Sussegad
Words by Nimisha Kantharia
Essay | Issue 02
If you have ever been fortunate enough to visit Goa, which is heaven on earth, it may surprise you that in the afternoons, there isn’t a single shop open, nor a local inhabitant in sight. A gentle hush blankets the landscape, the contented sigh of an entire state, partaking in the blessed ritual of siesta.
The afternoon siesta forms only one part of the Goan philosophy of sussegad. The word comes from the Portuguese sussegado, which translates to ‘quiet.’ But the concept itself refers to the relaxed leisure that abounds in Goa, to the laid-back attitude of Goans, to the sense of personal contentment that prevails here. To truly experience sussegad, it’s not enough to visit Goa. You must stay here for a while.
Come with me to my grandparent’s village in south Goa. As a child, I spent the summer holidays here, every single year. Stay with us here, for a week or two. Like me, you may find that you never want to leave.
The day begins not too early, with a breakfast of parathas and home-made jam, the former made by my grandpa, a natural early-bird who wakes up at 5 am every day. Since he’s the first one up, he makes breakfast for everyone, allowing granny to sleep in, for she is more of a night owl than a lark. Granny makes the mango jam from fruit harvested from our garden. We wash this breakfast down with a mug of milky tea. Can you see the sweet harmony of sussegad at play in this breakfast arrangement? Irrespective of prevailing gender norms, grandpa would cook breakfast, for both of them woke up in accordance with their own biological clock.
Step into our garden, blooming even in the summer heat, thanks to the rich red soil and deep wellsprings of ground water. The garden epitomises the enough-ness inherent in this landscape, for sufficiency, according to me, is an essential pre-requisite for sussegad. How can you be relaxed or at leisure, unless you have enough to meet your needs? Make no mistake, though. This garden was not always like this. It was granny, dressed in an old long-sleeved cotton shirt of grandpa’s, who wrested this foliage from the soil. She worked in the scorching sun, a straw hat on her head to protect her from a sun-stroke, digging, planting, weeding, raking and burning leaves, and watering the immense garden.
Some people stereotype Goans as lazy because of sussegad. But this is untrue. Consider granny, one of the most hard-working people ever! She was unafraid of labour, seeing it as an essential part of life, as essential as rest. She taught me work is merely a part of life that we are meant to take in our stride.
On the days when it is too hot for gardening, a splash in the river beyond the fields provides a welcome respite from the blistering heat. There’s always a breeze blowing here, cooled by the gurgling water. The sun makes the water’s surface sparkle and casts dappled shadows of the surrounding trees onto the stream. Let’s sit on a rock and watch the tiny, black fish darting about, tickling our feet. Soon the village women come, joking and gossiping in Konkani, carrying their loads of washing on their head. A bit later, the buffalos join us, slipping into the deep green water, wallowing in it beneath the mossy trees.
When we return home, granny serves us large mugs of kanji, the starchy broth produced while cooking parboiled rice. Despite the heat, the steaming drink whets our appetite for lunch. Mounds of white rice are served with meat, fish and vegetable as accompaniments. The fish is always fresh, the morning’s catch, which grandpa buys from the market each day, along with the daily newspaper. The fish is served as a curry or a fry, while the meat is either chicken, sourced from the fowl granny keeps, or spicy sorpotel, my favourite. Granny inevitably garnishes the vegetable dish with grated coconut, which lends it a sweetish flavour. Often, there is poi, or sanna, to mop up the gravy. With such a spread, such a medley of flavours, there’s always something that suits each person’s taste.
And then the unavoidable siesta! All the adults retire to their rooms, for a rest or maybe a drowse. But if the afternoon heat hasn’t cast a spell on you, just like it never did on me when I was a child, then we can sit on the swing in the garden, or browse through granny’s endless collection of backdated Reader’s Digest. And if the rich fare served at lunch sits heavy on your tummy, I have just the solution! Sour bilimbis from the tree besides the well, best eaten with a palm full of salt crystals from the jar beneath the kitchen cabinet!
After an evening snack of coconut-jaggery rice flour pancakes, we take a walk to the hills behind the house. When we return, our legs aching and feet stained red, granny is already squatting in the backyard, in front of an outdoor fire she has kindled from coconut husks and cow dung, boiling well water for our baths in a humongous black pot. Once we are all bathed, we gather for evening prayers, and then dinner, comprising the afternoon’s left-overs, is served. Another quintessential characteristic of Goa is to cook only one enormous meal a day and serve it for both lunch and dinner, freeing the women-folk from toiling in the kitchen all day.
We retire early to bed, tired after the day’s work and play, satisfied that we have devoted time to meaningful pursuits and leisure, to God and to each other. It is this satisfaction that results in sussegad.
So, even if you, like me, cannot tarry forever in Goa, if like me, you leave behind a piece of your heart each time you visit here, at least, this time, you can carry away with you, the spirit of sussegad.
Nimisha Kantharia is a surgeon and writer from India. Her work has been published in Lunch Ticket, Hot Pot Magazine and addastories, the online literary magazine of the Commonwealth foundation. Her essay, The Girl with the Turquoise Eye-Shadow, was awarded the Diana Woods Memorial Award for Creative Non-Fiction. She writes fiction under the pen name Faye Coutinho and can be found at www.fayecoutinho.com