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Anjuna dreams Mayabhushan Nagvenkar takes the temperature in his home village. We moved into Anjuna in the late 1970s. We were the first Hindu household in Doxoxxir, a predominantly Catholic ward, until another Hindu family moved in next door sometime later. Mutual suspicion marked the first few years in the neighbourhood, which later gave way to curiosity. Gradually as interaction increased, those around us considered us good enough neighbours.Things were as normal as a quiet neighbourhood would allow, until less than a decade ago there was a renewed wave of collective doubt. A family of foreigners had moved in on rent next door. (The word "foreigner" in Anjuna, automatically implies white) The family comprised a blonde haired toddler named Benjamin and his mum Anna, who hailed from Denmark. Anna ran a stall at the Wednesday flea market in Anjuna for most part of the season, while little Benjamin played in the gravel all day wearing a muslin kurti, ate dal and rice and loved cricket. Some years ago, Benjamin rushed into our yard chasing a cricket ball and bumped into my mother and apologised to her in fluent Konkani, which stumped her. Next, he wanted her to play cricket with him. While the term globalisation is somewhat recent coinage, the spirit of this phenomenon has been in currency in Anjuna for decades now, its roots going back several centuries. Social historian Teresa Albuquerque, who belongs to Anjuna by way of marriage – records in her book Anjuna: Profile of a Village in Goa that maritime history knew the village of Anjuna and its ward Chapora as Hanjamana and Shah pura, circa 1100 AD. "Hanjamana was a prosperous Arab commercial settlement and an important port along the west coast during medieval times," Albuquerque writes. "Hanjaman corresponds to Hanjuman – a merchant guild." In another book A Life Well Spent: A Biography of Pascoal de Mello, Albuquerque notes: "The port of Chapora had for long been a vital maritime hub. It was once a gateway to the holy city of Mecca and many ships were anchored, repaired and even built there. To Chapora came Arab dhows loaded with horses bound for the great market at Pernem, across the creek." For centuries now, Anjuna has served as an interesting port of call for merchants, adventurers, and soldiers among others. While in the early days, it was the loosely strung fleets of Arab dhows, which sailed across the Arabian Sea, the tide continues to bring travellers to this shore. Perhaps, the village remained etched in the consciousness of global travellers, much in the way the memory of a journey made long ago throbs faintly within a wandering bull elephant's head. After the Arab dhows ceased to haul anchor in Anjuna due to numerous geopolitical reasons, the village lived for a while like a bough without a single blossom. It carried on as a sleepy fishing village, until the 1960s saw it bloom once again with the coming of the flower children. Dominic Fernandes, who lives in Gaumvaddy, a ward located near the Anjuna tinto, recalled his first brush with hippies in the late 1960s. "They were walking by me in a group. They wore strange clothes and sported strange hairstyles, which I later learnt, were modelled after the Beatles. They were in love with this place. And we fell in love with them, because of they money they brought along," Fernandes said, not too fondly. But he does have fond memories of the Beatles hairdo, which he too sported after the hippies. Two score years later, Fernandes worries less about hippies. His major concern is a mammoth housing project that's under construction in a plot located right next to the Chapel of St John. A huge structure has cast a dark shadow over the bust of Fr Agnelo, an illustrious nineteenth-century priest who also hailed from Anjuna. Fernandes is not the only one perturbed by an Anjuna that's crowding far more quickly than imagined, with the springing up of one mega housing project after another. There are some like Sarjano, a gnarled, temperamental Italian chef and author. Sarjano lives in Anjuna and has been running an Italian restaurant in Vagator for some years now. But he thinks it's now time to pack his bags forever. Sarjano's on the lookout for an elusive Eden, somewhere on the South African coast, which was "discovered" some years ago by vagabonds of the sun and sea like him, but whose location is a closely guarded secret. "It's getting too crowded here," he said. "More and more people of my generation don't come here anymore. There are other places springing up like Laos or the beaches of Cambodia." Sarjano, who's been coming to Anjuna for the last 30-odd years, does not categorically say it, but drops hints that Anjuna-philes like him are being crowded out. "Indians tourists from Mumbai, Pune and Delhi are slowly replacing us foreigners," he said. "But there are other places which offer cleaner beaches and a better living at a much cheaper price than Anjuna." Still, there are voices of optimism, like Greg Acuna. Acuna has been living in Praiaswvaddo, Anjuna, for the last seven years and runs a firm that makes animation software for children. It was a sight he saw outside the infamously famous Curlies shack at Anjuna beach that inspired him to conceive Earthlings, an animation and live action TV series with the theme "One Planet, One People". He describes the stretch of beach outside Curlies shack as a place that epitomises the spirit of globalisation in Anjuna. "You have 20-25 children from different countries frolicking together by the sea," he noted. "Most times they don't know even the language the kid next to them speaks and yet they get along famously." Source : Time Out Mumbai ISSUE 3 Friday, October 03, 2008
