Susegad Stories From Goa

1.04 Was Goa the first powerhouse of Indian stories? with Frederick Noronha

May 27, 2022 Bound Podcasts Season 1 Episode 4
Susegad Stories From Goa
1.04 Was Goa the first powerhouse of Indian stories? with Frederick Noronha
Show Notes Transcript

Goa has always been filled with travelers. Each of them has a story to tell. And publisher and journalist Frederick Noronha wants to capture them all. Did Goa have the world’s first printing press in 1556? Does literature HAVE to be elitist? Why does Fredrick want to record the stories of Neo-Goans aka the new settlers in Goa? Tune in for massive insights into Goan stories and people. 

Frederick Noronha is a Goan journalist and founder of Goa 1556, an alternate publishing house that has published 60+ nonfiction books related to Goa. He has written articles on Goa, Goan books, media, environment, development, and information technology and edits for Konkani Wikipedia. 

Travel tip: On your next trip to Goa, drop into Goa 1556 or in one of Goa’s many tiny bookstores. And pick a book at random. Who knows what secrets the book will reveal? 

Brought to you by Bound, a company that helps you grow through stories. Follow us @boundindia on all social platforms for updates on this podcast or take a look at their other podcasts.

Hosted by Clyde D’Souza. He is a creative director who has worked in TV, print, and digital. His book Susegad: The Goan Art Of Contentment captures Goa through conversations, memories, stories, recipes and much more. He lives between Mumbai and Goa and lives the Susegad lifestyle every day! Follow him on Instagram @clydedsouzaauthor

Produced by Aishwarya Javalgekar

Editing and soundtrack by Aditya Arya

Artwork by Artisto Designz

Brought to you by Bound, a company that helps you grow through stories. Follow us @boundindia on all social platforms for updates on this podcast or take a look at their other podcasts.

Hosted by Clyde D’Souza. He is a creative director who has worked in TV, print, and digital. His book Susegad: The Goan Art Of Contentment captures Goa through conversations, memories, stories, recipes and much more. He lives between Mumbai and Goa and lives the Susegad lifestyle every day! Follow him on Instagram @clydedsouzaauthor.

Clyde D'Souza  00:07

Hello and welcome to say God stories from Guam. I'm your host Clyde de Souza. I'm a three time published author, media professional, and a go on who loves everything about Go on. My latest book is called to say God, the golden out of contentment. In my podcast I chat with some famous and some of my favorite goals. And together we explore go beyond the speeches from Fany to follow Casa to cashews, come discover gua like you've never done before. Frederick neurona was born in Sao Paulo, Brazil. He grew up in Guangzhou, and later on spent many years as an eminent JUCO and journalist. He has a PhD on publishing and GWA. He has over 6000 photographs on Flickr. He runs a YouTube channel with over 2 million views. But what I think is his greatest absolute greatest contribution is being the creator of an independent publishing house called GWA 1556, which has published over 140 titles. If you want to know the story of GWA, and its storytellers, Frederick neurona is your man. Now normally, I've seen Frederick on YouTube interview all sorts of goons from all walks of life. But today, it's my honor to interview the man Frederick neurona himself. Welcome, Frederick to the cigar stories podcast.

 

Frederick Noronha  01:44

Thanks, thanks, LIDAR. You've given me a big, big buildup and I don't know whether I'll be able to live up to it. Anyway, here goes

 

Clyde D'Souza  01:52

you already do. Pleasure to have you on the podcast. Okay. So Frederick, my audiences, from all sorts of all sorts of people from inside, go outside, go up people who are new to the podcasts, people want to know stories about GWA. And I think you are the person who has kind of brought these stories to life. But before we get into all of that, I want to ask you something which will give our audience a sense of where you are. Can you tell me where and who are you talking to us from?

 

Frederick Noronha  02:22

So I live in a place called Saliba, which is eight kilometers northwest of Panem. It's actually quite in between Pangea, matzah and Calangute. But it's a village it's a kind of urbanized, you know, our villages in Goa not so rural. So it's a village, which is in between these three places.

 

Clyde D'Souza  02:42

There. It has a beautiful church, right? I mean, which is which has a Gothic architecture, isn't it? Marty? Do you church? Salako. Right.

 

Frederick Noronha  02:49

It's It was built in the 1870s, which is late by gold standards for a church. So it's basically the only Gothic church that has been built in Goa in that sense, you know?

