The "Jagoma" Mission
- Boroupi: Norman Noronha
The "Jagoma" Mission
As I recollect
my childhood days in Goa, I remember of a true incident of my life and I wish
to share it with all of you my friends. It was around Easter time.
“Jagomas” is botanically known as
Flacourtia jagomas and known in English as the Rueala
Plum.
In our village, Navelim, there was a house of a rich landlady, her
Portuguese style house was surrounded by a compound wall, and inside this
compound was a JAGOMA tree,
whenever we passed
by that house our mouth would water looking at the delicious maroon color
fruits that were hanging all over the bush.
We always longed to have it but it was too difficult a task as a fearful
dog was tied to the stem of that tree to guard it, during one summer holidays me
and my friend planned to raid that bush and capture those yummy Jagomas ….we
set out for our mission with a 10 Goan hot pav which we purchased from the
local poder, our parcel was wrapped in the news paper and off we went.
It was about 2.30 p.m. in the afternoon most of the villagers were
enjoying their afternoon nap –Siesta - but this old lady was sitting on rocking
chair in the balcao, we heard her snoring and thus were quite sure that she was
asleep.
The greatest job was to tackle the Doggie.
My friend assigned me the task of feeding the
dog with pav gradually. As the dog got busy enjoying the first pav my friend
jumped like Rambo over the compound wall with a small bag tied to his waist to
collect the prized fruit.
He kept plucking the berries while I kept the dog
busy feeding him with pav within few minutes he had collected bagful of the
fruits.
He gave me a signal with whistle that his job is done my pav were also
over, but mission accomplished! He flung
back over the wall and off we went to enjoy the fruit of our hard labor.
Those were the days
my dear friends if we tell this to our present generation they will mock at us
right ?
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Goa-world.com Team adds:
Norman Noronha has been unanimously elected as the 'president' of the Navelim Youth Centre-Kuwait recently and we congratulate and wish him all the very best in his continued efforts in the interest of sports and cultural activities in Kuwait.
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Goa-world.com Team adds:
Norman Noronha has been unanimously elected as the 'president' of the Navelim Youth Centre-Kuwait recently and we congratulate and wish him all the very best in his continued efforts in the interest of sports and cultural activities in Kuwait.
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That's a lovely story.
ReplyDeleteI found your blog on Googling 'Jagomas'. I'm a 28 year old who has grown up in Goa, and for some reason, cannot recall ever having tasted this fruit! It's possible that I have, when little, and have simply forgotten.
I was very excited a today when a friend showed me a jagoma tree in his garden, and on seeing this excitement, collected a whole load of them to give me. I think stories like yours must be quite popular because I've often noticed this fruit featuring in similar 'summer holiday' stories from my father, in-laws etc.