A typical feature of a Goan house is the balcão (Portuguese) which serves as a sitting space. It comprises of cement or wooden benches on both sides of the main entrance of the house, with additional single seats in front. It is a place to catch up on things happening around, for quiet study or a nap on warm afternoons or playing draughts, carrom, ludo, snakes and ladders and other board games on rainy afternoons.
The balcão has had the reputation of being the ideal place for idle talk and gossip, but as I recall, it was the best place to listen to the radio broadcast from Radio Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) in the 1960’s and to receive better reception. It was considered as one of the powerful radio stations in Asia broadcasting English songs and western music in quality, content and clarity. It also relayed BBC news. Radios were few and neighbours came to listen to news, popular hits and radio shows.
We had two cages on both sides of our ‘balcão’, hanging on the beam across the two pillars that held the roof of the entrance. There was a myna in one cage and a parrot in the other. They could both speak three languages, and had a remarkable memory and extensive vocabulary. The parrot was more adept of the two. These birds provided impromptu entertainment, and showed off their skills in singing several short clips of the tunes of the day that played on the radio to people passing by our house who stopped for a while to hear some of their colourful and amusing repertoire.
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