Well, the rains have come, and I've stranded myself here at Calangute. On Monday I took the bus into Panjim on "business", and during the course of the day, rode down to Margao and bought my train ticket to Madras. The weather had been very good and I'd been enjoying myself, so I decided to make Goa a two-weeker. That day it rained, Tuesday, yesterday, and today it really poured. The plan was to move down to Colva for the last week, for variety. I tried today, in the middle of a real solid rain, and got firmly closed out. All 3 of the hotels at Colva were pretty full, so I decided to bag it and settle in at Calangute again, wait out the rain until train-time on Tuesday.
Saturday was a very nice day. The manager sent out one of the boys to get a rental bicycle for me, and I spent most of the day riding up and down on the roads behind the beaches. Went down to Fort Aguada in the A.M., up to Anjuna Beach in the P.M. On Sunday I lazed about, swimming and reading. On these days, the sunny ones, I'd developed a pleasant little routine: have one of the tables in the restaurant moved out to the far edge of the patio, drink 2 or 3 fenis while the sun sank into the sea, then have dinner by lantern-light while the night got darker and darker, and finish off after dessert with a cigar and coffee.
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Sunday night I got propositioned by a gay Italian. Had me up to his room to smoke dope and showed me all of the strange little articles he'd bought as souvenirs.
Tuesday afternoon, after spending the morning shopping, I took a second government bus tour. Was seated next to a very friendly and pretty English girl named Sarah, but did not pursue her at all beyond the bus tour.
Wednesday morning I walked up to Baga Beach and had a dip and started reading, hoping the rain would hold off, but after a while I could see it coming offshore, and got nicely soaked with rainwater before I made it back to the hotel. I was just walking in the door when I heard someone yell my name. It was Doug the American, first met in Herat at the infamous Yaqin Hotel, last seen ill in Bamiyan at the Hindu Kush. He came by the tavern, Dinky's, later on, and we got all embroiled in beachside low-life, smoking dope, being hustled for meals and drinks, and beating off obstreporous drunks.
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Thursday morning up at a reasonable hour, finished packing and off on the busses to Colva Beach, assuming that, like Calangute it was quiet and that there was a surplus of hotel rooms available to pick from. Solid rain all day, and I was bitterly chagrined to find everybody pretty full, except for the Sea View, which entirely lacked a sea view, and I could not see much sense in staying, so I caught a taxi back to Margao, and then bussed all the way back to Calangute.
Note from 2007Seems that I'm going over the same ground twice here.
Glad to find that they, at least, hadn't filled right up, checked in and went right over to Dinky's to find Doug and see if he was really interested in doing some innertubing, as he'd said the night before. Spent most of the evening there, huddling on their veranda with the palm fronds and plastic sheeting keeping the rain and wind off, drinking fenni and lime juice and talking.
Friday morning Doug and I met at Dinky's, Doug rolled up some hash cigarettes, we smoked one and went off to find innertubes, which everyone had said would be easy to find. No innertubes. So we went swimming instead.
Had a good time in the surf and playing in the river that runs into the sea at Baga. Two nice Italian guys picked us up and dragged us off to the Lomir Hotel for lunch, and I managed to lose my good pair of glasses. Losing a pair of glasses wouldn't be so bad, except that when I got back to the hotel I dropped a lens of the 2nd pair, and it broke all over the bathroom floor. So I went through 1 1/2 pair of glasses in one day, and am now walking around "with one eye". Sheker, the manager here, recommends laying over at Bangalore, which is a stop for my train to Madras, and getting a new pair there.
Rain and wind all through the afternoon and everning Friday, but Doug and I managed to get a little sun in the morning.
Got really wasted on hash at Dinky's last night, drink a lot of Nescafe, which is excellent at Dinky's, and played a little chess and cards.
This morning I went into Panjim with my one lens glasses to get some wrapping material, reading matter, and money.
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