NT BUZZ brings some tribute, some homage and some fond reminiscences. Though these are specifically addressed to some fathers, the emotions behind these words are universally applicable to all dads out there, and since it is not possible to reach out to ever single father this is our way of telling all father’s how much they mean and matter. Happy Father’s Day
I’ve never been a big follower of days such as Father’s day, Mother’s day or Teachers day. To be honest I still don’t know any of the dates. Any day of any month is special to me.
My father has always been a very special person in my life; the person I am today is because of the way he and my mother have brought me up. He has taught me wrong from right in the most liberal way, making me realise and learn things for myself. And I was always surrounded by love.
People have often asked me, “What is it like to be the son of a celebrity?” but all I could say was “it’s exactly like being the son of a father who loves you”.
I’ve had a great child hood, and I hope to one day raise my kids the way I have been raised.
Happy Fathers Day!
--- Jonah Fernandes, son of Remo Fernandes
While young girls remember their first dance in reference to their father, Pai’s and my relationship was differently primed. The things that I remember most is a roughly hewn man, uneducated, often getting into loggerheads with his daughters, me and my sister, Theresa. Yet this man had a heart of gold, was wise with knowledge of a different kind not one that is learnt from books.
When I was growing up, he had a commercial careira and I remember travels to Old Goa to the Barade hill Velim and to homes of relatives in that lovely spacious vehicle. I remember him carrying me a six-year-old home from the tiatr my mother loved to frequent. I would wake up sometimes and feel protected by the warmth of his body.
Every night he regaled me with stories of his travels with the careira, germinating and nurturing a love for story telling at a very young age.
Pai always wanted me to be a doctor. He may have told this to me once when I was very young a wish stayed in my psyche all my life finally prompting me to do research.
Around nineteen the tension between us began to rear its ugly head. Pai unaware that I was nursing some ambitions of becoming a writer clamped down expecting me to do the regular things other village girls did. It was then that I left home to find my future in a big city and stayed away for many years.
When I returned in my forties we had both changed. We got on well and even shared a smoke together. Often he would ask me Bai why don’t you write for Goa Today and The Navhind Times like you used to when you were twelve.
I have grown away from all that writing Pai I would say and dismiss him. In many ways by waking those dormant memories he got me painting and writing fiction again. All about Goa that both of us knew.
In 2007 during an international conference in Baroda I remember my friends Shivaji Pannikkar of MS University and Kavita Singh professor from JNU calling me out from the Conference room and saying that I had to get home quick and my tickets were already booked. Pai had had a massive heart attack.
On the flight, dazed, I remember thinking I had just left the day before putting the keys of a sumo in my father’s hands and telling him that he had a driver to himself and this would be his vehicle. Having been a careira driver he knew Goa’s roads and loved to visit once in a while. He was 77, diabetic and the doctor’s had declared him unfit for driving. When I reached the room there he was fitted into a coffin. But in many ways he is alive for me through the memories I treasure of having known this gentle giant of a man.
Savia Viegas on her father
Father's Day is a celebration to respect fathers. But it is not that we should honour and remember or respect our father on this particular day. Father’s memories should be in our hearts. My father Goem Shahir Ulhas Buyao, gave me many good things, one of them is music, which I have inherited from him. He used to take me to musical programs to encourage me. I learnt music from him and today people know me for same. It’s a proud feeling that wherever I do musical programs people talk about my father’s music. For this everyday is marked as Father’s Day for me.
My fathers birth is on June 21, it is said to be longest day.
Happy Fathers Day to all.
---Sidhanath Buyao on his father Ulhas Buyao
It’s strange that what makes me, a teetotaler, remember Father’s Day is the iconic Chivas Regal advertisement created by one of my idols – David Abbott.
It helps my case because as a family, we are very patrilineal. We swear upon God saying our father’s name. My father did it. And so do I. And looking at my son grow up I oftentimes love the frustrations that he causes my wife, by what she says ‘being like his father’. Small things like the way he sleeps, the habit of opening his mouth while concentrating on small details, the way he scratches his own back – these are supposed to be my traits. In short, the fact that my genes have scored higher is a matter of great annoyance to the mother of my child.
My father was a great strength of support. He never ever criticised me or my actions. In retrospect that says much, because most of them were foolish, youthful excesses, at best. I guess that’s the best that you can give your child – let them know without saying so much, that you will be with them. Mothers are different, they talk, they shower love, they are vocal. But how do fathers cross that chasm without shedding their masculine skin?! Luckily for me, I grew up before advertising had created the metrosexual, ‘I can also shed tears’ type of a father. And I am grateful for the fact that my father laid great stress on me being independent and taking my own decisions very early in my life. Be it buying grocery and handling money before I turned eight. Or that my shoes should shine well. Or the fact that things removed from one place should go back there. Simple things that would matter in the organised chaos that I live in today. We were always middle class, and somehow the economic status seems virtuous to me today. My father and many of his contemporaries never ever complained. They never said they were sick of life and that life isn’t fair. A huge change when I compare that to the way I and my friends behave.
My dad is no more, but he made sure that I grew up strong enough to take care of myself.
---Harshvardhan Bhatkuly on his father
My dad, my papa, my pa, my popeye, my love, my life....
Like my mom, he has always been there for me from the time I open my eyes. He loves me to bits, but can get angry more than any other person I know. He is very strong, but can cry easily if he sees I'm hurt. He can think of the best gift for me for my birthday and he will travel any distance to be with me on that day.
From the beginning I used to enjoy seeing my dad's face whenever I won a medal because he would jump the highest with joy and happiness. My pa, my friend, my well-wisher, my guide, my mentor.
I thank him the most for he has made the biggest sacrifice of his life by letting his best half (my mom) be with me in Bangalore for the last four years.
Happy Father's Day papa.
Talasha Prabhu on her father Satish Prabhu.
