Dear John, I would like to share a few thoughts, especially since you are contemplating visiting Goa some time this year.
Goa you tell us, has held some very bad memories for you. And you are further troubled with what is being written on Goanet about all the happenings there. I strongly suggest you put all that away from your mind. Although you are Portuguese-English and a mixture of many other ethnicities, there is something in you that makes you feel you are almost a Goan. We on Goanet can see that. Perhaps it's because you were born in Goa. Perhaps it's the love that people embraced you with while you were in the throes of a difficult family situation in your childhood. But let me tell you the other side of the story. When you step into Goa, there is an almost magical quality to the land that will make you forget all that you have long ago experienced and all that you read on Goanet. Yes, Goa is changing. It is beset with many problems that the people who live there are trying to change. All power to them. I too like you, went with to Goa with large concerns. Unlike you I had very pleasant memories of my fathers and mothers land and I was afraid that what I would see would not bear any resemblance to what I remembered. I was afraid that I would not be able to hold to memories that I cherished. What I saw in Goa was a beautiful sight. There might have been ugliness behind the scenes but what I saw on the living canvas was a land that was in the throes of a dynamic change. The people were no longer susegado. They seemed to be filled with a kind of energy I had not seen before. The houses were as beautiful as ever. The ancestral homes were overshadowed by modern villas and bungalows built with pride both by Goans who had made good and by the non-Goans who painstakingly wanted to claim this piece of paradise as their own. No amount of tree cutting could take away from the beauty that I beheld. No number of migrants in the fish market in Margao that I never fail to visit, could take away from the pleasure I felt. If my father and mother were still living, they would have been proud. Not just to see their beloved land undergoing modernity, but also to see the people enjoying a prosperity they could only dream of during Portuguese times. I do not want to minimize any of the problems that our Goanetters write so much about. Quite some of it is true, though most of it is exaggerated. Goans living there will solve most if not all of them in the manner they see best. We on the outside can only listen and when asked, help. But to you and I, casual visitors, with a strong sentimental connection to the land, Goa is yet Goa. No longer a young boy riding on a bicycle with short pants, but a young man confidently striding and saying to us "I am the same person you knew. Don't stop loving me for the change that has taken place." So go with happiness in your heart John. I assure you that you will not be disappointed. Roland. +1 416 453 3371 On Thu, Jul 10, 2008 at 6:37 AM, JOHN MONTEIRO <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Thanks Roland ! > All this being ruined by greedy politicians, greedy land-grabbing developers > & illegal (& no doubt some 'legal') greedy ore-mining operators. > John Monteiro
