Three little pigs Contemporary Goan Fairy Tales By Cecil Pinto
Once upon a time there lived on a farm a widow pig named Solloga, who technically was a sow but was in a ward reserved for women and hence fancied herself a pig. Solloga had three piglets named Dukullo, Dukona and Barranv. Dukullo, the youngest, liked to play in the mud and listen to Konkani pop songs on FM radio. Throughout the day you could see him pigging out in the mud with his headphones on, while simultaneously forwarding witty SMS to his friends. Dukona, the sister pig, was quite the hog and could eat and drink any and every thing – and did. She was into Bollywood movies and music and often heard voices in her head. Every evening as she drunkenly approached the poured swill she could hear it singing to her, "Main hoon donn, main hoon donn!" "Yeah! Yeah! Yeah!", on the other hand was Barranv's refrain. He was the shrewdest little pig. When not taking matka bets Barranv was busy devising Multi Level Marketing scams and also sending pigs to the Gulf – without telling them that no pork is allowed there. Solloga tried to bring up her three little pigs to be ethical. "Build good character. Build strong houses", was her constant refrain. But they just ignored her. In her own words it was like, "Throwing pearls to swine!". "Stop being such a boar Mom", the three little pigs would say to her. One day while returning from the market Solloga said to her piglets. "You have grown up and are now too big for our little house. It's beginning to resemble a pigsty. Who's going to build their own houses now?" The three pigs were happy to leave and shouted "We, we, we!", all the way home. As could be expected Dukullo built himself a mud house but did not follow the sound technical expertise given by Eng. Jose Lourenco from Velim. Dukona built herself a house of cabbages, with a cowdung floor, and got it registered as an NGO for Garbage Management and made quite a decent living on the subsidies and was in fact able to afford a huge liquid plasma screen to watch Bollywood Song and Dance Competitions all day. Barranv forged papers and bribed a talathi to show he was a tenant, on Form I and XIV, of a derelict 'Portuguese style' house, whose owners were abroad for many generations and as could be expected were clueless. He then indulged in 'acts of ownership' like painting the house and doing up the compound wall. When nobody objected Barranv just occupied the house and signed an affidavit saying he was in possession of the house for many years. He then proceeded to refurbish the old house. In the backyard of the house Barranv built some of those horribly pretentious un-Goan cottages, with exposed laterite walls and domed RCC roofs, and sold them to retired Brits for huge sums through taxi-driver-cum-brokers. Barranv did not laugh all the way to the piggy bank, but rather invested his excess funds in real estate – and not Mutual Funds. One day a hungry jackal named Kolo, who loved to eat Goan sausages, decided to taste pork directly. His theme song was "I'm too foxy for my wolf!" Kolo chanced upon Dukullo's mud house and shouted, "Little pig, little pig, let me come in." To which Dukullo answered, "No, no! Not by the hair of my chiny chin chin." Kolo rightly figured Dukollo hadn't heard right as his headphones were still on. So he bellowed, "Then I'll huff, and I'll puff, and I'll blow your house in." And he did. The house collapsed and Dukullo went limping for protection to his sister and her cabbage house. Kolo approached Dukona's house and asked to be let in. "No, no! Not by the hair of my chiny chin chin", said the obese and drunk Dukona. Kolo discarded his normal response and shouted, "Use Fair & Lovely for heaven's sake. It will bleach your facial hair and improve your skin pigmentation!" Dukona didn't get the pun and shouted out, "How come you're not offering to blow me and my house?" Since the TV was on full blast Kolo didn't hear that and just blew the house down. Drunken Dukona carried Dukullo piggyback as they ran to take refuge in Barranv's huge estate. When Kolo approached Barranv's residence the security guard, at what was by now a gated complex, asked him to fill up a form - which stumped Kolo as he was illiterate. But Barranv, who was just returning in his Mercedes from some meetings at the Secretariat, welcomed Kolo into his house. He appointed Kolo as his liaison agent for Government offices and then proceeded to combine all three pigs properties and start work on building and marketing a huge residential/holiday complex with 60 bungalows and 220 luxury apartments (with swimming pool, gymnasium, security, lifetime maintenance and rent-back facilities) named 'Dukorville'. When some neighbours protested the hill-cutting and other environmentally destructive actions he convinced them by giving them jobs as supervisors, pool attendants and security guards. They were happy. The others he offered a fat brokerage and commissions, to get him buyers for his properties. They were happy. The few who still continued to protest he ignored as by now he had bribed the local panch, the sarpanch and the local MLA to ensure inaction. Continuing in this pig-headed manner he purchased prime property from the corrupt and inept village Communidade and started work on Three Pigs Resort which was marketed as a resort solely for foreigners and other non-Goan pigs. When we last caught up with them… Dukona had had 34 cosmetic surgeries but was still unattractive – and a drunk. Dukullo was producing Konkani pop-song VCDs. Kolo had finally stopped fantasizing about eating Dukona, or any pig for that matter, and stuck to chouris-panv and sorpatel. He had his eye on the Chairmanship of a Government Corporation. Barranv was financing the re-election attempts of six MLAs. Konkani proverb: Dukran kedna kondd sodunk na. (While some pigs just wallow, others succeed by being shallow) -------- The column above appeared in Gomantak Times dated 17th April 2008 =====