------------------------------------------------------------------------ * G * O * A * N * E * T **** C * L * A * S * S * I * F * I * E * D * S * ------------------------------------------------------------------------ ANKA SERVICES For all your Goa-based media needs - Newspapers and Electronic Media Newspaper Adverts, Press Releases, Press Conferences www.ankaservices.com kam...@ankaservices.com ------------------------------------------------------------------------
Dear Mr.Faleiro, I made a trip to India in 2001 to attend to a Seminar in Noamundi and visit iron ore mines in your country. We were a group of two engineers and myself - a geologist, working for Vale - a Brazilian mining corporation. During our trip Alvito DĀ“Souza - a native and resident Goan mining engineer, joined us and showed our way round in a very enlightening trip after the Seminar. We started in the Tata mines in Jahrkhand and went on to sites in Orissa, Chhattisgarh, Karnataka and naturally came to an end in Goa. Apart from the technical side of our trip, I was quite impressed with India and the panel we had of its rich, multicultural history. When we arived in Goa, we paid a visit to Alvito's family. Though having a Portuguese family name, Alvito could no longer speak the Portuguese language. In fact, he explained that his father, having taken part of the political movement which led to the independence of Goa in 1961, had naturally also decided to break with the language ties as a part of his political motivation. Alvito's wife however could still speak perfect Portuguese, having learned it with her parents as a first language at home. I remember having also talked to their youngest son who was in his early teens at the time. But - I do no know why, I did not address him in Portuguese but in English which he commanded fluently as it happens with educated people in India. Now I have come across your considerations on Portuguese names in Goa and remembered a question that occurred to me later: has Alvito's son learned to speak Portuguese with his mother? I believe that - if he has, it could indeed turn out to be a very good advantage to him. If one speaks Portuguese, it will be easy to learn Spanish - for the languages are closely related and similar. Add Hindi and English, that you learn at school, and he would be fluent in three of the most widely spoken languages in the world today. Let alone India itself, he could probably find opportunities all over the Americas, not only in the US. If you happen to know Alvito and his family, send my regards to him and Eslinda, his wife. Yours, Nelson Borges(*) PS - In case you have that name in Goa, I learned recently that it stands for the medieval name of the city of Bourges in France; the name was granted by the French king Phillippe le Bel to a French military man who took part of a siege laid on Bourges in the 1100s and later moved to Portugal where the name was introduced.