Consuming Goa Portuguesa : Vacationing in a Postcolonial Colony

Introduction

Goa, located along the Arabian Sea, first became a popular destination for tourists from other parts of India in the 1980s, following the arrival of ‘hippies’—flower children from the West—two decades earlier. Trichur (2013) writes that although India annexed Goa in 1961, it was through the nation’s consumption of Goa as a tourist destination that the region could be ‘truly integrated’ into India in the 1980s (Trichur, 2013, p. 160). The state attracted tourists through advertisement brochures (Trichur, 2013, p. 152), but with the advent of the Internet, other means of advertising began proliferating at the turn of the twenty-first century. Consequently, by the 2000s, the nation’s familiarity with Goa as a holiday destination had given way to real estate investments. Through carefully crafted e-brochures, online advertisements and commercial websites, the real estate market in Goa has catered to the desires of the upwardly mobile Indian middle class, selling them the idea of second homes in this exotic holiday destination through the use of colonial-era language and imagery. Although such advertisements showcase some simulacra of ‘Indo-Portuguese’ architecture—a term used for Goan architecture of the European colonial period—these developments remain gated abodes for rich non-Goans.

For the Indian urban elites, investing in the state is not just about buying ‘a piece of Goa’ on which to sojourn, but it is also about buying into what this land signifies: an exotic ‘laidback’ Goan lifestyle. Owning property in Goa allows elites from Indian metros to brag about it within their cliques, for example, which is a performance of status (Kandolkar, 2016, p. 367). This begs the question of whether the idea of ‘a Goan lifestyle’ is something definable or, more to the point, something to be defined for and by those in the position of buying into it. For example, the hard work of catching fish at dawn is the ‘lifestyle’ of some Goans, owing to the coastal location of the region; yet, this would not be what the buyer of a second home—a person more drawn to the pursuit of leisure—would want to do while in Goa. The notion of Goanness ² on which this article focuses is not about how it is defined but how it is deployed. For example, as discussed below, the simulacra of Goan architecture that real estate companies have employed demonstrates that Goan identity has been conveniently subjected to interpretation and invention.

As indicated above, the passage of time has seen Goa transform from solely a tourist destination to a site for property ownership for non-Goans. In other words, Goa not only figures in the national political economy as a tourist destination, as Trichur (2013) claims, but more recently as a capitalist venture, marking India’s turn to neoliberalism through real estate projects in the post-liberalization period. For example, in the village of Saligao, ‘several old Indo-Portuguese colonial houses have shifted hands from Goan Catholic owners to Western settlers, or people from Delhi, Mumbai [Bombay] and other parts of North India, with pockets deep enough to afford its [sic] costly upkeep’ (D’Mello, 2010). However, in this neoliberal period, ‘deep pockets’ are no longer necessary to buy property, as banks, with support provided by the neoliberal state, grant easy access to mortgages to economically rising middle-class buyers. Searle (2016) writes, ‘The liberalization of the Indian economy in the 1990s changed the structure of the real estate industry: it ushered in new roles for private-sector elites and spurred the growth of real estate-related markets such as mortgage financing’ (p. 25). Spectacular accumulation, she argues, was made possible by the semiotic work of positioning these real estate entities as desirable. In this vein, Goan real estate developers use images of Goa’s scenic settings and a simulacrum of elements from the Indo-Portuguese style, both of which have become synonymous with a ‘laidback’ Goan lifestyle in advertising properties in Goa as desirable products to Indian buyers.

In metros, such as Delhi, argues Searle (2013), developers employ the semantics of ‘professionals’ to sell property by enticing urban elites from Delhi proper to invest in gated high-rise housing in the National Capital Region (NCR). She adds that ‘developers appeal not only to upper-class Delhiites’ longing for a home free from environmental pollution but also one free from “social” pollution’ (Searle, 2013, p. 289). Thus, elites from Delhi proper seek to escape not only pollution but, more importantly, the congested social condition of the city. Goa, a popular holiday destination with pristine landscapes free of pollution, then, becomes a ‘nearby’ getaway, and developers in Goa accordingly entice elites from Delhi and other metros to invest in second homes in the tiny state. In addition, an examination of real estate advertisements shows that promoters in Goa troublingly employ imperious language to create nostalgia for the region’s colonial past.

