Assagao figures amidst the tiniest and well laid out villages of the Velhas Conquistas of Bardez. And small is naturally beautiful. Assagao is a mere strip of land of about 7 kilometres in length, and it is sandwiched between greenhills clothed in caju groves. From Mapusa town, the road u-turns uphill and, while descending the pass in the small plateau, splits into two.

The main artery proceeds straight along the church of St Cajetan, the Assagao Union High School and St Michael's church in Anjuna towards the Vagator beach.

The second negotiates circuituously westward and passes by the Pallotine Seminary to Badem. These parallel roads run alongside the hillrange and are lined with modest to magestic mansions. Virtually at every kilometre, a crossroad connects the main roads in this valley known for crossandra flowers. In Konkani the flame-coloured flowers are called abolim and since they grew here in plenty once, Assagao was known as aboleamcho ganv or fulancho ganv.

Pals from neighbouring villages generally greet us with Assa re ganv.They tell us that our village got its name when a prince, who was lost on the hills of Assagao on a dark night, heard the cock crow to announce the dawn. Overjoyed, the forlorn prince heaved a sigh, Assa re ganv. Being brought up in the proximity of cocks and bulls, Ascoumkars don't buy such cock and bull bluff. We believe that Assagao has something to do with the timbre trees called hasson, whose bark is known to cure pain particularly from joints. Hasson being abundant in the village, it was named Asson-ganv or Hasson-ganv. But it's the height of annoyance when anyone mistakenly presumes that our ancestors hail from Azgaon in Maharashtra.

The greenhills separate Assagao from Siolim in the North, Mapusa in the East and Parra in the South. The only village Ascoumkars can reach without crossing a hill is adjacent Anjuna. But with the tourist inflow coastal Anjuna would prefer the foreigner than their country neighbours. Anyway, Assagao is happy with her hillocks, which prevent industrialisation but keep away the noise, congestion and pollution of the Mapusa town down the eastern slope. Ascounkars are a graceful people but rather sussegad.