 

Clyde D'Souza  02:58

Yeah, so it was quite beautiful. True. Now, I've always been a reader, okay. Or obviously before I've was a writer, and before I became a writer, as a child. I think my aunt gave me my very first book and I was about 10 or 11. I think it was on my birthday that she gave me this collection of famous five stories by Enid Blyton, okay. And I was hooked. And I started reading the book during my birthday party itself. So that's when I can remember that my that is my first time that I fell in love with books and reading. So do you remember when and how you yourself got into reading and books?

 

Frederick Noronha  03:31

Actually, Clyde, our generation was very much into books and radio in that sense. Now we we kind of grew up with them, and we love them. And we didn't have too many distractions, and that was not there. And cyberspace was absent and things like that. So I still remember the librarians, the reading tables, where I got started the magazines we read, and we had to struggle to get reading material in those days. It wasn't easy, but it was fun. It was great.

 

Clyde D'Souza  03:57

Absolutely. I mean, for us, our Twitter and our Instagram were literally the pages on some doggy or bouquet, maybe some families or friends house. So yeah, that was how I guess a lot of us kind of got into the hole. It was it was sometimes distraction. It was sometimes exhilaration, sometimes an adventure when you couldn't go out so books became our sort of coming to my next question. Now as a you know, as a three time author, I've written three books. I'm always in awe of publishers and the work they do the work that you do, rather, you know the power that you publishers have the responsibility that you have, you know, you are like the gatekeepers, the promoters of stories and of storytellers. So I want to ask you, as you know, as someone who's I think one of the probably the only publisher in Goa, what was the moment that made you decide to get into the world of publishing?

 

Frederick Noronha  04:45

Actually, to put things in perspective, you know, I am basically I've been a journalist all my life since 83 Onward since the age of 19. And then along the way, you know, I kept feeling that the GWAS story not being All. So at that stage sometime around 2007, I actually thought like, Let's pitch in and try to get into publishing to, to almost, you know, jump to straddle the divide, and to jump over from one side of the fence to to another side of the fence. And at that time, almost around the same time 2005, the National Book Trust government of India, they have been holding a series of very interesting publishing courses, and they held one in India in Goa, then in Punjab, so me and three, four of my other close friends joined it. And some of us ended up as publishers.

 

Clyde D'Souza  05:35

And now we have to tell our audience the name of your publishing house, which we haven't, and the name has a history behind it, and it has a story behind it. So the name of your publishing house is, of course, GWA 1556. And how did you come up with the name? Why did you come up with a name with the name? I know a little bit about it. But can you please share the background See,

 

Frederick Noronha  05:54

when I was a kid, okay, I remember going to maps and going every week to this bookshop and asking them have the children's books come and they said, No, they've not come now. But try next weekend. They were no children's books in those days. You know, later on, everyone talks about the Soviet books, which made things accessible. And there were a few books within India, there were few magazines like sunshine coming from Cooney, of course, Junior statesman was there, and then sun came up. But that was later on, when I was in the sixth or seventh standard, there were no books available. And then suddenly, as a journalist, I get this chance to go on a short scholarship to Germany to study journalism. And they take us to Mannheim, which is a town very close to where the the first printing press was, you know, invented by Gutenberg, the Gutenberg style printing press, I go to this printing press, and I buy the souvenir for 10 marks. And then I look inside. And to my shock and horror, I find the story mentioned there that first printing press in Asia gua comma 1556. So that was the year in which it came. So then I think to myself how, you know, I've been thinking for a long time, how do I kind of align these two facts that the first printing press came to go? And when I'm growing up in the same gua, we have no books here, like, you know, so so. So in that sense, that was what some of my research later on was, was all about. But I thought that, you know, let's use this name as a kind of a bait to make people think you know, about GWAS role in history, because this tiny place, which hardly matters in terms of geography, but in terms of history, it was this meeting, point, clashing point, whatever you want to call it of cultures. So in that sense, you know, we, I wanted to keep the name as something that would make people think of vi 1556. That was the year in which the first printing press in Asia was set up in Goa. And it came here by accident, it was supposed to go elsewhere to Ethiopia, obviously, India, as it was called in. And that's that. So that's how the name came about. And everyone asked me, asked me, Why did it come? And so I never spent a chance to give this big sermon on on the history of, of going printing and printing and accidents of history. Is that sense? No. So it's a fascinating,

 

Clyde D'Souza  08:05

fascinating sermon, where did you start the publishing house from was it from your home was it like, started from a garage? How, what was it, it's

 

