FISH AND GOSSIP WITH A SPECIAL COUPLE IN SIRIDAO, A VILLAGE IN WAITING

This path is not on any obvious tourist map, it doesn’t lead to any destination, but is a breathtaking journey. On a hilly curve which starts almost at the entrance of the Bambolim beach resort and winds its way through a narrow forested path, with a sharp drop to the magnificent sea on one side. We reckon that this was just a village dirt track at some point of time, connecting Bambolim to Shiridao, where men, women

and cattle used to traverse.

While cars, vans carrying gas cylinders, and hotel cars use this path increasingly, it still remains an underrated, undiscovered gem, passing through one of the thickest canopy of trees, a rocky hillside and the sloping expanse of green and palm, as the landscape dives into the ocean. The village of Siridao begins where this path ends, at a place called Firgurm Bhat, marked by a very high light mast (which hasn’t been functioning for months), on the beach front. 

Along this coast are the famed Siridao bungalows, lavish sprawling homes built by the pounds and euros saved by hardworking progeny of Siridao parents, working in London, Wembley, Swindon and Paris. These are big homes, but these are quiet homes as the pound and euro kids don’t have the time to come home, even annually, making Siridao seem a bit like a ghost village. 

At Church on Sundays, the faithful congregate, all provided for by the hard work of their children, each longing for their return. Siridao, is actually a village for the waiting.

Last Sunday, we did a bit of Siridao exploring, a family affair and chanced upon a couple who were doing what everyone else does, waiting for their daughter to come back from London and be with them. And here’s their story. Decades ago, the family of Ainuddin Hakim set up one of the most public service oriented businesses that those in coastal Goa could ever have, that of trading in sea food. Simply put, Hakims folks used to send out many trawlers into the high seas for days and return with their catch to be then sold to smaller fishermen and to establishments. For Aino, as he is called, Goa has but been only a life, at sea, by the sea and off the sea.

 So many years later, the sea is all he has and his beloved Goan wife Dumiana in the village of Siridao, and of course, his delightful beach side seafood restaurant he runs, Seashell. He could have kept no other name for this. Once every two years the sea recedes, and leaves in its wake a humungous quantity of sea shells of all shapes, sizes and colours, enough to full five or more truck loads. That is when Aino and his boys pick them up from the sea bed and use them as a carpet for the flooring of their restaurant. Thus every two years, the sea gives “Seashell” a brand new carpet.

 You can’t really miss it. It’s right at the end of the wooded path that comes in from Bambolim and next to the non-functioning high mast, with a clear unrestricted view of the ocean right up to Vasco.

 We spent a very lazy, contended and quiet afternoon with Aino and Dumiana, who we met for the first time, playing host almost as if we were invited guests. We spoke as we ate a fantastic meal of very fresh modso rawa masala fry, prawn curry and rice. This was comfort food at its best and most delicious. Dumiana who could pass of as a friendly warm aunt or a favourite but gently strict matron in a girls hostel, chatted about the village and how every home has a child in England or France and how she wanted her own little one (who is married by the way and has one child and another one on the way) to come back, from London, because “she has everything here”. Mothers will always be mothers, from Siridao to San Fransisco. 

Meanwhile Aino thinks about his trawlers at sea. They will return in ten days, and he speaks proudly of his boys and their capacity for hard work and the preparations they need to make for each trip. He also looked back on his days in Miramar where he used to supply fresh sea food to homes and establishments and the friends he made then, who still come to Seashell, not just to eat, but host parties to celebrate their best occasions, in the company of Aino and Dumiana. 

Before we left late that afternoon, we realised the couple had quietly walked away from our table and were somewhere inside. Looking in, we saw such a lovely sight. Both of them had sat down to have their lunch, which we had delayed, and were chatting away sweetly oblivious to the world. They were just a lovely couple and yet they were lonely parents. 

This loneliness, in such a beautiful land is not the bane of Siridao. It’s also the bane of Goa. But with folks like Aino and Dumiana, who battle loneliness by spreading warmth, Goa still does have the right antidotes to loneliness. Here’s more to more Ainos and Dumianas.