By examining advertisements and brochures for real estate projects, this article shows how companies utilize Goa’s locational and historical uniqueness to sell property. An example of how real estate in Goa is marketed is in these developments’ co-optation and consequent commodification of Goan Iberian design. They use such architectural influences as Baroque-era elements and distinct regional materials to frame views of open landscapes, thus creating a desirable image of a serene life that also offers a step back in time. This is in sharp contrast to the intended buyers’ usual residences. City life in Indian metros is marked by traffic and a lack of greenery, all set against the ubiquity of concrete urban architecture as the epitome of modernity. Meanwhile, as seen in real estate brochures for property developments in Goa, the architecture being sold to these city dwellers evokes Goa’s past and the properties are presented as if the land is unpeopled by the region’s natives. The investor is welcomed to take this ‘virgin’ land, in all its gendered valences, wherein real estate advertisers claim, for instance, that one can own ‘a piece of Goa’ ³ by making it one’s own in the absence of any native presence.

While the developers essentially hope to generate profits from their projects, their advertisements reveal the manner in which Goa is consigned to being India’s pleasure periphery. This colonial relationship between India and Goa is represented in how real estate websites offer an understanding of Goa and being Goan as if the real estate promoters are authorities on the subject. This bears similarity to how, as Said (1979) argues, the idea of the East of the nineteenth century was essentially created by Europeans who sought ‘to manage—and even produce—the Orient politically, sociologically, militarily, ideologically, scientifically, and imaginatively during the post-Enlightenment period’ (Said, 1979, p. 3). Just as the Orient was conceived of by European culture as its other for ‘flexible positional superiority’ (Said, 1979, p. 7), aspiring Indian elites are manufacturing the idea of Goa as an internal space of difference in order to consume it.

Colonialism in the case of Goa did not operate in the same fashion as the erstwhile relationship between, for example, Britain and British India. Apart from the difference in duration—Goa was a Portuguese territory from 1510 to 1961, and India was under the British from the 1800s to 1947—there was a major difference in the characteristics of these two colonialisms. As de Sousa Santos (2002) argues, Portuguese colonialism was seen as a subaltern colonialism, especially in relation to the norm of British colonialism. Aware of their diminished position, the Portuguese sought to ally with the English on the one hand (Ferrão, 2014) and the Saraswat Brahmins on the other (Trichur, 2013, p. 37). The Portuguese retention of Goa during the period when the British ruled India kept the tiny region aloof from the nationalistic imagination of the Indian nation that was building during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Despite the lack of geographic distance between metropole and colony, in that Goa is part of modern-day India’s geopolitical whole, there continues to be an ideological, historical and cultural distance between the two. As Menezes (2011) observes, after Goa’s annexation, there ‘continued … [the] colonial experience of being ruled from a distant centre, with local interests and concerns marginalised to favour those of the conqueror’. Therefore, Menezes compares Goa’s Portuguese colonial past, during the time of the Estado Novo, with its post-‘Liberation’ present and sees little distinction in the governance of the region despite the passage of time and political affiliation.

Due to its former association with Portugal, Goa operates differently from formerly British India because it is now part of India yet not exactly like it. Localized as a nearby neighbourhood, it is Goa’s very otherness due to its cultural, linguistic, religious, and historic distinctness that is employed to attract tourists from elsewhere in India. As Ferrão (2016) notes, ‘Goa has become a colony of a postcolony’ through the manner in which it is projected and consumed as a pleasure periphery by elites from other parts of India. Hereon, the article examines advertisements associated with real estate projects, wherein developers sell Goa as an idyllic location to Indian buyers by portraying that the region is unpeopled and open to settlement and that investors can purchase Goan identity by simply owning an ‘Indo-Portuguese’ styled property in Goa.