Frederick Noronha  08:13

basically, it's like, not even a mom and pop shop, do my wife does help me. But it's also it's just a tad short, like where, where I've been running it from from the I'm sitting here on this table, which I which has a workstation and ologists at the side of my dining table. So it's extremely small. And in the last 234 years, I've been a bit disillusioned by the way, publishing has been moving both in Goa and the rest of the country. If you look at scroll, you'll find one of my huge lemons written there. But, you know, I've been thinking of options to, to, to the model we are following which had been small alternative, you know, kind of using four or five different financial models to make the book work. I've been dreaming more of shaping it up into a kind of an artist cooperative, you know, which, which, which if it works, and if it actually happens, my termite might achieve my goal of creating space for writing in that sense, you

 

Clyde D'Souza  09:05

know, great, so you're, you're like you said A one one man, army and a not a mom and pop shop or a Pop Shop. Amazing. And in your little dining table or dining table? In your house in San Diego? Yeah. So you were born in Sao Paulo, right in Brazil, right. And when did you then come to go? Ah,

 

Frederick Noronha  09:25

so as you know, Clyde most go and go and particularly Catholic go and stand to be very strong into migration. So all of us have a migration story. So my dad was working for some contractors in Jamshedpur at the steel plant taught us and the contractor has finished their job and they were going to set up another steel plant in Brazil. So he was in his 20s. And he went there with my mom in the 50s. And they stayed on for almost a decade. We came back in 66. So I've been in golf for the last five and a half decades in that sense. So don't walk backwards and calculate my age, but you know it. So you know that Since I've been here all along and struggling to understand go as we go go along now, because when you come back to home, you know, quote, unquote, home, you kind of imagine that this is a place, you know, and I'm sure it happens to many migrants, regardless of which state they are forming in India today, go into a bit more, because our migration story goes deeper. And it starts earlier, and we are a smaller community and all those kinds of things. So when you come back home, you're still struggling to find out what's this place you call home, and you don't even have a clue. So in that sense, you know, I think my attempt to get into books to get into reading also had a lot to do with, with, you know, trying to understand the place, so I came back Yeah, 66 Yeah.

 

Clyde D'Souza  10:43

Yeah, I think our my generation and also your generation, we were kind of caught between this pre colonization, colonization, I was 10, I think when go off, and they go to statehood. You know, and I didn't even know what it meant. You just spoke about home, which is such a loaded word. And home for us, especially for Go on. This is a multivariate thing. And you grew up in in Guam, and you've been chronicling GWA, and gluons, you know, for decades now. And of course, you've told the stories of so many goons. Now I again, as a writer, I have to say this, but I always suffer from something called imposter syndrome. I figured I found out what this term was while I was writing my books. And basically impostor syndrome is someone who feels you know that He's fake. Right? So whenever I'm writing a new book, I always think who am I to give all this gun? Why am I? Why am I the one to be writing this, I'm not even worthy enough, I'm not an expert to tell the story in when thereby bring these stories to so many 1000s of readers. So that's what I suffer from sometimes when I'm writing a book now as an editor and a publisher, you Frederick, how do you filter all the stories that come to you all the manuscripts that come to you? What is it that you look for, and you see something that is authentic and worth picking up in publishing?

 

Frederick Noronha  11:55

So impostor syndrome is something which all of us have. And I then I also am in habit, in that sense. It's something positive, maybe at least it keeps us humble and reminds us that, you know, we are we are not the cat's whiskers or something like so when choosing a story. Basically, see, if you if you've been in journalism, if you've been in printing, you also get this intuitive feeling that something is well told, maybe something has a few mistakes, but can be corrected, you know, it got it got all its facts, right, we are moving to nonfiction. So that's a slightly easier to judge field. You know, fiction is very subjective. And I don't really enjoy fiction, I really don't do much of it. But nonfiction is not so difficult. If you if you find, I don't think we've got any single author who has told a story badly, or so badly that it cannot be corrected. Most of them are hugely passionate about a field so they know exactly what they're talking about. You would find some, you know, something jarring there and something incorrect, which can always be you know, corrected along the way.

 

Clyde D'Souza  12:56

So you're filled with stories. And you'll be now publishing books since 2007, which is about 15 years now, and counting. And 140 titles, if I'm not mistaken, all sorts of topics like the Abberley, which is a gwass. State flower, two stories of Portuguese go out to even books on company language. You had just briefly mentioned some of the challenges, but but can you tell us like, you know, what, some of the successes of guar 1556? And what were some of the maybe the drawbacks, or the challenges that you faced.

