Tony MartinTony Martin, the better-known pen-name of Anthony Barretto, worked his way through Goa's English-language newspapers, before shifting to education. He has gone into self-publishing, and, in his own modest and low-profile manner, has managed to put out books with a print-run of 5000 copies (amazing by Goa's standards). Currently, he is working on a website on Canacona.
Just an out-of-school teenager that I was, life then posed a 'Catch 22' situation when one first landed in Panjim. Without any experience, it was difficult to get work. Yet, at the same time, it was difficult to get experience because I couldn't get any work.
So one fine day armed with a recommendation from the late music maestro-priest Fr Lourdinho Barreto, who hailed from my village of Galgibaga in the southern extreme of Goa, to Fr Freddy for the post of proof reader I arrived at the Gulab office. This got an I'll-let-you-know from the editor.
Well at least I knew what job I was looking for.
Then, with a fantastic helping of luck I got a job with the Herald — oops actually it was with Norlic India, the firm shown as the employer of those doing the proof-reading of the Herald, in those days.
The job was as a proof reader, and the date was August 12, 1985.
To us, whether it was Norlic India or Herald did not then matter, I was getting my bread, so there was no point complaining about missing the cake.
But along with my bread, I also got a taste and a first-hand glimpse of what I had only heard of earlier — exploitation. Obviously the Norlic India tag was meant to deny us the applicable scales for proof-readers. We were almost like daily wage factory workers. Accept it or leave it. With pressing financial constraints, and at that time there wasn't even a functional union in the Herald (it came sometime later, and have worked in fits and starts) the option was clear: shut up and do your work or speak up and get kicked out.
All said just-enough-to-survive Rs 400 a month was still a luxury.
So I got myself testing the waters in the novitiate of journalism. For a tender 'naal' (coconut) like myself the sub-editors of the time — Anthony, Rico, Godwin Figueira and sports editor Nelson, to name a few — were exceptionally good. If I had peanuts for salary, I had gems for seniors.