By Manohar Shetty
It was rather fortunate for the security of our nation that the CIA and its covert partners knew nothing of the existence of Alwyn Miranda, an Indian citizen of Panjim, Goa. Tall, pale and with a touch of Iberian blood—or so it was rumoured—Alwyn may have frowned at his description as an ‘Indian’ as in December, 1961, when the Portuguese were forced out of Goa, he like some others of his social background, had harboured a desire to leave and start a new life in Portugal. Though he spoke Portuguese fluently, it was the fear of starting afresh on foreign shores that had compelled him to stay back in the familiar confines of Goa.
Over the years with Goa blossoming as an international tourism destination, Alwyn had long ceased to have any regrets of not starting anew in Lisbon or Coimbra all those years ago. In fact, he truly loved Goa, more so since the place, from the late sixties when the hippies had found a haven there, had drawn even more foreigners to its shores. It was these Anglo-Saxon visitors that so enamoured Alwyn Miranda—or more specifically the all-White American tourist who occasionally bypassed Hawaii or Bali to land on the golden shores of Goa.
Alwyn’s love affair with America had begun more than 45 years ago when, as a boy of seven, his father, an officer with the Shell petroleum company, had taken him for a week-long holiday to Disneyland. It was the only trip abroad that Alwyn had ever made, but it was a visit he had never forgotten. Like the hanging roots of a banyan tree, this visit had over the years grown and spread its wings so wide in Alwyn’s imagination that the memory of that holiday now encompassed fictitious visits to Washington DC, San Francisco, New York and the Rocky Mountains—indeed to even the remotest corners of America. It was an America that he knew only from maps and movies, but this did not discourage him from feigning first-hand, an extensive knowledge of the country whenever he met an American in Goa.
Given this vicarious addiction to America, it was not surprising that Alwyn had pancakes, waffles and orange juice for breakfast, hamburgers and French fries for lunch, and cheeseburgers and apple pie topped with more orange juice for dinner. On occasion, he would buy butta from Miramar beach, and smeared with butter for a teatime snack, he would call it ‘corn on the cob.’ It was even less surprising that he had named his two Alsatians Roy and Rogers.
In recent years, he had tried very hard to acquire a Chevrolet Sedan but financial constraints had forced him to settle for a Maruti van. This was, however, no deterrent to his love of America. He knew the names of all the States and their capitals, had a more than cursory knowledge of the Civil War and could name all the Presidents starting from Abraham Lincoln to Barak Obama. On President Obama, Alwyn harboured a few strong reservations, all of which had to do with his race. ‘Just imagine,’ he would tell his friends, ‘if Hillary Clinton had been made the President—the first woman President of the United States!’ This visualized triumph of the gentler gender to mask his antipathy towards the Black community may have fooled his friends initially, but not after Alwyn had consumed a few drinks—not Bourbon or Martinis which he could ill afford, but an IMFL (Indian Made Foreign Liquor) brand known as ‘Aristocrat.’ Then Alwyn would let slip his animosity towards America’s ‘first Negro President.’ Or teased by his amiable friends, he would extol the virtues of ‘the White American pioneers’ who had ‘crushed and civilized the Red Indians.’ He also, whether high on whisky or not, disliked Soul and Rhythm & Blues music, believing it was all rendered loud and jarring by ‘Negro musicians.’ Not surprisingly, his first love was for Country and Western exponents like Johnny Cash and Dolly Parton. And singers like Frank Sinatra and Ricky Nelson. Secretly, he was appalled that Louis Armstrong had performed before his favourite President, John F. Kennedy at the White House. Why not Dean Martin or Fred Astaire? On one occasion he had gone all excited to the Kala Academy to listen to a visiting group from America only to return disappointed at the sight of a sea of joyous Dixieland singers. Back home that night, he had found solace in a two-hour re-run of his favourite soap opera ‘Dynasty.’
