Goa - etched in memories forever

Well it’s been quite some time that I’ve been thinking of blogging on our Goa trips... However this time around I really wanted to put them in action...So here I’m scribbling on... Before I write I just wanna warn you as to what you are getting into...So a small disclaimer...

Disclaimer: This blog is pretty long as it was one of my favorite trips and I didn’t want to miss on the minutest details even...So if this reminds of long boring chapters of your history books ....pardon me!!! Secondly since most of the blog is written in the night (the only time i could write in peace), it’s highly recommended that you are read it when you have no external disturbances...Finally, as all of you know as how a verbal I’m, so please read it imagining that i'm narrating it out to you...Trust me it would be more fun...

When you wanna unwind yourself and just break free from your monotonous daily life schedules, Goa tops the list of travel destinations...This time around the more compelling reason was Akki's advent to India and it had to be special..So after a lot of brainstorming as to who can make it or not, finally 9 of us decided to make it for the trip...The crew: Anish, Maddy, Akki, Darshan, Pali, Tina, Arpita, Sushmita and me :) We commenced our journey on the 24th nite so that we could spend the Christmas eve in Goa...Akki and Darshan were to join us in Panjim...

We had to board our bus from Gandhi nagar, so after wrapping up work soon, all of us gathered at UB city...Getting a rick when you really need it and that to for meter charge is battle half won, however it’s never that easy...Maddy , Tina , Arpi and me would almost have missed by our bus courtesy our reckless auto driver who put a cycle rider down n started fighting with the latter in spite of being guilty..

We just managed to flee from the scene before it got dirty and in India its hardly happens that you miss catching a bus/train coz you are late :)...They never disappoint you, you always make it before the time coz these means of transport never stick to schedules...So after reaching Gandhi nagar, all of us had the time to have a sumptuous dinner and darling Rahman could make it to see off all of us :) Then began the treacherous never ending bus journey..Arpi got almost psyched up with bug bites when our chivalrous Maddy lent his jacket to her...Akki and Darshan were smart to board a train from Mlore...Firstly it hardly took them anytime and trains are always a better option...We were supposed to meet them at Panjim at 8:30 a.m...When they learned from us that we haven't reached anywhere close to Karwar even by 11, they decided to leave for Calangute...

Finally with craned necks and a turmoil of 18 hours we finally made it to Panjim by lunch time :) .Boarded another cramped bus to Calangute and we reached perfectly for tea time... Meeting Akki after such a long time eased the fatigue for me...

The hotel that Akki had booked had this old British charm to it with walls made of these hollow bricks and metal boulders...Akki had managed to get hold of one bike, the rest were supposed to picked up once we reach...However getting the bikes looked difficult and worked out expensive when compared to hiring a gypsy...So we decided to hire a gypsy from the very next day as it was already dawn now... Girls being more in number, we got two rooms and the poor guys had to accommodate in a single room... So after a quick shower, all of us had to satiate our hunger...

We had the first taste of booze, "breezers" on the goan soil...It was a just small trailer of things to follow...After feeding on some chicken noodles, we got back the room...What's xmas without some cake and wine..Maddy n me went n picked up a port wine and a yum chocolate cake from Monginis :)...Thus we upgraded from breezer to wine in a span of two hours... In Goa, yeh sab chalta hai and no one complains....It was dinner time by then n as we decided to party in spite of being sleep deprived the previous night...We ate by a shack close to Mambos and then headed to Mambos on feet ...The house music that played wasn’t all that great and hence we couldn't dance later than 3 a.m..We witnessed some strange people on the dance floor who gave us some entertainment by the way they dressed, danced and exchanged glances....After the not so great dancing at the disc, n , all of us decided to get back to our room..

Walking in streets in wee hours of the morning is something you can think of doing only in goa!!! I love the liberty one gets there :) ...While we walked back to the room, a coffee shop had to grab my attention n those who know me well would also know, that the chances of the place being Cafe Coffee Day is close to 99%..But to my hard luck n space constraints we had to settle down in Barista...Gorged on some sinful yet irresistible brownies with chocolate sauce, Chocó 'o' vlocs n some hot chocolate...Your diet definitely goes to the back burner while you are in goa :)...Finally we reached the room after a crazy n tiring day but yet(may be somethin is missin here) the energy to do a night out...However all of us refrained ourselves to get to bed so that we could catch up on some sleep which our bodies craved for but finally decided to go get some rest...

