The Goan Club – East Africa. Nearly all of my education in Nairobi came from religion through the church with its clear aims and objectives. Likewise our Goan Clubs also had aims and objectives and as Vivian Dsouza who lived in Dar es Salaam stated “was a home away from home”. It was truly our second home, where we met friends. Like birds of a feather, we flocked together I am sure that it was our folks who oiled the British colonial administration within the East African Community Countries of Kenya Uganda and Tanzania will agree.
The Goan Clubs evolved from just a meeting and greeting spot networking to mainly western sporting competitions with each other followed by socials. As a teenager I used to travel in a Morris Minor to Nakuru and Pit stop at the Goan club there on my way to the car races where a Saturday job awaited selling Ice Cold bottled Coca Cola preserved in sawdust sheltering them and delaying the ice blocks melting in the heat of the equatorial sun . The money was not much but worth the ringside seat to watch the skilful drivers of Alfa Romeo, BMW, Fords etc competing against each other along with motorcycle events. Other classmates worked at the horse racing track or Golf Course in Nairobi. As a Club we would travel by OTC bus to Goan Club Kisumu for their Sports Day followed by Social. Recall leaving School early to play Billiards and Snooker at the Nairobi Institute. We also had a good indoor Badminton Court and a newly refurbished highly polished spring dance floor. At the Eldoret Club while younger I recall getting my first Christmas present from Santa it was an inflatable plastic Globe. I fondly remember the late Peter Rodrigues who would collect several of us in the Team Bus his Vw Combi for football matches. I later worked with Peter alongside several volunteers running the Goan Association (UK) Sports Day in London, England before and after we had a clubhouse premises these events were always to capacity with enthusiastic participants . There were also sporting events with Mombasa this list can go on and on. The Goa Toronto facilitated a splendidly organised Youth Convention in Toronto Harbour front where I heard Konkani for the first time spoken with an American accent by Goan visitors from somewhere in America. A City tour and picnic at Thousand Islands was also in the Programme. Our Goan Teachers taught us to read and write the Queens English. Our Examination papers were from Cambridge England so on arrival in England we spoke better English than the locals with their dialects and encountered our first encounter with racism. Looking for employment, you would be asked if you have any London Experience. The lancers at 1st SCOGO Goan Clubhouse Beckenham, England was not a surprise but the Kunbi dance was as I had never seen this before and had it featured on the front page of the Goan Association Newsletter that was edited by me. Marianno Gonsalves led the dance. In Nairobi South B I used to watch my Hindu neighbours dance the Dandia, a dance of nine days nine days celebrating Navratri which takes place a month before Diwali and the Garba. At no time did I come across any of these dances at the Nairobi Institute, we watched Cowboy and Indian Films and occasionally went to the Drive In Cinema in South B. So I fail to acknowledge that the Goan Clubs were a Custodian to Our Culture as stated by Selma Carvalho. Most of us accompanied our parents when leaving East Africa during and after independence. Those of us who stayed in the United Kingdom for over fifty years have had hardly any criminal record and carried on limited Club activities as a search for premises began, that’s another long story. Today in the United Kingdom we have Europeans of another colour as the new arrivals from Goa Click here https://kafila.online/2013/08/31/europeans-of-an-other-colour-why-the-goans-are-portuguese-r-benedito-ferrao-jason-keith-fernandes/ For an example of self inflicted grievances Click here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O4OVdCIdD-M For the True Story Click here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=31OkwMf8Flc Credit to Niz Goenkar Menino de Valpoi Personally the friendship and camaraderie that the East African Goan developed through the networking of clubs through reciprocal arrangements have still a long way to be connected with the new Goan arrivals.The Goan of today is not the same people I was matured and educated with. Sadly the only connection is an unaccountable breakway trading as a Charity Goan Welfare Society which collects money for coffins to fund the bodies of the deceased back to Goa. To Qualify you have to have a Portuguese passport and claim to have no money. Their details can be found on the G.O.A.UK.COM WEBSITE. Once we can answer the question of what is Goan Culture then we can agree or disagree as to whether Goan Clubs in East Africa were its Custodians. Melvyn Fernandes. Thornton Heath Surrey 5 April 2020