Simulacra of Goan Colonial-era Architecture

‘Discover Goa—conquered but yet to be explored!’ So declares a brochure for Rio de Goa, a large real estate project by Tata Housing Development Company Limited (Tata Housing, n.d.). Yet another advertisement for a gated development, Aldeia de Goa, a project developed by DB Realty (n.d.), asserts, ‘If you want a piece of Goa, you must become a piece of Goa’. Clearly, Goans are not the target audience of these advertisements. Moreover, even as aspirational middle-class investors from Indian metros, such as Delhi, Bombay and Bangalore, are invited to buy property in Goa, it is mostly not for the purpose of permanent residency. Rather, this clientele would only use these properties as second homes or for a weekend or vacation getaway. ⁴ New housing developments around Goa, the sale of which targets the aforementioned client base, bear such Portuguese names as ‘Aldeia de Goa’ (Village of Goa) by DB Realty in Bambolim, ‘Rio de Goa’ (River of Goa) by Tata Housing Company Limited in Dabolim, and ‘Adora de Goa’ (Adoration of Goa) by Provident Housing Limited in the village of Sancaole, among others. This image of Goa is fashioned to sell a version of Goa’s culture that evokes a Portuguese colonial past while instantiating an idyllic present—one that obfuscates such realities as the housing shortage for native Goans. For example, the chief town planner of Goa has himself indicated that housing stock in Goa does not cater to the common man in the state (Times of India, 2016). It is precisely because non-Goans are buying land at such high prices that land is not available for locals.

In addition to employing Portuguese names, real estate developers incorporate colonial era-architectural elements to produce ‘authenticity’. Advertisements for these properties pair the Portuguese elements of the housing projects with information that is meant to produce an Iberian image of Goa that is to be delivered with the product. Addressing the potential non-Goan buyer, the first-person text in the Aldeia de Goa website states the following:

I know what you’re thinking. You’d rather build the villa your own way. How very Goan of you! Anyway, that’s why they have Villa Plots. One side of these 340+ square metre plots greets the sea and on the other side is a landscaped garden. You have the choice of customizing your villa down to the tiniest detail. As long as it fits the Indo–Portuguese style ambience, of course. (DB Realty, n.d.)

These descriptions reveal how developers package Goanness as a commodity to prospective non-Goan buyers. Moreover, the prospect of building a bespoke house with only an external veneer reminiscent of a Goan architectural ‘look’ provides the impression that Goan identity is open to interpretation and invention. Though this is a fabrication of what ‘Goan architecture’ is, it still creates the illusion of Goanness for those possessing a house in Goa. If websites like that of Aldeia de Goa seem to knowingly convey to prospective buyers an illusion of what it means to be Goan and to possess a piece of Goa, this fiction is deepened by portraying Goan architecture as something that can be created and manipulated according to a buyer’s whim. If something as solid as a house can be fictionalized, then it is all the more plausible that the meanings of Goanness and being Goan can also be made up; accordingly, these commercial websites not only create notions of Goanness but leave them open to constant reinterpretation.

The sales pitch for different types of apartments within Aldeia de Goa is also noteworthy:

What villas, men! For a change, it’s not just the name that’s Portuguese. These 3, 4 and 5 BHK [Bedroom-Hall-Kitchen] villas have actually been built in the Indo-Portuguese style of architecture. (DB Realty, n.d.)

To manage such difference while not upsetting the status quo of what it means to be a second homeowner in an ‘exclusive’ housing development, the Aldeia de Goa website again relies on a flexible notion of Goanness, which it creates by referring to ‘the Indo-Portuguese style of architecture’ of the apartments. This is an anachronism because urban multi-unit apartment buildings as we know them today were not a feature of the Portuguese colonial period in Goa. Architectural historians, such as Varela Gomes (2011) and Carita (1999), use the term ‘Indo-Portuguese’ only to refer to the architecture of churches, civic buildings and palatial and residential houses. These historians do not mention apartment buildings simply because this typology of built form did not exist in that period. In the above quotation from the Aldeia de Goa website, the identity of the development shifts from being merely ‘Portuguese’ to ‘Indo-Portuguese’. Also note the use of an unnamed first-person narrative voice. This ambiguous voice further allows the point of view to shift at will while always instilling a sense of all-knowing authority because of its omniscience. The pairing of this narrative form with the inventions of terminology and the identity of buildings conveniently allows divergent types of homes for sale to buyers of different economic means. Simultaneously, the mansions and apartments sold as is to clients whose pockets are of differing depths are labelled ‘Indo-Portuguese’. The mansions are customizable as long as they adhere to some code of ‘the Indo-Portuguese style ambience’, of course, but even the pre-fabricated smaller homes that cannot be altered are also ‘Indo-Portuguese’. In this conflation, it should also be apparent that while the notion of Indo-Portugueseness (and thereby Goanness) is flexible, it is also never actually defined.