 

Frederick Noronha  13:25

So you know, you always discover this amazing story, which, which, which, which, you know, kind of surprises you to give two examples. We did a book on guns in Burma. And at that stage, people do people have vague memories that they will go into in Burma. But when this lady Yvonne was, as Danny collated all the stories and put it together, you know, the depth and the vastness of it shocked everyone because they were caught up in the Japanese bombing of Burma on Christmas Day 1942, and a trek back to India, many of them some came by boat. And the story was so fascinating. That one of the mainstream publishers in India, I think speaking Tiger, if I'm not mistaken, came out with a with a second edition of the book, wherein they put a lot of stories of Indians in Burma as well together with the guns in Burma to make it more broad based. So you know, before that the story of Indians in Burma was not even told in that sense, you know? So we that was published by google 1556, the first edition, yes. And then they went in for a second edition, which, you know, we, we don't we encourage our authors to grow beyond us. So that's fine. That's absolutely no problem. And the second story was about this lady called Sita Wallace, who was 26 years old, and she was a radical revolutionary, a communist in the, in Angola. And she supports her revolution, and then she goes to Portugal and comes back to Angola and realizes that things are going already there. And corruption is growing and, you know, like, like, this revolutionary government is, is you know, going on the wrong road and she, she and her friends they organize a counter coup against the government. You know, although she's She's radical and they are radical, but they are different brands of radical during this Cold War, you know, kind of Soviet China, Cuba kind of conflicts that were going on. And then I kind of find this article on the Portuguese Wikipedia. I don't read Portuguese, but I just Google it and search it and try to use Google Translate to understand it. And I realized that with a name like Sita, okay, valleys could be anything. Well, this is one of these loose ofone Portuguese surnames. But Sita like obviously she has to have some connection with India if it's India, it's probably go and then she turns out to be 26 year old woman who was caught after the coup and killed and she refused to blindfold herself and the soldier shorter or totally heroic story and, you know, I managed to get republication rights translation publication rights from the author in Portugal who actually wrote a book on her just a little while before we did the republished. So there are

 

Clyde D'Souza  15:50

synthetic so what is this? What is this book called? I mean, it reads, I mean, you just, you just narrated it so beautifully, and I feel like I was watching a movie. Yeah. So what is this book called?

 

Frederick Noronha  16:00

So it's, I, you know, I like how if you have too many children, you're gonna forget the name. So I forget the names of my books. So but if you put it down Wallace, Sita Wallace, we ll Yes, you will, you'll find it. Great.

 

Clyde D'Souza  16:13

Well, so clearly, you are a scholar, because you you also have a PhD, right? In English, which is focused on publishing in the 20th century.

 

Frederick Noronha  16:22

I don't, I don't use too many showing. I don't claim to be a scholar. I'm not a scholar. I'm just, you know, an accidental publisher, accidental scholar. I did my PhD at the age of 50. When I was bored with my other journalistic work in publishing work, yeah,

 

Clyde D'Souza  16:35

amazing. No, you're just being very humble

 

Frederick Noronha  16:37

Frederick. No, no, but I enjoyed it. I enjoyed it. I enjoyed it. And I refuse to use those two alphabets before three alphabets after my name, because I feel that, you know, I enjoyed it so much, I learned so much from the full process, and there was no pressure No, in that sense, I was not doing it. Like, you know, for a job or anything of that sort, I just enjoy doing it, I, I would really tell anyone, if they're interested, go ahead, do it, you know, you'll enjoy the process. It's quite fun, provided you get a good topic. And a good guide, though, that those are,

 

Clyde D'Souza  17:02

I guess, I guess what you want what you want another way of 40 or what you're saying is that when you love something so much, it doesn't feel like work, and you're not doing it for any external validations or anything, you're just doing it because you love the subject so much. So what did you uncover during during this PhD of yours?

 

Frederick Noronha  17:16

You'd also actually, yeah, I put it this way. Also, I use this PhD as a kind of an excuse to, again, continue understanding GWA so for me, the book was just an excuse to understand the history of gore. And there's a whole lot of myths about the history of go and misunderstandings and stereotypes and you know, then you try to understand GWA in the, in the context of British colonialism, which is, which is not exactly the right thing to do, because the British came 200 years later, and the Portuguese came in times where where, you know, even even the idea of colonialism was very different, whether it's in West Asia, whether it's in Goa, Sri Lanka, Malacca, all over Gujarat, Surah, you know, the east coast of India, they wanted these pockets, which would help them to control and swap the kind of see trade, which they wanted to control and profit over. As a result of which their relations with the locals were very different in terms of, you know, collaboration and exploitation, and whatever, it was a different level altogether. So I use this full thesis as a way to understand, you know, the, the history of GW in that sense and

