-destructive trends.
There is a Konkani proverb which refers to “dead cow that gave 12 seers of milk” (Mel´le moshik bara sher dudh) to tell us that we appreciate someone only after his or her death, having failed to appreciate while alive. It is a sad, but common tendency to take persons and things for granted in our day-to-day routine. Nearly 20 years back, in an international conference at the Goa University I had cited another proverb while addressing a symposium on Goan identity. The full text of the conference may be consulted online at http://bit.ly/2y8Vlni, and the proverb is Ghor-mogreak pormoll na (Home grown jasmin has no fragrance).
While on a short visit to Goa during last month I chanced to discover at the Hotel Goan Heritage where I had chosen to stay at Calangute that Antony Veronica Fernandes was the president of its board of directors. Veronica Fernandes had been my Facebook friend since past many years because I was impressed by his involvement in promoting Goan tiatr and his familiarity with individual tiatrists. I met Veronica personally, though only passingly once at the Kala Academy in Panjim four years ago, when I went there to see Akantvadi, a tiatr that denounced the entry of a Hindu fundamentalist organisation in Goa.
My stay last month at Hotel Goan Heritage, a joint venture that resulted from the initiative of a group of Kuwaiti Goans, gave me a better opportunity to know more closely and experience the generosity of Antony Veronica Fernandes, who played a pioneering role in this hotel project right from the start, and he feels that his mission will remain incomplete until another such hotel is not set up in Salcete as initially promised to the investors. I was told that the acquisition of new property was becoming now exceedingly expensive, though during the initial phase of the Calangute project the greater problem was the opposition of Bandodkar government, which did not favour such initiative from Goan Christians.
In August this year Veronica Fernandes celebrated his 70th birth anniversary and he released a book and a video of his memories. As historian I am grateful to his sharing of information with many details and personal views and experiences during and after Iraqi invasion of Kuwait that can help us understand how he could and did face the challenges of post-Liberation Goa, harsh treatment of expatriates in Kuwait, his efforts at mobilising support for the liberation of Kuwait through Goa-Kuwait Solidarity Centre. He also sought financial support during three decades of his labour in Kuwait for Goa’s cultural and social needs through assistance to Goan tiatrists, as well as finding funds to set up Novem Goem Pratishtan, which initiated a Konkani Daily, and creating a fund of nearly Rs 20 lakhs for a cancer hospital project.
The testimony of Veronica will remain as a valuable contribution to our understanding of the lasting contribution of the Gulf countries to the betterment of lives of the descendants of thousands of Goan households since late 40’s of the last century. My own father, LC D’Souza from Moirá was one of the Goans who landed in Kuwait via Karachi in 1949 as an employee of KOC. Without any formal education he became a much appreciated cook of the mother of the ruling Amir Sheik Jabir till his voluntary retirement in mid 70’s. His professional companion was The Goan Cook’s Guide. With the subtitle Goan Cuzneracho Sangat, it was authored by Pedro Damião Dias, who had been cook of several British Indian viceroys. Published in Bombay in 1937 (4th edition) by BX Furtado & Sons, it contained 2012 recipes in Konkani. My dad’s three decades in Kuwait brought the shine of the Kuwaiti dinars to change the bleak fortunes of our family.
Unfortunately, many individuals deserving recognition have completed their lives in obscurity without ever getting into limelight. Great majority of Goans had no material or social conditions during the colonial past to merit attention, and quite a few developed their talents and distinguished themselves through diaspora. I wrote in the preface to Alfredo de Mello’s autobiographical book From Goa to Patagonia (2006) that globalisation was a truly a “Goabilisation” that empowered many generations of Goans who saw no future for them under the colonial dispensation.
Unfortunately, that continues to be the feeling of many Goans who do not see a brighter future even after the end of the Portuguese colonial rule, despite their hopes and dreams of a motherland in the post-colonial era. Many Goans who opt increasingly for Portuguese passports and take the road to UK, USA or Australia are likely to be lost for Goa, because their children once used to the comforts of the West are unlikely to return to Goa, except for occasional holiday visits.
However, the Goans who have made and will make a big difference to living standards in Goa and also pose a challenge to the corruption of the local governance are the dinar fuelled Goans labouring hard in the Gulf. Being largely, if not exclusively, drawn from Catholic community, it can count with the sympathies and backing of its West-based diasporic brethren, sustaining the hope of protecting the historic cultural and linguistic heritage of Goa and its overall well-being.
(The author is Founder-Director of the Xavier Centre of Historical Research (Goa) 1979-1994)
