Dear Mario,
Ref. your post below; you are absolutely right. Thanks from bringing me to my senses. What was I thinking; all this nonsense about Preserving Goan Identity. The only dilemma I face is what do I answer people when they normally say to me (A) Goa & Goans are significantly different from rest of India one example is Goa stands out for Tourism exceptionally vs. other states (B) What do I call myself now that there is no such thing as Goan Identity. My answers would most probably be (A) Its all mythical and there is no basis and (B) I now call myself a "Jolly Indian". Any suggestions from you are welcome. Thank God we are now, not like those fools who are ignorantly working/supporting Goa's Mythical Identity i.e. (A) Those thinking Goans are different from the Bengalis, Keralites, Tamils, Gujaratis, Europeans, Americans etc. Surely we are all similar in Identity!! (B) Fought in the 60's to keep Goa separate. What were they thinking? We don't have an identity and should have been merged with Karnataka/Maharashtra. (C) Fought in the 80's for Konkani, including those who lost their lives. We should probably change it now to Hindi, Kannada, Punjabi etc (D) Despite having hectic schedules are fighting against mega-projects, SEZ's etc We should allow these & change the demographics once and for all. (E) Non Resident Goans who despite being faraway and working for the Mythical Goan Identity e.g. The Goan Convention in Toronto with Goan Identity as the main theme. Why are they wasting their valuable time? We need to convert all these Goans into Anti-Goans & bury this Goan Identity issue once and for all. Can we form an Anti-Goan Movement for the purpose? On my August USA visit, can I meet yourself & all your Anti-Goan colleagues to brainstorm what we can do for the latter? I have some suggestions however for you & your colleagues to consider for this new movement: (A) Make Goa fully cosmopolitan Indian State with Hindi as Language (or better still a Globalised State); can be a good example for rest of India (World) (B) Encourage as many migrants as possible, give them voters rights, land and if that is scarce I recommend we offer our properties & houses as well. (C) Spread an awareness to convince Goans that it is no use holding on to land and its better we sell Goa to the highest bidder and become vagabonds. (D) Explain our side to these Foolish Goans that it's better to immigrate, feel guilty about not doing anything for Goa & then Castigate those working for Goa. (F) Explain that we should have controls for decent living standards, Language & Identity in our adopted countries, Goans in Goa are not entitled to the same because they do not know the difference between a country & state. Kind Regards, The New Anti-Goan. Message: 10 Date: Mon, 7 Jul 2008 11:26:31 -0700 (PDT) From: Mario Goveia <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: [Goanet] Goan Identity is NOT Anti-Indian To: [email protected] Message-ID: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Date: Sat, 5 Jul 2008 14:08:45 +0400 From: "Arwin Mesquita" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > Is the need for Goa to preserve her Identity, Anti-Indian? > Mario responds: > Memo to Arwin: > What Goan indentity are you takling about? > I thought Santosh had put a stake through the heart of that old shibboleth. >