 

Clyde D'Souza  18:23

very fascinating. I mean, really fascinating. Frederick, I mean, there's just so much of you know, it's like literally it's like layers of a being you can just go on go on and on going deep into the into the entire thing and I hope that your study is available somewhere and it is it is. So, now, as someone who we are not politicians, we are not you know, in in that sphere of the world, we are maybe the gatherers of stories and you are the promoter of these stories. So, what do you think is you know, should be or rather what do you think are the new stories emerging from this new GWA whatever it is that we are witnessing,

 

Frederick Noronha  19:01

here actually, Clyde you know, your question reminds me that see if there is not one go or there are many goals like no my friends used to say that I ate was like, you know, based on religion based on geography based on class based on so many things. So, many stories are still not getting told, I would say you know, let's see, because of our backgrounds, we are biased towards a certain kind of a story you know, like okay, it may be Catholic, it may be middle class and maybe expect to win, but there are so many other goals which say Hindu gua for example, interior gua, you know, younger go in that sense, you know, so those stories are really not emerging, I feel and I have a certain sense of guilt also that that we are not doing enough to get the stories out gender, for example, along gender lines. So some some of our workbooks happen to be written by women authors. It's just that way because it happens that way. It's not that you know, we have made a conscious effort to get these stories out. So a lot of things are waiting to be told. Now. For example, As the new settlers in Goa, for example, people who have settled in Goa, whether rich or poor, or whatever it is, I think they need a voice. They need their own voice. And they need to be telling their own stories is just not happening now. So So

 

Clyde D'Souza  20:12

yeah, I'm pleasantly surprised that you know that you have taken such a accepting view of it, because I guess that's what it is what it is right? We might call them Neo settlers, we might call them paella, witches, outsiders. But the fact is that it is what it is. And like you said, they also have their stories, and they need to be told. So let's maybe maybe I'm hoping that you know, you are getting some writers who are of these tribes. And maybe some of these stories will come out from you know,

 

Frederick Noronha  20:40

you know, I had this friend, I had this friend called Alito Sequeira, who was, who was a prominent sociologist had gone, you know, go and was the senior to me, much senior to me. And he would always say, y'all are so elitist to Allah. So one one sided in your views. And, you know, I used to feel guilty about it, then it struck me that the full process of literature creation is actually elitist. No, it's not like sociology where, where a person without, without literacy can tell their own story. If someone is willing to listen to them. You know, here, you need pen, you need paper, you need literacy, you need someone to tell to publish your work. You need that kind of luxury to sit down and write it for such a long period. So in a sense, yes, it's by there is a bias there. No doubt.

 

Clyde D'Souza  21:21

Yeah, no, you're right. It is a bit elitist, but to the that said, now, that comes back to my next question, because it's your you have gone beyond a little bit of this elitism, I would say, because, I mean, it is also it's not elitist, in that sense. But what you have done is also you have you have gone on to the internet, right? You're very active on the internet. So you if I'm not mistaken, you run the gua book club, right on groups, where discussions are from everything from photo book on GWAS hidden heritage to memorials on the late Mrs. Maria Rura, Kuta, who just passed away, right? So in that sense, you're going beyond just a published work, but you're keeping this entire thing alive. Now you yourself have like a YouTube channel. So you've moved on to YouTube. The channel has over 2 million views. I was amazed when I saw that. I was like, wow, this is great and well deserved. Great content on it from company lessons to interviews with a golden Portuguese singer. I can't remember his name right now. But he sang beautifully on the channel. And I think you've interviewed him a couple of times Chico, Chico, I think. Yes. Chico Fonseca. Yeah, beautiful, brilliant. It's just so what you're doing is again, you're you're you're keeping all of this alive, not only to print but to through video. And that's not elitist. So that's amazing. So are you planning to do a lot more video stories? And are you trying to like maybe enrich the production for lack of a better word? I mean, I like it, how it is it's raw, it's beautiful. It's

 