In another example, Provident Housing Limited, the developers of Adora de Goa, use the past to market the architecture of their enterprise. According to the architect of the project, ‘Adora de Goa is a perfect blend of Portuguese architecture and Indian emotions’; the developers assure that the architecture is ‘Goan Outside, Modern Inside’ (Provident Housing Limited, n.d.). This begs the question of how it is possible to have a disjunction between architectural styles in parts of the same building. It essentially means that the Goan architectural style of the buildings remains at the level of surface treatment. The developers claim the following about the still-under-construction complex:

The entire elevation and landscape of Adora de Goa stems from the idea of fusion. At Adora de Goa you’ll find the true spirit of Goa, that’s vintage yet modern in outlook. The bright coloured facade, the Piazza, Baroque statues, hand painted tiles and such other thoughtful fixtures will evoke the grandeur of [the] bygone Portuguese era… (Provident Housing Limited, n.d.)

The very name of the development, Adora de Goa, which translates to ‘Adoration of Goa’, is also in keeping with the use of Portuguese names that developers favour to promote their properties to non-Goans. The project as depicted on the website has a series of 16 high-rise buildings radiating out from a central circular plaza. The developers christened the very tiny apartments in these high-rise towers as ‘Manhattan homes’, adding that they ‘provide luxury in compact format’ (Provident Housing Limited, n.d.). When the building already evokes one place, what is the additional need to evoke another place? Once again, there is a disjunction in the building. The name ‘Manhattan’ conveys that the spaces in these apartments are small, and yet the message is that the buyer is purchasing a ‘home’. When one refers to something as a home, the idea is not usually of an apartment but a house. Thus, the language in the brochure is used very deliberately to obscure the fact that the space is actually tiny. Furthermore, the layering of Manhattan on Goa suggests that the project is a hodgepodge, where Goan architecture is simply a false label used for the marketing of this real estate project.

In fact, these high-rise structures are similar to those that crop up in urban metros in India. One would not expect that urban investors from India seek to purchase these type of dwelling in Goan villages. What this shows is that the demand for real estate in Goa is such that Indian elites are willing to invest even in tiny apartments. While there is clearly a desire for Goa, the production of the meaning of Goa as seen on the aforementioned websites is used to upsell even small properties. The shrinking size of second homes is also a result of mortgage-based financing available to small-time investors in this neoliberal period. However, such high-rise structures built in close proximity to each other contradict the density of architecture that exists in Goa, as most villages are made up of smaller low-rise houses. Projects such as Adora de Goa have become eyesores in the otherwise pristine landscapes of Goa. These new real estate developments are defiling the very environment of Goa that companies use to market their projects to prospective clients from the choked urban metros of India.

The Use of Colonial Tropes in Real Estate Advertisements

Besides employing elements from Goa’s colonial-era aesthetics to the built form that developers are selling, through skilfully designed advertisements, the builders also create an image of their projects in Goa to upsell these properties. Increasingly, e-brochures for real estate properties are using the language of testimonials to promote their projects, allowing for long-form copy with room for extended description, stylistic language and a conversational tone, which creates a sense of intimacy. Take, for example, the following testimonial of a ‘working professional’ for the Rio de Goa project by Tata Housing Company Limited:

Those crazy work hours of building brand structure spares precious little time for your family, doesn’t it? …

So this summer, the Mrs. and I decided to take off on our own to a place we can discover the youth in us again. Rio. And this one’s right here in India. Our plush seventh-floor 3-bedroom apartment in Rio-De-Goa overlooks the Zuari River. (Tata Housing, n.d.)

