Cheek-to-cheek at a Goan dance in East Africa
CYPRIAN FERNANDES: A Goan dance
A Goan Dance
Here is classic description of a Goan dance in any East African town
back in the early days when most of us in our 70s & 80s were young adults.
It is an excerpt from Peter Nazareth’s “fictional” In a Brown
Mantle. I use the quote marks because the book appears to be thinly
disguised as Nazareth’s once temporary homeland Uganda:
A dance in a Goan institute used to be rather formal. The dance usually starts at 9 pm, which means that the band starts playing at around 9:30 pm and couples start drifting in at a quarter-to-ten ( Cyprian: Goans were genetically such awful time keepers that allowed themselves the luxury of naming their own time: Goan time which was usually 60 or 70 minutes after the appointed hour).
The people are semi-formally dressed in attractive dresses or suits. The couples sit on chairs placed around the dance floor or around small tables (In Nairobi, it was just chairs around the dance floor). If they sat around the dance floor, the men usually vanished to the bar. They then hold their drinks and watch from the sidelines until somebody gathers up the nerve to commence dancing.
(Cyprian: Watching from the back of the hall is also another tribe of Goan men, young Goan men. The wannabe Romeos, the love-sick scaredy cats, and the not-so-drunk showing off an imaginary plumage but not girls worthy of respect are likely to engage them. The peacock plumages’ lair at the back is also home to the “tough guy” lovers who only dance the midnight special (usually cheek-to-cheek in the dim light) and last dance which is reserved for that special girl.)
Then the men go up
to the ladies of their choice (they dance with their wives first) (Cyprian: a
duty dance) and say: “May I have the next dance, please?” The reply is usually
“Yes” in which case they go round the floor in varying degrees of happiness. (Not
Fortunato D’Mello, who never took dancing lessons. When I asked him why, he
said that he once counted the number of times a couple went round the dance
floor. He then estimated the length and breadth of the floor. After which, he
calculated that a couple moved 17 miles (27 km) round the floor during that
dance. “All that distance and they got nowhere,” he said)
The band plays a
set of three pieces – say three quicksteps. Each piece lasts for three or four
minutes. The band takes a break and the two return to their seats, the man
saying “thank you very much” and “may I get you a drink”.
The next dance
starts – a set of three foxtrots. And the dancing starts. Three
waltzes. A break. A set of three rhumbas. Break. Three jive/soul.
Break. A mild of set of African dance songs. Break.
There is no
eroticism in Goan dances. Rather, whatever eroticism exists is submerged and
can only be detected when a wolf-like Joaquim D’Costa is dancing with a
long-haired married lady. And there is no break in the civilised behaviour,
except for the inevitable fight around the bar, which ends by somebody bringing
the warring parties together over a drink or somebody being thrown out.
A lot of my
friends loved the Italian Cha Cha Cha which made me chuckle. Some were very
special at dancing the waltz, others invented their own version of the dance.
There was one guy who took his partner round the hall almost as if he was
driving in a Grand Prix. Naturally, everyone kept out of his way. The Swahili
international hit, Malaika (angel) first recorded by its
writer Fadhili William was high on the hits list for the Midnight Special or
the Last Dance. The Midnight Special was also famous for traditional Goan
dances like the mandos and something British
called The Lancets (?), aped from the British in India (I
think). We locked arms and sang those ole time ole English favourites ....
She'll be coming round the mountain ... and dozens of others. Remember the
Hokey Pokey ... you put your left leg in ...? And the Conga Line after rocking
in the New Year? We loved everyone ... and, of course, Auld langsyne to
bring in the New Year. As the years went by Rock 'n' Roll, the Twist,
African-American soul and West Indian reggae began to dominate. Rowland Rebello
was perhaps the finest exponent of the jive and the twist. Goans did not take
to the jive too quickly but eventually most people were doing it. The samba and
the rumba were a lot of fun. The rumba often lent itself to be a favourite of
mine but I loved the jive (rock 'n' roll) and the soul hits the most.
Then, of course,
there was the "tag" or "tap" dance in which the men were
allowed to cut in on a couple mid-dance by tapping on the shoulder of the male
partner. This dance proved handy if you were shy of actually going up to her and
asking her to dance while she sat with her parents. It was also useful to cut
out any potential suitors by having your army of friends not allowing more than
a step or two for the intruder. The "ladies' special" allowed the
girls a chance to ask the man of their choice, sometimes announcing in public
who they fancied or who was courting them. Others played it safe by dancing
with a brother or father.
The other critical element in the social development of young Goans in East Africa were sports visits from one city to another. The sports contests were ferocious to say the least but all that tough love on the field sometimes turned to good love on the dance floor as new friendships were made and new loves were found. The sports visit was a high point in the social calendar of both the hosts and the visitors.
