Lions At The Gate

On the back roads where people are few and far between, where silence is left to its own devices, shattered only occasionally by a motorbike curving past you, it’s easy to be lulled into the melody of a melancholy road winding past old Portuguese-era homes.

That is until you come upon the lions.


We did, first at Brittona, then along the way through Ecoxim, and later, Salvador do Mundo before passing more lions as we made our way through Carona.



They watch over the road in pairs and needless to say they haven’t tired of watching over it for years on end. Decades are passé. The Brittona – Aldona stretch goes back centuries. And so do some houses. The others date back to early 1900s and possibly a decade or two further back, to the late 1800s.

Once we descended the slope to Britona after riding over the Mandovi bridge the ride got quieter specially after we swept past the fish market in the shade of the bridge. As night falls fish continue to be sold in the light of kerosene lamps. Cats keep vigil by the baskets at the feet of fisherwomen seated on small stools. The stools hold up well under the pressure brought to bear by the not inconsiderable girth of the ladies.

The cats have no use for the kerosene lamps. They have no use for the fisherwomen either. Their perseverance with their penance in front of baskets of fish would put a monk to shame.

In the opposite direction, not far from where we made the left turn, fishing trawlers ferry in fish. Across the river lies Panaji. Water ferries used to operate across the river to Betim. The bridge over the Mandovi made the ferry redundant.

The Sun was beginning to dip that October day last month. The Mandovi river lay to our right and for much of our way it would stay with us.

Rounding a bend I was drawn to the looming edifice of a whitewashed church.

The sight of the Nossa Senhora de Penha da França Church on the banks of the Mandovi in Brittona momentarily takes one’s breath away, more for its setting on the river as it curves past the 383 year old church. It is at Penha da Franca that river Mapusa, flowing southward, merges with the Mandovi. Along the road upstream of the river lies the maritime jetty at Virlosa.



On the banks of the Mandovi one can see massive barges ferrying iron ore upstream of the river. Occasionally they sound the horn, piercing the calm, startling water birds in the mangroves along Ribander causeway on the Panjim side of the river.

The Nossa Senhora de Penha da Franca church is known to have been built by seafarers, sheltering in her protective embrace on the high seas. The landscape momentarily stepped out to tango with us as we rode past the impressive white structure in the backdrop of the Mandovi.


White was restricted for use in painting churches during the Portuguese occupation of Goa. No Goan house came to be painted white in their tumultuous reign on India’s West Coast. So Goan homes took on colours nearly the entire spectrum of the rainbow, and they still do in the largely Christian stretch we rode through that evening. However some break ranks and paint white.



Gaily coloured homes lay back from the road, their gates opening onto paths that led to covered porches or balcaos as they are known locally. A profusion of carefully tended flowers in gardens flanking the approach to the entrance rose above the compound walls that ran along the road on either side of the two gateposts, lions guarding the gates.


While I had expected to see houses on high plinths, their balcaos continuing along the steps leading to the road, sometimes shepherded by curving balustrades, I saw few or none as we rode along, past homes. The plinths rarely exceeded a few feet off the ground. If there were any hidden from the road I wouldn’t know.



I could be forgiven for thinking lions came in all shapes or sizes, and different avatars as well.



While the lion resting on his belly came closest to what I might expect of a lion in the wild while it kept its eye out for prey, a sight reinforced by all the documentaries I saw in the years I was discovering wildlife before I discovered myself, I was still prepared to allow the King of the Jungle to lift himself up so he could see above the tall grass, into the far distance as Heraldson’s lion did.



However I could not bring myself to believe that a lion could swallow its pride and allow itself to be painted pink before being tasked with keeping watch over the gate.

Or for that matter take on a form that would make passersby pause and wonder of the fate that had befallen the proud King of the Jungle.


Still worse if it was reduced to mimicking a startled cat even if it could glory beneath many a sprightly flower bending over in affection.


If ever there was a case to be made for returning the King to the jungle, free to roam in freedom and roil the nights with his mighty roars and retain his form and identity, you have to visit John Sequeira’s lions above to see why.



Unlike the others we saw that evening, the lion at Olaulim had no company. It watched over the gate alone. It had turned the colour of the gatepost it was stretched out on. I saw no hint that it had ever worn the colour that lions wear. There was no hint it was saddened by the fact, at least none that I could recognise. Or maybe it was, and I had no way of knowing that either.



Some houses lay in disrepair. Their front yards untended. Gardens overrun by creepers and grass. Yet, the lions kept watch. If anyone decided to return they were ensured of a warm welcome at the gate.

But somewhere deep down the lions must’ve known they were fated to watch over a gate rusting away from a waiting that was lost to memory, lost to hope.

I could only guess. Was it a family that had migrated to far shores, intending to return while their dreams led them along even as they assimilated into once alien cultures, never returning even as they had promised themselves that some day they would walk through the gate and not walk out again?

Maybe they did return over the years, the visits becoming fewer over time until those left behind aged before passing beyond the pale and there was no one to return to, anymore.

I can only guess.

The lions, however, continue to wait.