Goa Have a Good Time

The Life of Reilly/Saol an Bhó Bháin

Getting to Goa meant getting a slight respite from the heat with the sea breeze. And as long as you avoided being out during the hottest part of the day it was all pretty bearable, despite the locals’ constant complaints about the soaring temperatures.

A Taste of Goa

A former Portuguese colony, Goa was the last part of India to be retaken after an invasion by the Indian army in the 60s. It has still kept much of its Southern European characteristics, in Panjim the capital, cobbled roads are lined by terracotta tiled terrace houses, with worn wooden balconies and a plethora of catholic churches to rival that of any Mediterranean town. Goa’s reputation was built on sandy beaches and psytrance parties bur unfortunately the high season for the festivals is around New Year. Most hostels were only ever half full and a few bars had already closed before the coming rains but there was still plenty to do.

Holy Houses

Goa is Electrifying!

First up was Old Goa, the old colonial capital city that previously boasted a population greater than both Lisbon and London. Since it’s heyday as the ‘Rome of the East’ it had been decimated by cholera and was now home mostly to ruins and churches. There were churches everywhere, from basilicas, to cathedrals, to chapels, to convents, you name a religious institution and it would probably have a building in Old Goa. In a global leaderboard of churches per population, I think it could have given even the Vatican a run for its rather sizeable money.  All of the buildings were in such spotless condition too, with immaculate stonework and sprawling green lawns, no mean feat to maintain in that stone splitting heat. The tick-tick-tick of the sprinkler seemed to be counting every rupee spent here rather than on the rest of the town, which lay in various states of disrepair. Crumbling walls lined every road and where covered in a pale hay like creeper, resembling an old man’s whispery, whiskered beard. Even the weeds had dried out, as all water was commandeered to sate the thirst of pristine parochial lawns. Time had caved roofs, rotted boats and grown up so thick upon buildings that they now housed more animals than a cottage with Snow White singing in it. A sad fall from grace for any place. 

Holey Houses

All aboard!

Getting between the towns though was easy, with a spider’s web of buses linking most towns. The buses chug along with the driver wrenching them up and down through the gears. They were small school buses, decorated with a wide-ranging collection of religious ornaments and keepsakes, covering everything from Christian to Hindu deities. Rounding corners at speed would indiscriminately topple bags and standing ladies a like and send them sliding down the aisle. Most journeys resembled the Knight Bus from Harry Potter, racing through gaps that weren’t there before and bouncing over potholes in the country roads that jolted every passenger out of their seat toward the well-cushioned ceiling. The drivers preferred to just slow down rather than stop completely when passengers were embarking or disembarking, maybe out of a fear of being unable to restart the engine. But overall at 20p a ride you couldn’t really complain.

Vagator Beach and Fort Chapora

Vagator Sunset

Up the coast things got a bit livelier. The beaches in Vagator were packed with people and no wonder with the Arabian Sea being bath warm here. It wasn’t quite as peaceful though when, at shin deep, waves were rolling in already towering above my head. On more than one occasion my swim shorts were being pulled towards my knees before I managed to get a hand there to yank them back up. Being caught with your shorts down in India mightn’t in itself go down too well, as due to traditional modesty both men (sometimes) and women (all the time) were wearing knee length trousers and t-shirts amongst the waves. However it was made stranger to see these groups of teenagers in their Victorian Era swimwear whilst some of the little boys playing nearby were sporting more Stone Age counterparts. My Indian roommate explained to me this was due to the intellectual caste these kids came from rather than a naked flouting of convention. With him I discussed everything from karma and life to vegetarianism and gender equality, and although we didn’t always see eye to eye it was really interesting to hear his traditional perspective and debate the details. He also helped me with my first foray into the mad world of Indian cuisine, onion and banana bhajis in particular being a roaring success.

Goan Brekfast, Spice Farm Lunch and Fish Thali

The food in general was pretty amazing, extremely cheap and very flavoursome. In Panjim in particular I fell in love with one restaurant, Viva Panjim, eating lunch and dinner there every chance I got. The kingfish vindaloo and a chicken xacuti were two of the stand out meals. Thalis, think tapas platter, are common everywhere in India with each state having their own flavours and offering meat, fish and vegetarian options. The hostel I stayed at also offered a traditional Goan breakfast in the morning, a mild chickpea and potato curry with a sweet bread and samosa. The samosas too, everywhere fried and crispy samosas, if you are what you eat then I must certainly be a parcel of spiced vegetables folded in golden pastry because I was eating them morning noon and night.

Arpora Night Market

Fine Feni and cashews

Although the season was in its last death throes the Saturday Night Market in Arpora was a surprisingly good night out. Not only did it have the usual crowd of dealers selling knickknacks and trinkets but it also had at least six or seven stages blasting all kinds of music. Nothing like taking a break from your weekly shopping to bop one out in the corner with a load of spaced out hippies. Stalls held a rainbow of spices most of which I didn’t recognize let alone have a clue how to use. Wanting to know a bit more about what I was eating I headed inland to Ponda for a tour of a spice farm. The guide was a cookbook of herbal mixtures each with their own medicinal qualities. She listed so many and so quickly that I had little or no chance of remembering the half. I do remember that nutmeg and mace for pepper spray comes from the same plant, as does cinnamon and bay leaves, crazy I know. I was amazed to see cashews growing each attached to its own apple. The apple although not ate raw was fermented to make a liquor called Feni, used to stimulate the appetite. But rather than pique my hunger it picked the hairs up on the back of my neck as it went down.

Palolem Beach

Having admitted defeat in my quest for a proper Goan party I decided to chase after Goa’s second most sought after treasure, the Goan beaches. In the sleepier south of the state, soft white sand beaches dotted the coast. Nestled between rocky outcrops, the headlands flank the beaches on each side enclosing them in its own secretive embrace. A forest of palm trees line each sandy expanse giving it that Robinson Crusoe/Castaway feeling of total seclusion on an untouched beach. Palolem the busiest of the beaches has a Noddy Town of wooden beach shacks, restaurants and shops propped up and painted in strong primary colours. A sort of Utopian community living there throughout the season, who’d shunned the city life for a life of sun. 

Agonda Beach

Agonda a 3km long strip of sand a scooter ride to the north was a quieter if equally beautiful break. Trekking through the heat along the inland road south, I made my way through a few of the villages before rounding a headland to find a shoal of fishermen fixing their nets and boats. Cutting out on to the beaches I walked the whole way home along the deserted Rajbag and Patnem beaches, where it was only the waves and I. Like the north though those waves were something else. Lazing about in the water was only possible between the lulls in the big breakers, which catapulted you through the air or rolled you under depending upon which way they hit you. Still, at times it felt like I was the only one there, floating on my back, bobbing like the flotsam of a wrecked ship washed up onto the beaches of a New New World.

Sunset in Palolem

Leaving Goa the tranquility I had been enjoying was shattered in miserable Margao. With nothing to see in that squalid town, its only importance was as a transit hub for travellers, and even there it failed miserably. After two days of cancelled buses and phantom trains, arguing with officials and lugging 15kgs of backpack through the heat, I finally managed to slink my way into a cupboard under the stairs style cubbyhole/bed aboard a bus to Bangalore with wedding bells ringing softly in the air.