If you ring me on my mobile phone in the morning, you might get a very odd sounding me replying to you. And if you think I'm sounding very sleepy, that's true. Because I work through the night, sleep through the morning, and occasionally keep my mobile phone on to receive calls!
This morning, a call from Joseph St Anne, the prominent ad-man and photographer, was quick to wake me up... He said the Bombay Saligaokars were keen to work on some souvenir for the annual event, and he suggested a book/let focussing on the schools of the past in Saligao. Of course, we have Lourdes Convent, Mater Dei Institution (both historic in their own way), the aula/shala (or Government Middle School, to use its official designation), and now the international school at Grande Morod. Joseph's idea was to get reminiscences and memories relating to the schools of the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries too. Maybe 17th century might be going a bit too far back, but we could still try. My dad, who grew up in Salmona, remembers a Mr Pinto's school (these schools were run from village homes!) and the kids of the time apparently had a children's rhyme which went Pinto, khadak kinteo (= Mr Pinto has lice in his beard!) But Joseph is right. It would make a lot of sense to pen down the histories of these small and not-so-small institutions. Mater Dei's alumni have gone on to become famous writers (Victor Rangel-Ribeiro even has a setting of Saligao in his novel *Tivolem* and the artist-writer in our group Mel D'Souza is an alumni of that institution too). Lourdes Convent has educated two or more generations of students, some of whom like Nympha D'Souza have gone on to win $1 million US government grants for their scientific research, and others like Dr Celsa Pinto hold the post of the Director of Education in Goa. I reminded Joseph about trying to rope in people like Fr Nascimento, and educationists like Yvonne Vaz (author of 'Songs of the Survivors'). We could also ask the schools to rope in their current students in a school-history project... This sounds like a good idea, and looking forward to the involvement of writers and wanting-to-be writers in a project like this! -- Frederick Noronha Columnist :: journalism editing :: alt.publishing, photography :: blogging Landline :: +91-832-2409490 Mobile :: +91-9822122436 784 Saligao 403511 Goa India Goa,1556 :: http://goa1556.goa-india.rog Photos :: http://photosfromgoa.notlong.com Forthcoming from Goa,1556: http://tiny.cc/peppercorns -- This message comes via the Google Groups "Saligao-Net" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/saligao-net?hl=en Please post regularly to keep the e-village active!
