World Goa Day Kampala Uganda. This year the small goan community of Kampala chose to celebrate WGD with a picnic at Kisubi beach, a lush green patch of paradise on the beautiful shores of L. Victoria. This year in addition to the usual group we welcomed a new family Dominic and Sunita Fernandez and also Jean Dmello who was joining us for the first time. The day started with a hectic car chase as some of us ended up on the wrong end of the beach where a bishop in full regalia was leading about 200 faithful to Mass. After a few frantic phone calls we did regroup successfully at the right spot. Just shows how the best laid plans can sometimes go astray!!
Goans they say are good at forward planning and to that effect Phillip Fernandes and his family were given the job of coordinating Holy Mass, with Fr. Fabian at the picnic site. As it turned out it was a beautifully orchestrated affair, Rita, Nancy, Sunita and Anne set up the make shift alter complete with candles and flowers, Romano and Maria prepared the hymns and led the choir with many melodious Konkani songs, Savio and his merry band added life to the singing with his guitar and the rest of us just took in Gods word against the scenic backdrop of swaying palms, blue waters and cool breezes, a real throw back to our historical churches in Goa. Mass over and having hugged and kissed each other a festive WGD as is customary, every one headed to the rustic bar where there were mounds of bitings and plenty to wash them down with. All sorts of beverages were set up wine, beer, juices, sodas and for the more seasoned drinkers among us Vodka, gin and whiskey! A picnic is never complete without games and music, this years theme was being truly Goan and so followed fun games like smashing a coconut blind folded, and it turns out that men have a better aim with a few tots inside them then do women. Romulus was the undisputed winner, coincidentally he is getting married in November and we wish him all the best as he heads home for the great day. Lunch as usual was a sumptuous affair, the variety of ethnic dishes left one gob smacked!! Sorpotel, roast pork, Xacuti, verdur of every kind, sanna et al. I think we could have fed as many people over again, going by the quantities of food that had to be packed away. A state of somnambulance always descends on the picnic party after such gluttony! And so it was that we found ourselves turning to the less arduous task of a sing along again accompanied by Saviors guitar. Old time goan songs were the order of the day, the younger generation just hummed along since Konkani music sheets are beyond them. Marcie and Prafull were in charge of the evening cuppa, tea/ coffee served with allebelles ( pancakes to the less savvy) filled with Gourdchun revived everyone enough to get back to more robust games like dodge ball, cricket and even soccer. Before pack up the whole group was called to attention by James Rattos who had some important information on the forthcoming Goan convention being planned for October in Zanzibar. I hope this time around we will be able to muster enough members to have a Uganda delegation for the first time ever at this biannual goan event!! The wonderful time that every member had and the happy memories which each one of us took away will keep us looking forward to yet another WGD around this time next year. Marcie Mehta PS If you have any comments, compliments or constructive suggestions for us you can email them to me [EMAIL PROTECTED] and I will be happy to pass them on to the "Goans of Kampala". __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com _______________________________________________ Goanet mailing list [email protected] http://lists.goanet.org/listinfo.cgi/goanet-goanet.org
