About homes: Stories from Goa.

Houses carry the imprint of their dwellers on them. People say a lot by the choices they make about their immediate surroundings, the way they live. History is threaded together with the shards of pottery and digs of crumbling structures dating back millennia. Located in their particular place and time, homes are a repository of people’s priorities, world views, histories and personalities. In a sense becoming a mirror of society itself.

An abiding interest in spaces, and how people live’ was what initially got me blogging about home in the first place.

I intended to say through pictures, stories, what the spaces I have personally experienced or even just merely passed through mean to me. At least from time to time, if not always.

All is well with intention; only one needs to actually get down to doing it too! Disappointingly I have not really started saying what I intended to say with this blog- barring a few posts which I link here and here (only cuz they were blogged so long ago).

I remained satisfied with what was easy, around me and full of me at the same time- my own home.

Now a tad tired with all the self obsession and self love (I have to say it, the blog in its current state does not leave me completely happy) I want to slowly get back to the original inspiration.

Was a trip to Goa recently that triggered the desire to revisit the germ of the blog. The houses that dot this lush piece of heaven on the west coast of India, bright, colorful, old and new alike, villages and Vaddos full of them, rich or poor -lend an instant personality to the territory.

Where only the churches were allowed to be white, the homes embraced colours in all shades, whole-heartedly and without any reservations. These structures dating back to each time and epoch in Goa’s chequered history, speak of stories and a complete way of life quintessentially Goan. Informing and inspiring the work of master artists like FN Souza, cartoonist Mario Miranda, photographer Dayanita Singh - just a few talents Goa's fecund soil has nurtured.

Monsoons are a beautiful time to be in Goa. It is enchantingly lush, verdant and quite. A season of soft, sun interspersed showers. Drawn by the welcoming homes dotting the landscape and a also following a chance encounter, seeking shelter from sudden rain one afternoon, I found myself seeking more and more homes and the people behind them. Over the few days I spent there, I had seen as much Goa from inside these homes as from the outside.

Posting a series of stories from Goan homes then… Saying as much is needed to be said and letting the houses do much of their talking.

Stylistically, Goan residential architecture, has resulted form extensive inter-mixing of pre-existing Hindu styles of home building with heavy Italianate, Baroque and Rococo influences introduced by the Portuguese upon their arrival on the Malabar coast, As opposed to the rest of the country, the Portuguese tastes entrenched themselves fast and quick on the Goan landscape, allowing very limited say to other influences, read english influences on house building styles in subsequent years also. A fact that sets Goa and its many homes apart from the rest of the country.

Have posted a few pictures of facades that caught my fancy. Will talk at some length over subsequent posts.

Mine has come to be called a `décor / design blog. As such some of you esteemed readers might find me digressing. I might as well shun that tag, because it is infinitely more interesting to observe people and how they add meaning to their surroundings.

Do talk about it guys... And come back here for more, because the journey was delectably long and leisured and my explorations many!