Frederick Noronha  22:47

raw, it's rough. I'm not see, I want to do more. I love to you know that I love the medium, but I'm not going to improve the quality for sure. Because I think there is there is a politics of you know, of economics in that sense. Once I aim for better quality, I'll need a bigger team, I'll be more expensive. And also, as of now, it's totally volunteer driven. And I do it like at the drop of a hat. No, it doesn't take me any effort. I don't even bother to edit. Okay, everyone is going to forgive me for this and say what a media disguise, but I don't mind them saying it. But I don't bother to edit my work. I just put it out row up there. You I'm giving you the story. You like it, you take it as it is, you know, this is not the best approach. I agree. But it's the most practical approach for me. And I feel that you know, a lot can be done, a lot of people are doing things. Clyde one point I want to make see a lot of people are creating work on GWA. The only difference between them and me is that I believe in sharing, I put it out there, you know, I believe in making it visible, I'll share very, you know, very promiscuously if I could use that word, because sharing has its own dynamics. And the share also gains as much as the person receiving it gains. So this is something I believe in from the late 1990s When I was part of this free software, open source movement, you can create great works collaboratively, that's all I believe, you know,

 

Clyde D'Souza  24:01

no, I mean, it's clear that you are you are you are a champion of open source. And that comes through in everything that you do from letting your authors go from your publishing house to a bigger bigger publishing house to putting up this content for free. shooting your videos row. It's truly amazing, you know, so now, the other thing that I want to ask you is that, you know, with all of this change that that is happening, right? What is it that you kind of I think answered this question, but what do you think is your legacy? What is what is your story? So to say, I just

 

Frederick Noronha  24:35

want people to if people exist in the world exist in proper shape to some years later, you know, understand themselves where they are coming from what makes guagua you know, what makes us what we are, you know, I think if we can solve a bit of that jigsaw, we would have done a job but more than that, what I finding is that people actually, you know, taking taking the cues and can Adding on at a much deeper level in directions, which we never anticipated now, and that is, that is a huge blessing, you suddenly realize that, that you know, you are building off the backs of others, and other people are getting inspired by your work which which which is all? I mean, what more could you ask for? In that sense very

 

Clyde D'Souza  25:17

well said, I mean, I've used this slide many times, we're all standing on the shoulders of giants, you know, and you might I mean, I know, you're very humble, but you are a giant. And we have all stood on your shoulders. Yeah. But I think I mean, I think your legacy is the fact that you have done all of this pretty much without any intention of major profitability or anything of that sort. It's just pure passion. You work tirelessly for decades now.

 

Frederick Noronha  25:43

No, but but but I have this feeling like I have this feeling that after us there are going to be many more who come up and who will, who is who are going to take it much, much more forward. And I'm confident about this, because the tools allow you to do it now that tools that to us the tools allowing our mercy, we can talk I don't I mean, like you're in Mumbai, correct? Which part? I don't even have a clue.

 

Clyde D'Souza  26:02

Yeah. So yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Right. I mean, and the beauty of it is that even though we have all stood on the shoulders of giants and all of that they will be bigger giants, who will come? Of course, I think we are all doing our part and you have done your part for it, you know, so now I just want to come to, you know, the next question of mine, which is that now in my book, okay, well, I've tried to do I know you mentioned you don't publish fiction. But what I tried to do because my challenge was okay, there is this words to say God, how do I make people fall into fall in love with the right aspects of this word? And not the word as Goins call it, which is lazy, or what? The stereotype, right? Yeah, it was a real challenge for me. And I tried, you know, my humbleness best to, to bring about a wholesome, balanced approach to it. Right? Because it was, that was the challenge for me. And I tried to include fiction a bit of,

 

Frederick Noronha  26:52

it's well done. It's well done. And it's nicely get it's got a good getup, also. And thank you that that means a lot coming from now. Not a day not an easy job to do, because it's a difficult concept.

 

Clyde D'Souza  27:01

Yeah, exactly. So that's what by the real challenge was that? So I've tried to include this nonfiction, of course, the sculpture there, every chapter has a fiction story to it. It has interviews, you know, with the prominent guns and all of that. And now I want to ask you, what is your advice to writers to young writers? Oh, maybe? All right. So whoever who wants to write whether from Goa or outside? Well, what is the what is it that you would you would tell them? What's your advice to them as someone who has now done this for 15 years or more?

 

Frederick Noronha  27:30

So basically, right from your heart, you know, don't don't think that you're standing on a pedestal and giving a speech. Imagine that you're talking to your grandson and grandson granddaughter, and this is what the story you want to let him know about. Tell tell it warts and all, you know, there's some problems mentioned it if you're if you feel that you can, that you're honest enough to tell it. Write about stories, which you know, write about subjects, which you feel strongly about. And your story is definitely going to come out good. Yeah, believe me in that sense. I think I think that nonfiction is a bigger challenge than fiction or fiction, all of us have an opinion. And we think it's the best story and all that but nonfiction is it's really tough to convince others and to get a good story in place.

