By Michelle Mendonca Bambawale
I wondered what September would bring; good news, I hoped and prayed. Would I be able to lift off the unshakeable gloom that sat on my chest like an immovable weight? The dark clouds that floated in my mind every night — the climate emergency, the never-ending war on Gaza and now Iran, the onslaught of AI and big tech controlling our lives…
By Selma Carvalho
Poet and playwright Owen Sheers thinks landscape is what happens to nature when humans arrive. We create landscape, otherwise nature exists, forlorn, desultory and on its own. In every manner the newly released anthology The Brave New World of Goan Writing & Art 2025, edited by me and published by Cinnamon Teal, encapsulates this ethos of Goans interacting with the land of Goa. Identity is that most unknowable thing, constantly changing, a mere shadow on the edges of our consciousness, and yet if something were to exist as Goan identity than that something is our love of the land.
By Selma Carvalho
My anecdotal observations suggested that Goans were leaving Goa for a better life. At the same time, many others from across the country were moving to Goa for a better life too. Hence when I moved to Goa during the pandemic, I grappled with fundamental questions about modern migration, indigenous cultures, and identity: Where is home? Where do I belong? What is culture? How do I connect with my culture and community?
