Cover of the comic book 'The Uninvited Host: Goa and the Parties not Meant for its People'.
If you follow the media coverage of Goa's tryst with the tourism trade, one usually ends up with the conclusion that Goans are a welcoming lot, hospitable and all-welcoming to the hoards of tourists who descend in the State which in recent times is all round the year.
However, an art exhibition aptly titled “The Uninvited” currently on at the Gallery Gitanjali: Panjim Pousada located in the capital city's Latin quarter (Fontainhas) tells quite a different story and encompasses in the artist, Angela Ferrao's inimitable style, the emotions of a section of Goans who abhor the invasion by tourists and the impact it is leaving on Goa's cultural ethos and day to day life.
The exhibition, which is on till December 18, has works produced by Ferrao over a year with scholarly inputs from her namesake but unrelated to her, academician based in America, Benedito Ferrao. The works symbolise a Goa which most visitors and those in the business of tourism ignore: the State's pristine environment and vibrant cultural ethos which is under attack by tourism itself.
The collaboration of the two unrelated Ferraos has also produced a 'comic book' which is titled in contrast to the exhibit's 'Uninvited Guest' in reference to the visitor (tourist) as 'Uninvited Host'. The comic book tells the story through illustrations how the tourist activity and industry in the State is increasingly excluding the local population and their interests.
A must-see exhibition, it literally tells the story of that section of Goans who abhor the negative impact of the tourism industry on the Goan way of life: the flip-side of this tiny State's so-called tourism-fuelled economic boom.
Amid Gaza bombing, Israeli army website hacked by 'Anonymous Jo'
Initially, there was a frenzy, in individual conversations, on social media activity and in the mainstream media. Now, not much is heard and written about the ongoing war in Gaza where Israel is on a relentless bombing spree, throwing all caution and international wartime conventions to the winds in retaliation to the attack in which Hamas killed some and took many Israelis hostage.
Clearly, Israel with its might has military superiority. The precision, intelligence superiority and prowess of its spy agency Mossad is legendary. But amid all this comes the news that the Israeli army website was briefly hacked by a pro-Palestinian group.
The group calling itself “Anonymous Jo” taking responsibility for the hacking said the arrogance and injustice towards people in Gaza was the reason for the harm to Israel whether by land, air or "electronically".
The Israeli army, meanwhile, has acknowledged and confirmed the hack, certainly a dent of sorts to its reputation.
Stunning security breach in Parliament
The latest buzz in the media, social media and all other information platforms is the hideous incident in Parliament on Wednesday wherein a couple of activists jumped off the visitors' gallery and got to the floor of the Lok Sabha, spraying a yellow coloured gas from canisters they managed to smuggle in the lower House of Parliament.
What has stunned many is the fact that the protesters, who incidentally were visitors to the Lok Sabha recommended by ruling BJP's two-term member of Parliament from Mysore, Rajesh Simha.
The duo breached three layers of security checks to get inside the newly built Parliament House with the gas-filled canisters concealed in their shoes. By that measure, the security arrangements in Goa's legislature complex turn out to be a notch superior, what with a beer can inadvertently dumped in the rucksack of a journalist, being detected by the security frisking every visitor.
Worse, the symbolism of the Parliament's security breach on Wednesday taking place on December 13, the anniversary of the terror attack on Parliament in 2001, wasn't lost either.
