Essay on “Goa Carnival”
Goa celebrates a carnival every year for three days before Lent. To Goa, the festival came with the Portuguese in 1510 and since then it is being celebrated every year.
In the early stages, the carnival followed the Portuguese pattern of utter obscenity and brutality. The festival has a resemblance to Holi in which people squirt perfumed and coloured water on passers-by and dab one another with vermillion. In addition to this, folk dances, Konkani songs, bullfights and fancy dresses add enjoyment and entertainment to the carnival.
Traditionally, the carnival in Goa starts with the triumphant entry of King Momo into Panaji on Saturday, followed by his entourage of pipers, processionists, drummers, musicians, bizarre masks and colourful proclamation. The king makes his subjects happy and gay and exhorts them to banish all worries from their minds and dance away the time on the following three days and nights without any let-up.