 

Clyde D'Souza  28:12

Yeah, I agree. I mean, for me, I always Yeah, I always say that. Fiction is actually just disguise nonfiction, actually, you know, and nonfiction is the meat of the story. The real you know, that's where the real story lies, if people can kind of get through it through, right. Yeah. So that's great. I mean, thanks for Jericho. It was amazing, amazing. Everything that you've said, I've really enjoyed it. But this is not the end of the podcast, we now move to our what I call the safeguard secrets segment. Yeah. So in this, in this segment, Frederick, I want to ask you what to say, which is peace. And what does that mean to you? What is your say God secret?

 

Frederick Noronha  28:51

So my suicide secret is 2003 2500 year old secret from the Buddha like, you know, in that sense, minimize your wants, and don't have any cravings take what comes. And that's life. And I think GWA had a lot of this in the past, though. Now we are catching up with a global mainstream unfortunately, it was such a simple society. And we all the more richer when it was simple, which are not in the monetary sense, but in every other sense.

 

Clyde D'Souza  29:18

But I'm seeing a revolution happening where people are realizing that having everything that you want, which is materialistic or comfort or convenience, still does not bring happiness. And I think I think there is a there is a shift happening towards simplicity. And that's why you know, things like Sega or all of these concepts of meditation and Buddhist Buddhism and minimalism, it's all coming. We don't know how much because I think human beings are kind of lazy and they tend to lean towards convenience, but we can hope that simplicity like you said, you know, you know grind case was a god secret. There was

 

Frederick Noronha  29:52

this girl group of young bomb bombing guns, or even others who came back to go in the 70s Once again, Claude Albert is, you know, Aleksey Fernando is the cartoonist, Josh, Peter, the lawyer, and a whole lot of them, they came to escape the rat race from Bombay. And the kind of impact they all made in their respective fields was amazing. The way they've influenced a go and debate is amazing.

 

Clyde D'Souza  30:15

Yes, absolutely. So my next question is something I think, which is very important, to me, at least, you know, because I think that this the question that I'm going to ask you is about love. Because I think love is transformative, it creates the passion, like your love for GWA for your home has made you choose a life which which, which has kind of given you purpose. So what is the meaning of love to

 

Frederick Noronha  30:37

you? Love is, you know, I, for my youngest days in my 20s, I used to believe that love is about chemicals, when your chemicals are right, you're enjoying the thing you're doing whatever it is, then it works. Okay, so whether it is doing a kind of job or being with a person you are interested in or whatever it is. That's love, in that sense, chemical change a long time and that's very sad. It can be sad also, which is why some of the best songs in the world are about love gone. heartbreak. Yeah. So so for us chemicals. Wow. Love for Me is fascinating. Okay, fascinating.

 

Clyde D'Souza  31:12

We'll take that answer. Amazing. Okay, so, now to my next segment, it's called the rapid fire segment. It's just, you know, just fun and quick one word answers if you if you can manage to do that. So okay, so the first question is your favorite gun book,

 

Frederick Noronha  31:30

my favorite gun authors. This guy who influenced me from the time I was 20 Is Robert Newman anthropologist from Marblehead, Massachusetts. And we recently published two of his books from from my early days influencing a lot. He writes about sociological issues, go at the transformation of the sociology of religion, all these kinds of things fascinating. He can write about any subject under the sun, including stamps that the Portuguese issued, you know, and, and he tells you a fascinating story about it. Of course, we disagree on some points, but I still hold him as one of the dearest influences in my growth.

 

Clyde D'Souza  32:05

Amazing. We will check it out. For sure. Okay, what's your favorite non gun book?

 

Frederick Noronha  32:11

You know, I always found it much more productive to read magazines so I can give you 10 names for magazines. Okay, give me a couple. So J is when we were kids Illustrated Weekly when we were young outlook. Vinod Mehta was my big time hero in that sense as far as running a magazine and newspaper, those many newspapers and you know, a whole lot of other magazines in times where we could Sunday, Sunday on the Akbar and a whole lot of others when they were so few magazines in the country, you know, every one which we could lay our hands on, we would read from start to finish.

