Wency, documentary, Norman Mendes, etc...

The other day, a young film-maker based in Delhi dropped over. Wency Mendes -- wency_mendes at yahoo.com -- says he is keen to make a documentary film on Goan music. Wency and Santana Issar had a long late evening discussion about their work, what they were planning to look at, how their costly hired camera had got stolen during a break-in at Anjuna, and a range of other subjects.

In passing, Wency (29) mentioned that his mum Anna Pinto was working in the North East. Small world! Anna and Cheryl DeSouza were among our early colleagues in the early days at the Herald, around 1983-84.

In quite another context, I knew Wency's dad, Norman Mendes. Norman was one of the influential persons who was part of the All India Catholic Universities Federation (AICUF), one of the few liberal-progressive Catholic organisations that shaped local youth in this state (and perhaps unwittingly created a generation of local campaigners and leaders in Goa subsequently). Most of the names that Wency mentioned were friends or known names: Vinay Kamat, Fr Fermin de Souza sj, the diocesan priest Emidio Pinto, and others.

It was sad to learn that Norman had died about three years ago, while still in his early fifties. We had not met maybe for two decades, but one often wonders about what's happening in the lives of friends of the past. By some coincidence, I was thinking of Norman Mendes (who was Margao-based after resettling from Mumbai) not many days ago.

Half-seriously, I told Wency that this was like a full circle being completed. Norman had influenced us in our collage days; now we were, in a small way, sharing our little info with his son!

Here's wishing Wency all the best in his work. He has already crafted a documentary on the North East, which has been shown at the Kathmandu film festival (organised by the Himal group, I think). Nice to see young people of Goan origin reach places in the world of documentary. I hurriedly added him to the Docuwallahs2 network on documentary film in India, and if you would like to join the same, check it out at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/docuwallahs2 -- FN Feb 1, 2006 14:39