The perfect vacation is when you have no particular itenary to stick by and just do what you feel like ...Our mantra was simple n we stuck by it..The next morning all of us got up lazily, freshened up at leisure and almost had a brunch of indianized continental French toasts, burnt bed, butter n jam spreads and scrambled eggs which had absolutely no taste... While the girls got ready, Maddy and Akki went n picked up the gypsy...Getting to drive the gypsy was on my mind and I had to fulfill this time since my dad's name is abbreviated to gypsy( satiating this desire was more like a necessity)..

Heading to Calangute beach was the next thing that came impromptu...I always felt a few kgs lighter in Goa (may be the toning up paid off) , so did the others I think...so we decided to have our lunch by the shacks again... After a few round of breezers and beer we ordered all of our fave seafood...”Goan fish curry “is something which i never recommend...It's more like a sweet dish with lots of vinegar ...The crew being hard core khara eating people (Mangys and Mallu's ) ,we could hardly have a spoonful or two..Pali succeeded in convincing the waiter to get us two bowls of ice cream in trade for the bad food he had served when. He took his revenge by serving us with ice creams with a hair strand neatly hidden...That was the final nail in the coffin....The female clan lost their cool and we almost picked up a cat fight with the shack owner...n thanks to Anish to bring to my notice that while the girls were having an heated conversation, the men were playing pool not even bothered about the ruckus...


After the disheartening food, it was time to soak up some sun by the beach and indulge in some water sports...While we changed to the beach wear Anish, Maddy n Akki got at their artistic best turning Darshan into a crocodile literally :)....To me he looked more like a male mermaid :P..We decided to enkindle our experience of the banana ride once again. The girls decided to go first...After a lot of persuasion we got Arpi to join us too though she hardly had the slightest clue that we would dropped in mid sea...So when we actually got dropped, Arpi became frantic and since she is a hydrophobic, she was stunned... [Not that we are ace swimmers ,we tried to put some tips to practice from the few classes that Pals , Tina n me attended] ..The rest of us looked like these small toads beating our legs but hardly moving forward...The boatman, I’m sure had his laugh seeing all of struggling and he toiled more to pull us back on to the banana shaped air filled boat... Arpi made the boatman's day for sure as she refused to let go off him and hugged him tightly fearing she would drown...The boys followed us ,except for Akki who took care of all our back by the beach side...Guess he didn’t want to lose his ear studs like the last time...


We were finally chased out of the beach by the life guards post 6:30 coz of the high tides...I had to steal this liner from Anish ,the ride made sure our annual salt intake was met ...The fun filled day came to an end with a nice dinner at the same place where we had when we had visited Goa the previous time...Prawn biriyani's were savored as we dined in the candlelight...Photo sessions followed with all the girls posing as noories and finally we headed out to the beach again for some or photos n fun.... The night had just set in....


So we all decided to just kick start the night with some drinks included water too: P.. When the wine goes in, strange things come out and that’s what happened...A gist of events is well summarized and written as a short poem by our great author Anish..

"Glasses were spilled and broken;
vows of not drinking were broken!
Broken hearts were remembering someone dear,
under the influence of the rum, vodka and beer!
Pegs were gulped down in numbers many,
and the words echoed "Sumi u r so funny"!
Stools were used to plug chargers in,
and some tried to take a balcony walk in!
Some anxious angry moments followed,
only for some more booze to be swallowed!
One plus one seemed three, as all were talli,
and the only sober person left was dear Pali!
Night passed away & then came the morning,
and someone decided it was time do some walking!"


One by one all of us were talli n out beginning from me, Akki, Arpi, Tina, Maddy, Anish and finally Mr. Awesome Darshan...The only survivor was Pali...[She should definitely join Mr. Mallya kingdom as a spirit taster as her spirits never go high n she keeps wondering why?]I'm not gonna elaborate on the events what happened for those of u who missed it, plz feel a little bad ...buhahaha...Except for the last line, an incident which really got us back to our senses... All of us talli were spilling the drinks all over the place and "Paapa Pali " was exhausted cleaning up the mess..Paapa anish also helped her generoulsy....I had almost come back to my senses and we both managed put everyone to sleep except Mr. Awesome aka Darshan..