 

Clyde D'Souza  32:45

All of us were only voracious readers at that time because we didn't have much

 

Frederick Noronha  32:49

that time the time but nothing to read today. We have too much read and no time. So it's the same. Yes. Tony and Antonia pretend Adana when you have to know Graham and then you have gram Yamaki

 

Clyde D'Souza  33:02

Yes, lovely. I'm glad you answered that because I have a question coming up about border go a company phrase, but you've given me a bonus company phrase. So great. So my next question is one go and maybe not in the publishing world or not in the you know, the author or writer World One One who has influenced you in your life?

 

Frederick Noronha  33:18

You know, my my school teacher, this guy called Ivan Rocha, who was such a weird guy and he was an English teacher and I hated the English language. But when I look back, you know, I have tears in my eyes is thinking how am I the guy shaped us in terms of reading in terms of general knowledge and and a few other librarians so, you know, I've even tank the reading table in my village library in my village. So these are the influences my godmother, of course, who always encouraged me to read.

 

Clyde D'Souza  33:45

So that's touching really, okay, who is who is who is a young girl and storyteller who you think is could be the future voice of God?

 

Frederick Noronha  33:55

There are many there are quite a few of them. That sense comes to your mind. When you're talking about fiction fiction nonfiction. Be either either you can get on nonfiction, some of my favorites are Jessica Faliro and Giselle Lorenzo.

 

Clyde D'Souza  34:09

Great, great, thank you. Okay, my next question is your favorite typical golden thing to do?

 

Frederick Noronha  34:16

Array I'm useless here for all this because I've been to a beach for years and things like that.

 

Clyde D'Souza  34:22

Yeah, but no, no, no, not not typical go and thing to do. But typical local going into let me put it that way.

 

Frederick Noronha  34:28

So so so people know me well call me an inverted snob because I'll go to this cheapest of cheap joints and the best and then have some fish curry rice there. So I enjoy my fish curry rice. I enjoyed simple, you know,

 

Clyde D'Souza  34:41

me too, which is which is which is the local fish joint, please name it.

 

Frederick Noronha  34:46

So I'm in Punjab next to the post office, please go there. So we've been eating there from the time it was priced at five rupees. Right now. It's about 810 And

 

Clyde D'Souza  34:57

that's still that's still amazing. Okay, and Shrum physical office

 

Frederick Noronha  35:01

in pendulous.

 

Clyde D'Souza  35:02

Great, I will do that. Alright, okay. Normally what I do is I you know, because I think that if someone wants to love a place, they need to love the language, they need to, of course explore the place they need to explain to people. So one of the things I want to do is, of course, teach people the company phrase, you know, an idiom, you know. So can you, you know, share one key phrase that you always use or that you like, and tell us the meaning of it, and maybe an example of it. So my favorite

 

Frederick Noronha  35:28

is, of course, there are a lot more colorful and ones which cannot be said on podcast, but my favorite one which can be said is Isiah, I cyber like I cyber means all Lord, like, you know, it can mean anything from like, you know, shock to dismay, to goodness gracious to What are you doing? Like, what the heck, like, you know, something like that. So, like, like, it can also mean Sorry, like, my goodness, it's my bad. It's my mistake, it can mean so many things. And I find myself using it so often because like, you know, it's so ambiguous in what it means. You take what it means for home, from, you know, whatever the context is.

 

Clyde D'Souza  36:04

Yes, it's a brilliant phrase. I mean, I Yes, I find it used on me from when I did certain naughty things to things were like, you know, yeah. As kids, right. So yes, it's a it's a really, it's a really great phrase for sure. Yeah. Lovely. Yeah. So thank you, Frederick, I have really enjoyed this entire conversation. And I've learned so much about how an independent publishing house has made such a big impact on not only GWA but on India, and that will leave a legacy for decades to come and centuries hopefully, and we'll all stand on the shoulders of all sorts of giants and one of them being you and I'm going to continue to have subscribe to your channel. I'm going to watch more videos and I'm going to enjoy the vicarious love for God that I have from your till I can come to go next. So thank you for coming on the cigar stories podcast. Frederick it's been a pleasure talking to you right

 

Frederick Noronha  36:53

don't cut this out but uh, places totally outlandish and undeserved. Thank you so much.

 

Clyde D'Souza  36:59

Thank you for joining Thank you for listening. And I hope you enjoyed this episode of say God stories from Guam. Do subscribe if you're a new listener and join a community of people who love and live the golden lifestyle. Again, I'm Clyde de Souza and for more go and content you can follow me on Instagram at Clyde D'souza author. This podcast is brought to you by bound a company that helps you grow through stories, follow them and bound India on all social platforms for updates on this podcast or take a look at their other podcasts, Maga, Sunni and see you soon