At every social gathering or high society wedding Alwyn would leave his Goan friends to seek the company of the smattering of White guests who invariably graced such occasions. Most of these guests would be from the UK or the Scandinavian countries, but this did not deter Alwyn from waxing forth on his ‘frequent travels to the US.’ He would, for instance, start off with: ‘Hi, I’m Al. You know, when I was in San Francisco last year and I saw the magnificent Golden Gate Bridge, I could not but wonder how small and puny was our own Howrah bridge.’ He would then gush on with ‘When I was in New York and beheld with my own eyes the Statue of Liberty I said to myself, what a sight to behold! An architectural marvel to Freedom. As you know, it symbolizes Liberty, Fraternity and Equality. Why can’t we in India build such a magnificent monument to mark our own so-called independence from British rule?’ When one of the British guests would reply in diffidence: “May be Mahatma Gandhi did not want any such ostentatious display.’ Alwyn would retort with ‘Oh, you mean the half-naked fakir? That is what the great Winston Churchill called him.’ To which the English lady would say: ‘Ah, but Gandhi was a kind of warrior saint. He used nonviolence as an effective weapon.’ At this response, Alwyn would swiftly change tack: ‘Yes, of course, “Mahatma” means “Great Soul”. And Churchill the warrior could not even win an election’. To which the British lady would reply: ‘Neither did Gandhi, of course. But then elections were beneath him. He was far above all that.’ This kind of revelation would be news to Alwyn, but with his vast experience as a convivial conversationalist, he was good at feigning knowledge. ‘Yes, of course,’ he would say. ‘Why should someone of his stature stand for elections? He was the Father of the Nation. And, don’t forget the movie on him won seven Oscars.’
Taking up his own cue, he would lead the conversation towards another artistic direction, to the only novel he had ever read: ‘Reading “Gone with the Wind” literally took my breath away,’ he would say. ‘Have you seen the movie starring Clark Gable and Vivien Leigh? Fabulous. I saw it seven times, once in LA.’ No one of course told Alwyn that Miss Leigh was born in Bombay.
Despite the occasional disagreements, Alwyn found these exchanges always convivial and he would go out of the way to fetch wine, and rum and Coke for such guests. However much he enjoyed the company of these visitors, it was the Americans he most craved for. But very few US citizens visited Goa. A tourism official had once told Alwyn that only a thousand or so Americans came every year, to which Alwyn had replied ‘If they can go to Hawaii, why would they visit Goa?’ After a pause he would elaborate: ‘You know of course that Hawaii is a part of the United States.’
On occasion Alwyn would meet an Indian doctor or IT specialist who had settled in the US. And even though they were American citizens with successful careers with high-end homes in New Jersey or California, they did not impress Alwyn. There was, of course, a touch of envy in him when they described their homes, their cars and their acquaintance with a large number of other White Americans. Alwyn would then ask a great deal of probing questions about these acquaintances.
Given his adulation for America and all things American, Alwyn never entered into any prolonged debate about America’s defeat in the Vietnam war, the gleeful and triumphal ‘shock and awe’ unleashed on Iraq in response to the concocted bogey of weapons of mass destruction and the razing of Baghdad with missiles fired from the safe distance of the stratosphere. The blood-thirsty admission ‘We think the price is worth it’ by their obese Foreign Secretary then (who looked like the comic figure Little Lotta), on television on the killing of half a million Arab children was for Alwyn just another instance of anti-US propaganda. For Alwyn, the Americans could do no harm. They were incapable of any Yankee-panky. He craved for their company. This came about again one late evening in a rather unexpected way.
Alwyn would often go out with friends for dinner usually on Saturdays to Britto’s at Baga or Souza Lobo at Calangute. He would always make sure that he found a table next to a group of White foreigners. That the waiters tried to segregate him and his friends away from such company would not strike him in the least. And, in fact, the waiters would breathe easy when Alwyn would strike up a friendly conversation with them. ‘Have you tried the pomfret recheiado?’ he would say. ‘It’s a Goan speciality, almost as tasty and hot as the fish I once tried in New Orleans…’ Or ‘Let me treat you to a feni, the local hooch. My friends in the US love it. I once tried it with a dash of maple syrup. It was fabulous.’
