------------------------------------------------------------------------ **** http://www.GOANET.org **** ------------------------------------------------------------------------
This month's Goanet operations sponsored by Mrs. Daisy Faleiro If you would like to sponsor Goanet's operations contact: Herman Carneiro - [EMAIL PROTECTED] ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Mermaid Nipple Advisory Mischief, artistic interpretation, bad taste or pure ignorance? By Cecil Pinto An easily excitable female friend phoned me up last week in quite an agitated mood. "Have you seen what they have done to the mermaid?" she screeched, "And specially her nipples?! She's now a pink skinned European with the dark brown nipples of an Indian!" Having seen the mermaid in question myself recently, I quite understood my friend's distress. A bit of historical background first. In the late 1930s the Director of Health Services in Goa was Dr. Froliano D'Mello, acknowledged as a truly great Goan. Dr. Froliano was also a Member of the Portuguese Parliament and had attended a conference in Lourenço Marques (now called Maputo), the capital of Mozambique. He was so entranced by the beautiful city that on his return to Goa he wrote two articles in a local newspaper Herald (not O Heraldo) about how Pangim city should also be similarly beautified. The Portuguese Governor (128th to be precise) at the time, Jose Ricardo Pereira Cabral, read these articles, summoned Dr. Froliano and appointed him the President of the Pangim Municipality. "You want Pangim to be beautiful then make it beautiful yourself!" Armed with authority and resources Dr. Floriano went on a beautification spree. This was in 1940. There was a sort of square for buses and cars (Praca de Camionetas) sandwiched between Rua de 4 Abril and Rua de Joao de Crasto, just before the Palacio do Idalcao and behind what used to be the River Navigation (Navegacao Fluvial) Department. Dr. Froliano ordered this 'praca' to be shifted to the area near the old PWD headquarters. He then created a garden at the place with lawns, hedges, trees and benches. To top it all off he got installed a mermaid fountain in 1941. This last act lead to a bit of controversy, with the more orthodox Pangim residents casting aspersions on Froliano's character. They wondered aloud whether he was going through some middle age crisis and had hence installed a statue of a voluptuous mermaid to stir his libido. The controversy died off and the mermaid remained. History and Sex – I'm beginning to sound like Mario Cabral e Sa. Over the years the Mermaid Garden, as it came to be known, fell into disrepair but in 2002 was refurbished by the Panjim Municipality, enthusiastically aided by heritage lovers and architects. It remains a lovely place for city dwellers and visitors to relax at any time of the day. The mermaid faces what was at one time the seaward entrance to the city. Over the decades the mermaid statue has been repainted many times, most often fully white. In its latest avatar, immediately preceding IFFI 2006, some inspired painter made her hair jet black, her skin pink, her fish-scales grey, her bellybutton maroon, her lips ruby red and, worst of all, her nipples dark brown! Now quite frankly, unlike my distressed female friend, I have no problem with artistic license. But let's first understand how a mermaid's nipples are popularly represented. In most Indian fountain statues the mermaid is a fusion of a buxom apsara and a fish - with a pot thrown in to act as the water outlet. At Green Park hotel there is one such fountain. The Shakuntala fountain in Mapusa, though not a mermaid, is similar. In both cases nipples are visible but the entire statue is painted white, with no distinguishing shade for the nipples. The most famous mermaid statue in the world is the Little Mermaid in Copenhagen which is made of metal, hence not painted at all. The Little Mermaid symbolizes the fairy tale by Danish author and poet Hans Christian Andersen. The post-pubescent breasts of this classic mermaid are more in keeping with the sixteen year old of Anderson's tale. Christened Ariel in the sanitized Walt Disney film adaptation in 1989, she was given a cute 'shell bra' but still has the dubious honor of being the first Disney 'Princess' designed and animated in a way that shows off the lines of her cleavage. But enough of the Little Mermaid. The generic mermaid of cross cultural legends has a certain mystery surrounding her sexuality. On the one hand she is depicted as a seductive temptress of sailors, on the other hand she is portrayed as being asexual and in fact virginal. Thus her nipples (a symbol of overt sexuality - if you will) would be concealed by her hair, water weeds or shell bras. She was often depicted either without nipples, or with nipples having no differentiating shade from the rest of the breast. All depending of course on the culture and context in which she was being represented, as the myth of the mermaid (and mermen) is almost universal. In Europe we have the Celtic selkie, the morgens of Brittany, the German nixie, the Norwegian havfrau, the veen of Finland, the tritonids and nereids of Greece, the vedava of Eastern Europe… The mermaids and water spirits of East Asia and Africa follow similar universal themes but play somewhat different roles in their cultures, in part due to differing attitudes toward sexuality. Indian women in particular deny the existence of their nipples. In a Bollywood movie a woman might display wondrous heaving breasts, and be soaked with sweat or drenched with rain but, miracle of miracles, nary a nipple will ever be visible through the wet garment. Exposure of cleavage is considered acceptable but leave alone exposure of, even hinting at the existence of nipples is considered vulgar. Forget Sania Mizra, take even erotic sculptures in temples. Women will be shown in the most convoluted of sexual acts but their breasts will be sans nipples. The classic mermaid joke tells of how a wizened fisherman finds a voluptuous mermaid in his net. He hauls her abroad and after a little petting throws her back into the sea. His assistant asks him "Why?" He replies, "How?" Taking the logic a bit further, if mermaids don't have obvious organs of reproduction it stands to reason they should not have nipples either - at least not very oddly coloured and contrasting ones! There are at least eight major attempts at desecration of the Little Mermaid statue in Copenhagen, from painting on bras and knickers, to sawing off her head completely. Fortunately here in Goa we are a civilised society and the only desecration of our mermaid statue is by the authorities themselves, aided by a painter with no taste. He's probably the same dimwit who gave zagor-istic colours to the centuries old all-white cherubic angels on the façade of the Pomburpa church. I appeal to the councilors of the grandiose sounding Corporation of the City of Panaji to restore our city's mermaid to her single-colour glory. And in future keep your hands off her breasts! ------------- The column above appeared in Gomantak Times dated 22nd Feb 2007 =========