Report and pics by Ashuntha Pereira London
Daijiworld Media Network - London (SP)

London, Jul 29: Sunday July 27 was a remarkable day for the Goans in the United Kingdom. Goans from across the country came together to express and experience their culture and heritage at the Goan Festival.

The umbrella organization called SCOGO (Standing Conference of Goan Organisations) that was set up under the leadership of Goan Association UK, organized the festival. The event saw the coming together of various Goan cultural organizations and village associations, who set aside a day to celebrate in UK the meaning of everything that is Goan. 

Goan Festival was organized by Goan Association (UK) in association with The Goan Organisation, at Archbishop Lanfranc School, Mitcham Road, Croydon.  The festival began with the Holy Mass at 12.30 pm.

The special attraction of the festival was the Goan food fair, in which all kinds of Goan traditional food was served through hundreds of food stalls put up for the purpose. The food stalls were loaded with lots of chorizos, prawn para, fish mole, xacuti powder, rechad masala and mango miskut and so on. There was the familiar smell of sorpatel and pulau wafting in the air. The sight of young boys and girls with Goan accent, selling chorizos and other products was really amazing and thrilling experience. 

Other than the Goan food fair, this festival also had very good stage performances like the string band, Goan traditional songs, fashion show, Konkani medley, speed dating, music for dancing, Khel Tiatr by Konkani Dramatic Association, raffle draw, disco dancing and so on.

More than 5000 Goans arrived for this festival from all over UK and enjoyed the real taste of Goan culture and heritage in this foreign land. The festival ended at 7 pm.