June: The Cow-Lady and the Monsoon

On the main junction connecting the road to the Goan capital of Panjim to the tourist strip of Candolim, a calf sat happily on the road. It wasn’t in the middle of the road, just to the side. Of course, this is a common sight in southern Asia but that didn’t stop an old lady from bringing her car to a complete stop in the middle of this busy intersection, getting out and slowly walking around the front of the car to see if the calf was still there. All the traffic came to a standstill in all three directions. Horns blared. Cow-lady took a moment to reassure herself, slowly got back in her car, turned the ignition and drove on.

This wasn’t the only head-scratching story involving cows this month. Driving through the market-village of Taleigao, my eyes witnessed the wonderful miraculous sight of a young calf standing behind her mother and drinking milk from her udders. At the same time, said mother was demonstrating the miracle of urination, which of course happens a little further back from the udders, at that moment in time geographically located right above the calf’s head. The calf was not bothered and continued to happily suckle at the milk as its head got warmer and warmer. I’m still processing this memory.

So it’s monsoon season here in India, and this particular little region of India gets some of the most rainfall each year, so the rain falls very heavily and very often, making it impossible for a Brit to go outside or get about. All the Delhiites are still on their holidays so Candolim is filled with northern Indians buying nothing but alcohol from the supermarket and then heading to the beach for a game of football. Most Indians tend to love the rains – they’re predictable, they’re contained with a few months and they bring life and celebration to the land. For me, however, rain is a depressing pain in the bum because what I know of rain is that it spoils your summer BBQ, wets your washing on the line and crushes your hope. Nevertheless, I’m happy to experience the Indian monsoon. Tick.

Last weekend was the festival of Sao Joao, which celebrates the life of Saint John the Baptist. Like every religious festival there is a lot of alcohol, merriment and arsing about with flower garlands on your head. The celebration of a Biblical baptist also calls for everyone to be submersed in water and come out experiencing new life. However, if they celebrated St. John properly then they would all eat locusts, wear camel-hair and get decapitated, but I’m assuming locals decided to draw the line at drunk people jumping into the village water-well (which is what actually happens to this day).

I do love Goans. They know how to celebrate. They took the best influences of the Portuguese after they left in 1961. The festivals I’ve been to thus far have been insanely happy occasions with the best food, wine and live music you could hope for. It’s a culture very close to western culture – a gateway into India for anyone who wants to experience cows, curries and crowded streets but also want the comfort of some of the things they’re used to.

Any part of India can be vastly different from the next. The coconut heavens of Kerala, Tamil Nadu and Goa are a world apart from the mountainous north-eastern states which are in turn hugely different to the planes of West Bengal. Every state has its own culture, language, history, laws, education system and music. It’s not a country, it’s a federation – a group of states being forced to work together to make a greater whole. Changes will naturally occur, but one thing is for certain, Goans will never give up eating beef.

One thing that is thankfully changing, albeit slowly, is the attitude towards women. This is a country where baby girls are often abandoned or killed, or their parents wait a few years and either sell them off for 1000 rupees (£11) into the sex industry, marry them off to much older men (who might go on to sell them into sex-work later), or abuse them themselves. A video was released this week of a 14-year-old girl jumping to her death from the 8th floor of an apartment building in Mumbai. Having interviewed Beena this week to learn and write up the stories of some of the women and girls she has taken into care, my heart breaks thinking of what that young girl was facing. Women are commonly seen as objects here and it’s this kind of injustice that I can’t learn about and do nothing about. Each of us can help in our own way, whether it’s teaching, or painting, or building, or cleaning, or giving to charity.

Talking of teaching, I’ve had a lot of interest in song-writing from some of the children and even some of the ex-BLC kids. Song-writing has been my passion since I was in the single-digits and wrote little songs in a series of exercise books, and it fills me with joy to be able to train kids here in how to create their own songs. Since introducing my song How On Earth in church a few Sundays ago, a lot of my students have asked for it to be their new project to learn it. I pray I am inspiring a new generation of song-writers.

Sidenotes:

• I was helping a boy with his 9th standard (UK year 9) science homework on the digestive system. It was all going well until I had to explain what a sphincter was. Thank God it was a boy and I could make him laugh with words like “bum” and “poo”. Haha
• One of the BLC sponsors paid for every child to go and see a 3D showing of Incredibles 2. Everyone loved it.
• I now have 12 songs written and I’m in the production phase of creating an album due for release around New Year. All proceeds will go straight to Bethesda Life Centre. The kids will be involved in the production of some tracks and will be helping with part of the artwork.
• I am in need of donations. If you feel compelled to give to help me teach here, you can do so via this JustGiving link or contact me on social media or send an email to hello@willadammusic.com and I can provide my UK bank details.
• The monsoon brings with it many disruptions to power supplies. At least when the power goes off at night I’m blind and cool instead of blind and praying under a cold shower.