Alwyn was a good swimmer and he had known the seas off Baga and Calangute ever since his childhood. He knew every pull and eddy of the tide on this stretch of coastline. While his friends drank and waited for the food, he would often go out for a swim. On this particular occasion, after a few drinks, Alwyn stripped down to his shorts and walked down towards the waves rising and curling above him. It was high tide but Alwyn knew his territory well. It was past sunset and an indigo darkness was settling in as he swam out strongly for about thirty metres, the waves pounding his head and chest. He had always loved the crash and pull of the sea, and with a couple of drinks inside him, he ventured a few metres further. He could make out the silhouettes of three women swimming quite close to him. There was no one else besides them. The wind carried snatches of their conversation.
‘Hey, Katie, this ain’t Detroit. It’s the wide-open sea!’
‘Ooo, Goa, here I come!’
Alwyn could make out the dark outline of a frisbee curling in the air.
‘C’mon, catch it!’
’Dunno where it is!’
‘C’mon, honey, go fetch it.’
‘Catch it, baby!’
‘You sure you kin swim, honey?’
‘Sure, but I cain’t see it!’
For a moment there was silence, with only the waves pounding in Alwyn’s ears.
He caught sight of two heads bobbing close by, followed by a shout:
‘Hey Katie, where are you?’
‘The tide sure is strong!’
Alwyn heard a gurgling sound close by and what sounded like a stifled cry. He saw the outline of two of the swimmers pounding their way to the shore, as if fleeing in panic to safety.
The third woman was some distance away, submerged by the waves and rising again to the surface, her arms flailing. He heard what he thought was another stifled cry. Alwyn acted quickly, and a few strong strokes brought him into close proximity with the woman. She rose again from the depths, another cry stifled in her throat. In a moment, Alwyn had his grip around her waist, and was dragging her towards the shore. He could feel the woman struggling, water streaming down her hair and neck. Alwyn thought he saw her eyes widening with fear, her mouth opening soundlessly.
In the distance, he could make out the silhouettes of the other two swimmers dragging themselves to the shore. He could now feel the floor of the sea and the woman in his arms struggling to her feet, water streaming down her shoulders. Within a few minutes, they had both struggled to the rim of the sand. Alwyn loosened his grip. The woman was now crawling on all fours, gasping and coughing, towards the beach and her two companions. Alwyn was a few feet behind her, also gasping. ‘I hope you’re alright, ma’m,’ he said. ‘The tide almost got you…
The woman was now with her two companions, who had thrown a towel around her.
Alwyn drew up closer, his eyes anxious. ‘You OK, lady? If you need a doc, first-aid, I can call…’
The woman coughed, her blonde hair glued to her brow and shoulders.
‘First-aid!’ she said. ‘Why the fuck d’you think I need first–aid?’
‘You were drowning, ma’m,’ Alwyn said, uncertainly.
‘Drowning! You moron, she’s a champion swimmer!’ said her friend.
‘You almost drowned her. And you were feeling her up! I’ll call the cops!’ screamed her other companion.
Flustered, Alwyn turned away. His feet seemed glued to the sand. As he squelched back towards the restaurant, his shorts stuck wetly between his legs, he could hear the women shouting, their words carried by the strong breeze.
‘What a creep!’
‘Asshole!’
‘Fuckin’ Indian!’
‘Where the hell are the cops?’
Manohar Shetty has published several books of poems, including Domestic Creatures (OUP, N. Delhi) and Living Room (HarperCollins, N. Delhi). His poems have appeared in a number of literary journals including London Magazine, Poetry Review (London) and Atlantic Review USA. He has edited Ferry Crossings: Short Stories from Goa (Penguin India) and Goa Travels: Being the Accounts of Travellers from the 16th to the 21st Century, (Rupa). His new book Full Disclosure: New and Collected Poems, 1981 - 2017 (Speaking Tiger; 2017) is available for purchase here.
The banner image is by Josh Gordon and downloaded from unsplash.com