-Brian Mendonça
The water melon was the last thing I had to pick up.
Having done that - with a few chickoos and a bunch of bananas for good measure
– I placed them in my car.
Nevertheless, my feet were drawn to the tantalizing
shape of a ship in my eye of vision as I looked across the Mormugao bay. Much
as I tried, I could not see the flag she was carrying. I went closer and though
the flag was still mysteriously absent, the name was clear enough. Tomini Victory.
Tomini
Victory is one of the ships of tominishipping.com group based in Dubai. She is a bulk carrier
with a gross tonnage of 33032. Length 189.99 m x breadth 32.26 m.
The port with the foghorns of the ships is one of the
things I miss in Porvorim. The clatter of the trains leaving with unerring
precision at their appointed times, and the almost ear-splitting sound of the
fighter jets doing their manoeuvres high in the sky are part of a soundscape
which only Vasco can boast of.
And then there are the familiar places I used to haunt.
The streets which I used to walk are not like a ‘tedious argument’ but replete
with smells, sights and shrieks (sometimes). Nowadays when I visit the port
town I feel I belong yet do not belong.
From Temptation –the
24/7 snack joint in Vasco city I bought fresh loaves of bread, and chicken
rolls. I used to pick them up for dad
when he used to be in SMRC hospital, Chicalim. There was also a request for the
squiggles of bread. So I bought them too.
Baker’s Den was the next stop.
I longed to have the freshly-baked white nankatai’s
with a streak of red jam to top it. And how could I forget Dom Pedro’s snacks? His beef samosas were legendary then. They
still are.
My
Father’s House
-Brian Mendonça
Nosing down from Mangor hill
I unlocked my father’s house.
The memories rushed at me
Over the dust on the table top
More than a year’s post
sat on the dining table,
waiting to be opened
to the hum of the fridge.
The rooms
silent as death
pushed me outward,
malevolent as the rancid water,
clutching a poetry book
in my hand.
(Mangor
Hill, 2019)
Tomini
Victory was built in 2012 and sails under the flag of Marshall
Islands. She was in Villanueva port
(Philippines) in February 2019 and in Novorossiysk (Black Sea, Russia) in
December 2018. Prior to that, she berthed in Gelendzhik (Russia) on 30 November
and Fos-sur-Mer (Southern France) on 9 November 2018.*
Ever onward, on its restless voyage, Tomini Victory has since left the shores
of Goa and has travelled across the Indian ocean, through the Red Sea, to the
Suez canal.
She is now in port Suez South Anchorage, Egypt.
(marinetraffic.com)
For life and death are one
Even as the river and the sea are one.
-Kahlil Gibran
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*vesselfinder.com. Photo courtesy vesselfinder.com Published in Gomantak Times Weekender, Panaji, Goa on Sunday, 14 April 2019.
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