The other critical element in the social development of young Goans in East Africa were sports visits from one city to another. The sports contests were ferocious to say the least but all that tough love on the field sometimes turned to good love on the dance floor as new friendships were made and new loves were found. The sports visit was a high point in the social calendar of both the hosts and the visitors.
The dance,
especially at Valentine's (usually a masked ball) in February, Bachelors and
Spinsters, Leap Year Ball, Easter, Christmas and New Year’s Eve, as well as the
day occasions (the “hops”) played a central role in the social evolution of
young Goans. Only the "best" people attended the dances as the ticket
prices were reasonably high to keep the "riff-raff"out.
Dress was formal: men wore lounge suits and girls
were in dresses. At Christmas or the New Year's Eve Ball, men wore their best
suits or black dinner jackets. A few brought their prized white shark
skin tuxedos out of the moth balls. The women wore glorious full-length gowns
and were at their stunning best. It was also usual for girls to wear a new
dress at every dance which they sewed themselves or a neighbour obliged for a
small fee. Some families used the same tailor throughout out his life or their
lives.
As the traditional
arranged marriage (usually with someone in Goa and later with someone in the
African country where you lived) continued to be erased from the Goan ethos, it
was left up to the Goan social clubs to cater for the young to take the
embryonic steps towards the mating game. It is here the besotted finally got a
chance to get real and personal with the girl of their current dreams (but not
too close, the eagle-eyed parents kept a sharp look-out and (in the very early
days) it was not uncommon for a parent to come on to the dance floor and insist
on a more respectable distance between the two dancers. However, it was not
long before young Goans were dancing cheek-to-cheek, or the girl resting her
head on the boy’s shoulder, sometimes rather awkwardly. That’s it. If you liked
the girl so much, you may have had one duty dance with her mother or her sister
and then you danced every other dance with her. If you were brave enough, you sat with the family. If you were
virtually one step away from the engagement ring, you held sweaty hands for the
rest of the night and everyone in the hall knew who was going get married next.
The dance was also the scene of many a heart break as a partner was dumped for
another or chose to play the field.
The most important dances were midnight special and
the last dance. Dancing cheek-to-cheek under very dim lights, or no lights, a
special guy saved this dance for a special girl or the best choice for the
night. Some of these cheek-to-cheek encounters did result in happy and
long-lasting relationships. At the Railway Goan Institute, most couples tried
to hog one of the three or four ceiling fans, dumped the tradition dance steps
that they had learned from the Bonny Rodrigues School of Dancing and opted for
a kind of sweet soul, slow, slow gyration, virtually in the one spot. Heaven,
if you were that special girl
It was also unforgivable for a girl to ask a boy to
dance (except, of course, once a night in the ladies special). “Decent girls
don’t do things like that”. “Decent girls don’t throw themselves at a boy”.
“What will he think of you?” Once in a blue moon, if you were mooning in on
other people’s conversations, you might hear: Why did you dance with her (or
him). In the case of “her” it was because she was just a friend. In the case of
“him” it was because he asked for the dance.
Now and again, the father of the girl (after having
his elbow well and twisted by both daughter and wife) would approach the boy
say to him: “You should come and visit us sometimes.” The boy would be there
the next day, for a little while. If that did not happen he would be circling
the house desperately trying to catch a glimpse or miraculously crash into her
as she ran an errand for her mother. A few would even have their secret meeting
places.
When you were invited to a home, on the rare
occasion, you were asked to bring your university degree, your Post Office (on
bank) savings book or evidence of your potential as an ideal suitor. Some boys
never took up the invitation because the mother or the father frightened the
daylights out of them. In later life, some lived to regret that but others
dined on the experience as an after-dinner joke.
The progression, of course, (in Nairobi at least)
was a date to the movies (20th Century or Kenya Cinema) or faluda
and samosas at Keby’s, ice cream at the various joints. Much later into the
relationship, it was coffee out at Embakasi Airport or a smooch-in at a
friend’s place or in a parked car outside her home or the grounds of the club. No physical sins were committed. Sins of thought are
another matter. Then, there were those wonderful picnics in the back of
a truck or in a convoy of cars. Lots of games, lots of singing and music and
lots of “getting closer to her or him (or the partner for the day)”.
I am sure my readers will decorate this piece with
your own wonderful experiences in Mombasa, Nakuru, Kisumu, Eldoret, Kericho,
Kampala, Dar-es-Salaam, Tanga, Arusha, Kampala, Jinja, Entebbe, or anywhere
else in the world.
I met the girl of my dreams, my late wife, at the
Railway Goan Institute.
Like a lot of my contemporary friends, I loved the
Goan dances
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