In response to: Message: 10
Date: Wed, 12 May 2010 23:23:51 -0400 From: Wendell Rodricks <[email protected]> Subject: [Goanet] StyleSpeak: THE FRUIT OF THE LAND Reading Wendell's post, old memories gushed down into a flood, thanks Wendell, it certainly made me smile amidst the torrid and the tumults currents we all are swilling in at the moment. Wendell made me go back to the days when I came to Goa form Bombay for the first time, at the young age of seven, where I found myself out of sorts with the surroundings, being used to the well lit Bombay, I had to fumble around in the light of the kerosene lamp, nights were creepy, and the screeching insects made it even worse, I was one scared child, I still remember, I use to make "susu" standing at the edge of the veranda, rather than walk down the steps into the creepy darkness. I was cursing my mom for dragging me down to this Godforsaken place, surrounded by dense forest on one side and huge gigantic bread fruit tree on the other and coconut trees all around, I use to be scared of my own shadow, but I was amazed and enchantered by the sunlight creeping through the dense foliage, the twittering of the birds, the fowls and the pigs around, the swaying of the coconut trees in the strong breeze coming from the sea made me go dizzy. As time passed by I got used to the surroundings and the darkness around, but life was nowhere near the life in Bombay, slowly but surely I resigned to the fact that this would be my life and I better get use to it, but before I knew it, I was packed to the boarding school in the city which looked far far off, I was dejected to leave home but relived to be in the brightly lit boarding school, made new friends and was happy after a long time but after a while I started missing the trees, the twittering of birds and even the screeching of the insects and most of all my aunts fowls and I longed to go back home, the first long break I had from the boarding was during the Ganesh holidays, as soon as I reached home I was running around like a possessed child, and from then on I never looked back. My love for my village grew in leaps and bounds and it was then my adventures started. I and my friends ventured into the thick foliage of trees and to my amazement and utter disbelief my friends started their attack on some small trees around, I had now idea what they were, but reluctantly accepted and the taste the fruit, it was so good, I myself started gathering a few, but out of nowhere a man came and started yelling and shouting in our direction, all my friends ran, I had no idea what the problem was but none the less I too ran like hell with a few fruits I could manage to hold on to, and when we were safe we made ourselves comfortable and started feasting on the fruits, all my life till then, I had never eaten anything tastier than this friut, it was my encounter with the custard apple, finally I asked my friends as to why we were running, and the answer made me nearly wet my pants, we had actually robbed my own uncle's custard apples, everyone in the family was scared of him. That same evening I was not al all surprised to see my uncle and my granny at our place, as soon as I saw them, I thought I would be better off else where, but later I found out that they had come home with some custard apples for me, saying that some of the village kids had robbed most of the fruits and before all of them disappeared they thought of giving me some, I was buried in guilt, but relieved that I was not recognised. After that I never ever ventured into my uncle's custard apple groove, which had lots of such trees. During the Diwali holidays again we tried the forest area but not my uncle's side and it was the first time I had come across "chinvram", at first I was scared that they might belong to someone else, but was assured that they were wild and at first I took just a couple straight from the tree, and boy, did they taste good ? This was all together a new experience for me, and there was plenty of it all around, but unfortunately I made a mistake of putting a few in my shirt pocket, but emptied the pocket before getting home, when I reached home, I was dripping in sweat and was soaked to the skin, as we had walked up and down the hillock, mom at once noticed the black stains of the "chinvram" and was at once taken to task and was made to promise that I wouldn't venture into the forest again. My movements were under observation. So I had to be careful, but that did not hold me back. During the December holidays, one afternoon I noticed a few elder boys gathered around the corner of my aunts property further down the back of my house, every one was sleeping at home, I was curious, so I made my way to the place and to my surprise they were hiding behind a big tree, I could see one them already on the tree, the tree was full of pinkish red spiky flowers which indeed looked like sea urchins, they did look very pretty and along with these flowers I noticed large pink and small green fruits, I had no idea what they were, and I surely knew these guys were up to no good and warned them that I'll tell my aunt, just then one of them offered me some of the fruits, these