We had just hit the sack when Dars started his rounds outside our room. The day had just begun for Akki junior and he assured that he would go to bed after a few drinks. After every drink Dars would walk back to his room in a straight line as though he was rope walking and get another peg...We weren't convinced though, so we waited for him to take another two and then forced him to get to bed...Pali was smart enough to hide the drinks and he still keeps blaming us for it:)..Finally after running all the errands we finally rested ourselves and just closed our eyes when Anish called me up to inform that Darshan had walked out of the room...Anish was too sloshed n sleepy not in a position to go stop him :)


We dragged ourselves from the bed and went down to searching for Darshan...The dawn had broken to the day and it was already 6.00 a.m when we went to bed....After looking for him in the restaurant and a few shops nearby, we decided to come back and catch up some sleep for half an hour and then continue our hunt..In the hope of waking up in half an hour, we were shocked when finally got up after 3 hours again by Anish's frantic call regarding Darshan disappearance... It had been almost 4 hours since Darshan went missing n this really scared the shit out of us...All of us started running helter skelter searching for him...Maddy, Pals and Tina went searching for him in and around Calangute in the gypsy while Anish n me set out on foot searching on the beach..We were scared to inform Akki guessing his reaction...Finally I disclosed to him n things heated up when we tried reaching his friends ; even they didn’t have any clue abt him...All the running around went in vain when we couldn’t find him anywhere..

Anish n me were just heading back when Darshan returned home just to know that Darshan had walked all the way to Baga beach in his subconscious mind, had a sound sleep on one of the benches and even robbed off his fave Puma sandals....Dars darling had then woken up to our luck and to his shock he realized he was all this while in the beach and that too so far off from the room...He managed to get a drop back to the room from a phirang...The episode of how much free gyan he got from all of us and specially the blasting and the whip he got from Akki is censored :P... Jokes apart, we were all glad to have him back safely n soon it was time to get started with the day...

The next day was another lazy one and it started with a brunch in a nicely decorated shack by Angoda beach..We sat in the first floor of the shack facing the sea and had the perfect seating of low lying beds and cushions ...The best part about the beach was that it was less crowded n not at all commercialized..So after two action packed days, it was more like a chilled out day...We played dumbchardes when Akki got these idea of playing football on the beach...Akki and Mads went out to get football while we lazed around drinking mock tails and having pancakes..Finally they returned with a Frisbee disc instead of football and all of us took turns n played...From there we headed to rocky side of the beach after picking up pastries n patties from Monginis..

We tried and relived the moments of our previous trip as we had almost done the same the last time...All of us gazed into the horizon even though it was dark n it just looked a straight line separating the sky and the sea..Maddy and Akki were kind enough to let me drive the gypsy for close to 200ms...It was dinner time by then , so we changed and then headed for dinner by to a restaurant close by...


The night didn’t end there, In goa you go to bed at the crack of the dawn.So we decided to have our second not so crazy night but swore by ourselves that it shouldn't get as wild as the previous night and so Dars Swore by us that he wouldnt do his walking again..Most of us were exhausted after two continous night outs..Sumi was the first one to hit the bed after a glass of wine, followed by Arpi n then Pals..All of us just had the enough energy to just finish our drink and crash onto the bed and we did just the same....

All of us freshened up quickly , packed our bags n decided to have our breakfast of burnt toast n butter for the final time :)..A lot of photos clicked and memories captured, we left the resort with a heavy heart having a ball of time in the hotel n those unforgettable crazy nights :)...Few more hours left to hand over the gypsy, we went to the Golconda fort for few of the first timers to Goa like Arpi, Sush n all...Pali n I stayed back at the gypsy taking care of the baggage n also to avoid getting tanned...The sun was glazing hot, n while the rest roamed around the fort taking pictures, we stayed back sipping some nariyal paani :)...


God wasn’t kind this time around in case of food as we landed up in another hopeless restaurant where we were served with uncooked rice..Belly baba aka Maddy entertained us with his whacky one liners all through out the trip...Looking a not so good looking fish fry , he cracked another one " Fish is dry, but its is fry"...All of were in splits hearing that....Having some chicken and mushroom patties pre lunch was one good thing that we did...It was time to hand over the gypsy and the feeling of leaving goa started sinking in ...

The final thing on the itenary was to visit the St Francis church , we thought we should end the trip on a holy note..The church was closed when we reached so all we could see is the xmas decorations the crib, the xmas tree n so forth ...After clicking a few pics, it was time to depart...Akki and Dars were leaving to Mlore from there...The rest of us boarded a cab to Vasco to catch our train...

With heavy hearts and a unanimous feeling of "Dil maange more”, and at the same time a feeling of contentment filled ourselves... A trip with nice blend of people who hardly knew each other and a few who knew the others too well resulted into an equation of new friendships and the older ones cemented...All of us just echoed one phrase “Goodbye Goa, Rock Blore" as the new year eve was about to unfold...

PS: This guy has been one of the main sources of inspiration for me to write and complete the blog...The moment he wrote the poem on the fateful night, I had made up my mind that at least for the poem's sake I need to write this...Anish aka fluffy dog, the chief editor of my blog, thanks a ton for helping me out write my first ever blog...Heaven forbid if I don’t mention, all my friends who made it to the trip and those who didn’t, love you all..... :): D: P