This testimony is meant to showcase the story of a successful professional who, having worked his way up in the competitive environment of the Indian city, is now looking for a break to ‘discover [his] youth’ by moving to Goa. He hopes to do this, along with his ‘Mrs.’, by going to ‘Rio’. Though he means Rio de Goa, the shortened reference suggests the Brazilian city of Rio de Janeiro, a location which evokes the exotic, not least because of its famous festival of Carnival. Additionally, just as Goa, Brazil is a former Portuguese colony, which shows that the idea of leisure and exoticness are once again referring to Goa’s connection to other Iberian locales.

Through the use of websites, Goan real estate projects are marketed through the evocation of the region’s Portuguese colonial past. Different from, but in tandem with, print advertisements and/or billboards, the companies’ project websites take the form of what Russon (2017) refers to as advertorials—‘paid ads masquerading as opinion pieces’. Whereas, Russon points out, opinion pieces on Goa have now become commercialized, advertisements have, in turn, become opinionated, blurring the line between forms of mediated communication relating to the state. Together, such media—advertorials and property-advertising websites—parlay the idea of Goa by creating knowledge about the region. This is in keeping with Said’s (1979) aforementioned point and the shiftable idea of Indo-Portugueseness that builders use. Further, that the sources of information in advertisements are purveyed electronically suggests a particular kind of audience. Informational websites require time and access; thus, the intended reader is not only a citizen of the digital age but also one with the leisure time to read. Surfing through websites for properties is a different practice than simply gazing upon a slogan on a billboard or imbibing the brief wording in a print advertisement. Information is key here, and its measured consumption through an opinion-presenting website itself connotes the very idea of leisure being sold to someone who wants to partake in a leisurely lifestyle. In this digital era of communication, the developers are invested heavily in the online advertising of their properties, wherein a convenient, stereotypical idea of Goa has been created through both architectural images and textual descriptions in curated testimonials to upsell their products.

Neocolonialism Through Capitalist Ventures

In this neoliberal period, real estate developments cater to the desires of mostly elite consumers. Fernandes (2004) explains that this is a recent phenomenon in India, where ‘questions of livability and development are fundamentally shaped by the emergence of a model of consumer-citizenship that seeks to displace the political claims of marginalised social groups to resources such as jobs and housing’ (p. 2428). Irrespective of the manner in which properties are advertised, real estate projects which target non-Goan elites have severe economic ramifications for native Goans (Kandolkar, 2018). In effect, the marginalization that most native Goans face is a product of neoliberalism, where the state allows the private sector to cater to the housing needs of the affluent, so that they may profit from owning second homes. At the same time, the needs of the less well-off are neither met by these private companies nor the state. As Goa is one of the smallest states, the effects of urbanization have become more acute for the people of the land. Outside investments have caused property prices to soar in Goa, making it difficult for average local Goans to secure affordable housing for themselves. Even the chief town planner of Goa, the government official responsible for preparing the state’s development strategy, confessed that the housing stock in Goa is beyond the reach of even middle-income Goans (Times of India, 2016). The irony is that while primary homes remain out of the reach of Goans, the 2011 Census shows a growth in the number of unoccupied houses in Goa from 77,284 in 2001 to 125,503, representing a rise of 22 per cent from the previous census (Times of India, 2016). Most of the new housing stock, which remains empty, consists of second homes that belong to investors. Since land in this small state is scarce, this shows that the real estate market developing property for second homes is depriving average Goans of access to primary homes. Moreover, if middle-income Goans are unable to avail housing in Goa, then the low-income and the poor obviously fare much worse. The problem is so bad that the chief town planner, in the above-cited interview, was unable to propose a solution.

While it may appear that there is no solution to the housing crisis in Goa because land is in short supply in the small state, one might wonder if this is a convenient ruse by which the state can abdicate its responsibility to the citizens while privileging neoliberal capitalist interests. The very land which the state needs to invest in to develop housing for Goans is being sold or developed as land for second homes, catering to status-seekers from Delhi, Bombay, Bangalore and elsewhere in India, who are lured to the region due to its Portuguese cultural history. In fact, through land acquisition and other means, the state too grabs land from locals for projects which are not necessarily in the interest of Goans (Nielson et al., 2017). The state-acquired land is not helping the Goans build more housing; rather, in this period of capitalist neoliberalization, it is done to help corporations. In Goa, successive governments have continued to patronize haphazard planning, encouraging speculation in the real estate market, which largely benefits only the rich (Da Silva & Chandrashekar, 2018). With the state happy to encourage speculation, as large properties are siphoned off by real estate sharks, Goans are rendered homeless in their own land.