were big guys, reluctantly I took a few and tasted one, and by God it just melted in my mouth, it was deliciously sweet, I just could not believe the taste, and without any remorse I joined the plunder, that was my first taste of the love apple. Later on I realised that when these guys wanted to pick on the fruits from my aunts property, one of them would slip into my aunt's house and on the pretax of talking to her, hide her glasses the moment he got the chance, as it was common knowledge, that without her glasses my aunt was as blind as a bat. My aunt had "peram", limes, "jagomam" and "toranjams" as well around her house, my elder relatives use to be envious of her as what ever she planted, would grow and start yielding fruits very fast. They said that she had a gifted hand. She had the fruits that nobody else had in the village. Then came the most interesting season, summer holidays, I was growing in experience and getting bolder by the day, but was very scared of my parents and my uncle, but at the same time liked the adventure, climbing became easy but not the big trees, I was and am still scared of heights. Summer use to be the season of fruits in abundance, we ourselves had mangoes, jackfruits and cashews. I could even eat one whole jackfruit at a time and my sisters use to be amused at my eating capacity, I could just go on and on, mangoes and bananas were my favourite, we even had "dalima" (permanganate), Chico's, around the house. During the summer holidays we kids mostly lived of fruits but our elders seldom knew about our adventures and when caught were punished severely. I use to finish my share of the house chores early in the afternoon and be ready to go out to collect the wild fruit, when everyone was asleep in the afternoon "kandams", "chivram", "konner", "roz ambade" (amla), zamblams, which grew in the wild and in plenty, among them the best were "charams", they grew on big trees, so climbing those was out of question for me, I was the one to gather the ones falling down, like the other fruits we put them in a cone made of leaves and ate them as we moved along, we were not interested in hygiene, pick them from the dirt just wipe them on our clothes or hands or thighs, which were equally dirty and gobble them up, and they tasted real good. We had just one huge "adam's apple" tree in our village and that belonged to the most hated landlord in the village, so it was very rare that we could have a go at that, but when we had the chance, when he wasn't around we made marry. Breadfruits were and still are a common sight in our village, it's a delicacy that I love to have on my table. I myself planted two at my place but unfortunately the monkeys have a far greater appetite for the new shoots that spring out than my appetite for the fruit, leaving the tress naked and leafless. Today, though we still have a few trees of "binddam" and "otomb", the rest like the "zambul's", "charam" "konner", "roz ambale", "jagomam", "toramjam", "adam's apple" and the "love apple" trees have all disappeared from in and around our village, it's sad the new generation cannot experience the joy that nature gave us. Who is to be blame for this ? Everytime I go to Margao, I still look for love apples and what I see baffles me, small and green and I am yet to see those big ones like pears though not as big in size, but tasty indeed. As we grew older our adventure became fewer and then finally stopped altogether but I still yearn for those days, somehow my rendezvous with the wild and home grown fruits during my younger days has brought me closer to nature and thus my involvement against the destroyers of our environment, it hurts me to see our hills and mountains going bald and the damned miners playing havoc with our nature. I still like to walk through what's left of the forests in our area, I even bind grafts of mangoes for myself when I am at home during the season and even today when I walk in the wild if I come across any of the wild fruits and berries, I make it a point to bring home for my kids but do they enjoy them as much as we enjoyed them ? Hell no ! How can they ? They wash and rinse them before eating ! They like them but don't enjoy them like we did ! Freddy Agnelo Fernandes -------------------------------------------------------- The content of this electronic communication is intended solely for the use of the individual or entity to whom it is addressed and any others who are specifically authorized to receive it. It may contain confidential or legally privileged information. If you are not the intended recipient you are hereby notified that any disclosure, copying, distribution or otherwise placing reliance on the contents of this information is prohibited and may be unlawful in certain legal jurisdictions. If you have received this communication in error please notify the sender immediately by responding to this email and then delete it from your system. -------------------------------------------------------- ______________________________________________________________________ This email has been scanned by the MessageLabs Email Security System. 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