Accountant Adventures: Sun and Sand in Goa

Just as a huge wave hit me in the bum

On our way to the airport, we passed the same corner where we had previously bought the magazine from the kid. This time the kids were selling books and they each had a stack of at least 15 paperbacks. I’m still reading Shantaram, so I didn’t need one but Praj was interested and looking at the choices. As the kid went through all of the books one by one Praj said no to each as he already had read them. Finally near the end of the stack Praj found a book that he didn’t have and the kid held the back of the book up so that Praj could read it. As they were discussing the price, the taxi lurched forward and into the intersection across the street. I turned to see the kid with his 15 books follow us running on foot, into the middle of the intersection and down the street. Praj yelled at the driver to pull over when he could so that he could get the book from the kid. There were cars everywhere and we had traveled pretty far from the intersection. We looked back into the traffic but we couldn’t locate the kid. Had he turned back and given up or worse gotten hit by a car? Then all of a sudden, there he was running in the middle of the street with all of his books in his arm and the hugest smile ever on his face.

Our flight to Goa was delayed and we did not make it to Goa until almost 10pm. We didn’t have any plans for a place to stay in Goa and we had planned to spend the evening looking for a place but the late arrival was going to make this more difficult. In an effort to save money, for convenience and to see real India, Praj and I talked to people on the plane trying to get them to invite us to come back to their homes or hotels. We were finally successful with a tall Taiwanese engineer, who offered to have his cab drive us to his hotel and to allow us to spend the night in his room on the floor. His driver however was having no part of it and told us that he could not drive us because his orders were to pick up one, not three. It was a bust, we were in Goa at night with no place to stay. We talked to all of the hotel companies at the airport but they were all over $2000 INR per night, way out of our price range. We used my lonely planet book and were able to secure a room in Panjim, the capital of Goa, for $350 INR per night.

The night we arrived in Panjim we went to a restaurant and I saw my first squat toilet. It is basically a hole in the floor that looks like a permanent Porta-Potty, kind of gross but the food was delicious. I also used my first spray toilet and found it to be less scary and much nicer than I had anticipated, not to say that it is now my new preference, but it wasn’t bad.

Last night we went on a Sundown Cruise that goes on the river for an hour and has music and traditional dancing. Once the cruise started they had a traditional dance and then they asked for couples to come up and dance. No couples came up and finally the DJ put music on to try to encourage them. When I think couple dancing, I think old people dancing to a slow song, but they were playing club music. Then another traditional dance was danced and then it was time for the guys only dance. In America the guys only dance would be just as dead as the couples dance but not in India. As soon as they said “guys dance” and started the club music, all of the guys on the ship ran to the stage. They were jumping around, flailing their arms, pumping their hips, and bumping and grinding with so much energy. It was absolutely incredible the excitement and vigor with which they danced. I did not get up there and afterword I greatly regretted it. That was it for the dancing, no women only and no singles dancing, this was a family cruise after all.

Today we checked out of our hotel and moved to a nearby town that is on the ocean. At the beach was a group of 35 guys who were friends, down from Bombay. They were playing this game that I have never seen before. I don’t know the real rules of the game, but this is what I observed and believe the rules to be: There were two teams of 6 guys and one team had an anchor who stood facing the other team then one of his team mates bent over and put his head and shoulders at the standing guys crotch, then the next guy put his head and shoulders onto the second guys butt and the rest of the guys did this as well, forming a line. The other team would then run and launch themselves one by one on top of the crouching guys. The object for the first team was to stay standing while the second team jumped on them. The second team tried to knock down the first, but once they jumped they had to pile on top of the first team and not fall to the ground themselves. The first team to fall over lost and became the team that got piled onto. They were having a great time and it was quite enjoyable to watch. I’ve had my little break from the sun and I have reapplied my sunscreen, it’s time to get back out there.