 Since the dawn of civilization, this land of ours has reached out to the world, sending over the waves its gems and its jewels, its aesthetics and its philosophies. And in turn, it has opened its arms to welcome peoples and ideas from far and from near. The ports and shores of the western coast in the south of India were the great gateways for the west. Christianity too came to India over the seas in three distinct waves. The first wave is popularly believed to be soon after the death of Jesus, when one of his twelve apostles, Thomas, came to the coast of present-day Kerala with a message of peace and a philosophy of love. The second wave of Christianity came with the Europeans, the Dutch, the French and particularly the Portuguese in the 15th century. The Portuguese sailor Vasco da Gama landed near Calicut in 1498, successfully finding a short trade route from Europe to the riches of the Indies. The most recent and the most powerful Christian influence however came with the British. It began with the missionaries who came in the wake of the East India Company and in the 300 years they stayed, it spread across the face of the vast and beautiful country, influencing its lifestyle and its culture in a deep and seminal way and in turn being influenced by the colour of its tradition and the richness of its philosophy. Today a series of statues in a classical temple pond commemorate the first Indian Christians. The pond is set in the Saint Thomas Church at Palayu. Parents consider it particularly auspicious to have their child baptized at the same spot. The world famous Mylapore Church is a monument to his memory. Devotees come from long distances to pray for his intervention. Thomas and others who bear his name, particularly Thomas of Kana, left a deep, indelible mark on the people, especially so in Kerala which had a strong tradition of spiritualism. Another very old and thriving Christian community lives west of the ruins of the Vasai Fortress near Bombay. This is one of the places the Portuguese colonized after Vasco da Gama's pioneering voyage. It was the Portuguese admiral Albuquerque who established Goa as a bastion of the Portuguese Empire on the Indian continent. Goa, of course, has a 4,000 year history of its own. From 1510 AD when admiral Albuquerque conquered it, till 1961 when it became a part of independent India, however, Goa remained a Portuguese colony. Like Christians in Kerala, the community in Goa has also evolved a distinctive personality of its own, combining its western heritage with the strength and the color of its oriental roots. If the Portuguese impress on Goa is deep, then its very heart and soul is France's area, its patron saint. Old Portuguese lifestyle which lends this state its distinctive flavor remains evident even today in its everyday life, its architecture, its houses. The synthesis reflects in the marketplace and in the food a happy blend of the west and the east.