Advertisements for real estate in Goa speak to the close relationship between neoliberalism and neocolonialism. For example, in 2016, the developers of Tata Housing put up a large billboard outside Goa’s airport, which read, ‘It’s time to claim your piece of Goa’. J. K. Fernandes reacts to this hoarding:

One is welcome to purchase property in Goa, but when this act of purchasing is converted into an act of claiming or conquest, and opens the path for the consequent disregard of the existing social fabric, it is transformed from a possibly quotidian act to one of colonial violence. (Fernandes, 2016)

But can ‘claiming or conquest’ be differentiated from being ‘welcome[d] to purchase property’? What is overlooked in suggesting that there is a difference between these two forms of ownership is that the choice to welcome land purchase is set against the backdrop of equal rights and fair laws, which is far from the real scenario for most Goans in Goa.

Developers, such as Tata Housing, want those in India to ‘claim’ a piece of land in Goa, as if by doing so, the land will be transferred to the ‘rightful’ owners. When advertisements suggest that Indians can claim their own piece of Goa, it also alludes to their capitalist neocolonization of this territory by purchasing this land one piece at a time. Even as these advertisements use the language of ownership, it is laced with the diction of colonialism that constantly trades in and recalls Goa’s inconsonant history in comparison to the rest of India. Despite the Indian annexation ⁵ of Goa in 1961, these slogans appear to imply that the project of Goa’s integration into ‘Mother India’ remains unfulfilled. Therein, capitalism provides an apt solution: the consumerist ownership of Goan land by Indians who can then extend the nation’s rightful claim on the nation’s margins.

Conclusion

To project Goa as an idyllic location to Indian buyers, the websites associated with the real estate projects discussed in this article have manipulated representations of Goanness while making it seem as if Goa is unpeopled and open to settlement. As I have been arguing, the rhetoric in the advertisements suggests the recolonization of Goa, especially through the use of opinionated commercials that appeal to the pioneering spirit of Indian buyers, and particularly those seeking to elevate their status. The advertisements suggest that the decision to buy into Goa is not merely for investment but for the lifestyle that ownership of a second home connotes. This pandering to the desire for status is accompanied by the promise of stakes in the very ethos of Goanness, which is made commensurate with owning a piece of Goa. In a bid to appear Goan, these real estate projects create an idea of Goa by rehashing the architecture from the Portuguese colonial period. The illusion of this remaking of Goan architecture is clear when the developers imply that it is enough to maintain the external appearance of ‘Indo-Portuguese’ style in the edifices sold, while their interiors can be altered as the buyers please. More perplexingly, the real estate developments even present high-rise apartments—a building type that was not part of the colonial Portuguese landscape—as Goan architecture. Clearly, the architectural legacy of the past is simply used to upsell even tiny apartments, which individuals can purchase owing to the availability of easy mortgages that banks provide. Here, the relationship between corporations, banks and the state should be underlined because these joint enterprises occur with governmental sanction, further indicating how Goa is being systematically exploited. As Searle (2013) notes, ‘Government agencies, housing finance companies and private banks have created a market for mortgages in India since the late 1970s, aided by falling interest rates and tax incentives for home buyers’ (p. 276). In the period following India’s move towards economic neoliberalization, such state-supported corporate enterprise further abets the neocolonization of Goa by real estate investors. What links the knowledge of Goa that real estate websites create with the financing made available to non-Goans through neoliberal capitalism is the speculative nature of both, as they equally trade in structuring the consumption of the region with no basis in grasping its ground realities. As digital information combines with market instability in the speculative consumption of property, the fictions that these create have a real impact on the lives of Goans and their land. How the story will end remains to be seen, even as the fabled settings of Goa’s greenery and palm-fringed coasts continue to be converted into concrete sequels of the dreams of others.