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Chandor Ganv Vhodd Zaum! |
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Vaddo View Igorjebhatt | Miria-Jirem | Cavorim | Binddimod | Guirdolim | Cotta This is one place you can�t avoid, no matter how hard you try. Whether you like it or not, you have to come to Igorjebhat regularly: to the market, the panchayat office, the society, the shops, the pharmacy! This place is in the village centre! But that�s not all of the ward�s claim to fame. It also has a superb natural spring, with water as clear as glass. And will you believe it about their youngsters here? They know just how to put abandoned land to productive use: turn it into a playground and now, also put up a children�s park there! Smart, or what? One thing, though, isn�t it strange about the name of the vaddo? The
place doesn�t really belong to the igorz, does it, now? So why call it
Igorjebhat? (Igorjebhatcar sounds funny too, doesn�t it? Ha, ha!). Other
vaddos in the village have already given themselves new names �Vila
Formosa and Collos, to name two. (For that matter, Igorjebhat was
earlier called Kamram Vaddo � Ironsmiths� Vaddo!) Isn�t it time
Igorjebhat changed its name too, to one which more correctly reflects
its character today? How about calling the place �Capital Vaddo�, given
how the whole of Chandor seems to depend on the village centre, and the
panchayat office (our very own government office) is located here too?
This sounds like a rather unique name, doesn�t it? There may not be a
Capital Vaddo anywhere else in Goa! Yeah, amigas and amigos, let�s go
for it! Let�s start calling the ward Capital Vaddo from now on! If we see as much refreshing green in Chandor as we do, it is mainly thanks to the hardworking people in Miria Jirem. They haven�t yet abandoned our paddy fields the way the rest of us have. Agriculture may be a dead loss today, but, surely, there�s nothing so tasty as rice from our very own fields, is there? Can�t the panchayat repair the baandh and subsidise labour and fertiliser costs for our tillers here? We should not hesitate to spend any amount of cash to preserve our ocean of green! But what�s this we hear about the vaddo wanting to change it�s name?! Miria Jirem is a brilliant name! (According to the local historian, Zenaides Morenas, Miria Jirem �is a corruption of Miranjiren,�� the term by which the ward was known earlier, as may be seen in property documents of the time. �Miranjiren means basically the residence of the Mira, or high officials of the Muslims�). Just consider the euphony � the spice! � in the name! Miria Jirem! Please don�t take the tang, the purmod if you will, out of our village! Let�s hold hard to whatever little romance yet remains in our charming Chandor. It is little things like this which bring a smile to our faces: your cute old bridge at Todeahandicode, the delightful machan in a tree by the roadside, and, once again, your incomparable name � Miria Jirem! And (we�re not done yet!), hats off to you for showing us the proper use of a paddy field left forlorn and abandoned! Viva Football!! Goooooooal! When you consider Cavorim today you can�t but become nostalgic. For instance, looking at life in the vaddo now, would you ever think of fish? There was a time, though, when angling used to be a major pastime along our side of the Kushavati. Our locals (especially from Ximder) were also wizards at ensnaring, with their khurkhuls and uponnim, the biggest fresh water fish that dared to look towards Cavorim. One smart fellow was so good, he was called Caddumcar Caetan! And who remembers that the fields and creek upstream of Todeahandi used to be called Couddi Todem? After the monsoon harvest, the sluice-gate at Handi used to be closed and the accumulated water used to breed fish! Or, take the vast expanse of the Pattem field lying so forlorn and fallow today. Only a few years ago, the green blanket of its rice sheaves was a sight to behold! Almost half the people in Cavorim lived off agriculture and even sold some of it. We also grew a third �crop�, after the summer harvest, of sweet potatoes, chilli, brinjal and peas. This cornucopia is now, of course, a distant memory. Not to mention the delicious taste of charam, canddam and cashews on our hillsides! (No thanks to those who have wiped out all the trees and shrubbery along the Cavorim hills!). Perhaps we need to trek up to the cross on the rock here and offer a ladin for the welfare of our vaddo and our village! But while you�re doing that, keep an eye open for our animal friends, monkeys and panthers, who seem to have developed quite a fondness for Couddikars, especially our pigs and dogs! This extreme corner of Cavorim got its name (no prizes for guessing!) from the bindinns (kokum) proliferating here long ago. If, however, you go looking for bindams today all you are likely to find is prowling wild animals! (They are driven into Chandor by surely nefarious activity in the forests beyond the hills in Cavorim). Anyway, if you pass this way at night, keep a sharp look-out � that pair of glints in the dark may not be a couple smoking cheek to cheek, it could be a leopard! And, if you can help it, try not to sleep in an open verandah here � Martin Teresa, our friendly pig-butcher of old, did, and suddenly found himself in the company of � you better believe this! � an alligator! The creature had climbed up the steps and headed in Martin�s direction, ignoring Martin�s female relative on the other side of the verandah! The creature may have been hungry � Martin probably gives off a very appetizing smell! � or simply lovelorn! By, the way, can someone tell everyone in Goa that there is a difference between a leopard and a tiger? To call a leopard wagh seems unfair, to both leopard and tiger (they must have egos too, surely, such handsome creatures that they are, one spotted and fast and the other, striped and powerful!). Considering leopards seem to have made Chandor their refuge, we better learn to call them by their right names, right? Or � Grrrrr!! Chomp! Chomp! Hey! We didn�t know humans were so tasty! Ani gheia! Did you know it takes almost an hour�s walk to get to the main road from Doneamod? All that talk about Jesus having come to Kashmir seems like so much speculation, doesn�t it? But that He came to Chandor seems clearly incontestable � His footprint is there for all to see on a stone in Guirdolim! Apparently, going by that infallible repository of fable and truth � mother most devout! � the toe prints are a record of Jesus� stride from the chapel on the Mount to Jitlem spring. This � Jesus� visit � probably explains the spring�s healing touch! It�s amazing, the friendship we share between our three hamlets (Cavorim, Chandor, Guirdolim). Nothing can come between us, not the railway line nor the artificial and unnecessary separation into two panchayats. (Who�s unholy idea was this anyway?). Guirdolim is an integral part of Chandor, sharing land, institutions, friends, neighbours, lovers, relatives, family and a common history and interests with the rest of us in the village. Let our combined population swell to a respectable number (let�s not work too hard and too quickly at it, though!) and we can even rejoin in a municipality! That will be the day! Viva Chandor United! If you happen to pass through this riverside ward, walk with care. You could stumble into fragments of history and legend no matter which way you turn! The footprints of the Kadamba queen, for instance, the headless Nandi bull, the 2nd century Shiva temple ruins or our very own ghost and rakhonddar, Cottapshi. (If you should run into this formidable fellow, however, don't be afraid. Just control your fear � make the sign of the cross if you have to � but don't, no matter what, swear! If there's one thing this gentle giant is hypersensitive to, it is bad words! If even one coloured word or two escapes you, you could find yourself being dipped again and again in the river, or even clinging for dear life from the topmost leaf of the tallest tree around! (How many drunks have explained their night-long absences this way!)). Yes, Cotta's a fantastic place! As also, we are sure, are all the good people who live here � toddy tappers, farmers, seamen, Gulfies, office workers, bakhars, the lot! What is best about them, of course, is the solidarity they show toward each other. Just consider how they've rallied round the cause of Angela Gomes and are working to give her family whatever recompense they can secure from a callous government! Don't you worry, Cottakars, we � everyone in Chandor and the whole of Goa � are with you all the way in Angela's cause. All for one, one for all! Mog assum!
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