My association with Percival Noronha would have begun from my childhood, when my father Dr. Manuel Dias would take me by the hand, accompanying him on his excursions and errands around town. I remember going to Percival’s house innumerable times, and they would talk animatedly in Portuguese about the old days and their current time.
As I grew up, I got to know Percival on my own terms, and he became a go-to person for a vast range of subjects, from the history of our city, of the bairros of São Tomé and Fontainhas, of Goa in general, advice on research avenues in the run-up to our Casa da Moeda 175th anniversary celebrations in 2009, Goan furniture, to numismatics, astronomy, and so much more.
Percival’s house was spotlessly and elegantly kept, but the inner room with its large table was like a war room, a veritable beehive of activity, with papers, books, photographs scattered all over as Percival feverishly dictated letters and his thoughts to one or two assistants trying their best to keep up with him. Although I hadn’t visited him in the last few months, I’m willing to bet he remained active on some project or the other as best as his health and mobility would allow him, to the very last.
He convinced me to become a life member of the Friends of Astronomy group started by him; the lifetime membership then (and perhaps even now) was an extremely low sum, of a hundred rupees if I remember correctly. Thanks to him, generations of us have been fortunate to watch eclipses and other celestial phenomena through the telescope up on the terrace of Junta House. One memorable occasion I’ll never forget was the time it was possible to see the planet Saturn, with its rings, ‘disappear’ behind a glorious full moon, only to reappear on its other side a while later. The Friends of Astronomy has sparked an interest in the heavens in so many generations, and perhaps influenced some choices of career paths as well. Percival would often be there himself, supervising things, with a devoted bunch of extremely knowledgeable and dedicated youth milling about him. In the Friends of Astronomy alone, he has left an indelible, immeasurable legacy. I remember him telling us on several occasions about the logistics, of handling and maintaining the expensive telescope, and other aspects of the running of the group, including the publishing of a regular, very informative newsletter. He often lamented the fact that ever-increasing light pollution in the city was obscuring the observation of the night sky, something that children today will grow up ignorant about unless measures are taken to curb and reverse it.
Percival graciously accepted our invitation to speak about Indo-Portuguese furniture at the maiden edition of our Casa da Moeda festival in 2009. His presentation was extremely well-attended and received, and covered all aspects of the subject, down to whom to go to even for ongoing maintenance and upkeep of antique furniture.
He was a seemingly timeless fixture of Fontainhas, watching life go by from his first-floor window. He had a wry sense of humour, even when lamenting the erosion of so much that was and is beautiful about our heritage, the upkeep of the city in general and monuments in particular, and of basic values such as civic sense, honesty, integrity and decency. Our best way to remember him would be to live as he lived, by the values that he cherished and the many noble causes he espoused. We have lost in one man, a national treasure.
(An edited version of this article appeared in the Times of India on 21 August 2019, incidentally the death anniversary of my own father, Dr. Manuel Dias. They are probably picking up where they left off, in their conversations in Portuguese, up there somewhere)
bestringtoness.com said:
Percival spoke about Indo-Portuguese furniture at the maiden edition of Casa da Moeda festival in 2009. His presentation covered all aspects of the subject, down to whom to go to even for ongoing maintenance and upkeep of antique furniture. He was a seemingly timeless fixture of Fontainhas, watching life go by from his first-floor window. He had a wry sense of humour, even when lamenting the erosion of so much that was and is beautiful about our heritage, the upkeep of the city in general and monuments, in particular, and of basic values such as civic sense, honesty, integrity and decency. Our best way to remember him would be to live as he lived, by the values that he cherished and the many noble causes he espoused. We have lost in one man, a national treasure. (The writer is a doctor and music educator)