Goa - 7 years on

Well its probably not 10 years since we last went... and I am sure Yash will provide a very Subodh ( of Dil Chahta Hai) style of date and time of when we first went to Goa :) , but nevertheless it s always nice to go around with a 'round figure'.. A visit to Goa is always an emotional release, frolic laden, and yes memorable.. and from the countless trips that we may have made, with family, friends or even as a couple, this one had to stand out.. as the best in years.. !!

This Goa trip was a first in many ways .... probably one of the first where the number of participants, hit double figures... ( yaayy) :) ... for most it was the first major trips made with their wives... for a certain Ms. Shabana,, it was a FIRST time ever, in Goa..... well you dont count being in Goa as a one year old , as a legitimate trip, do you? We later on bugged her atleast 20 times about how this could be her first trip here :)

But lets go back to where the trip idea originated from. For me and Sandu, the standard reason to go to Goa is almost always the same... the "kool devta" factor. So this idea came up when he announced his promotion to fatherhood status during Vishal's wedding. And ofcourse, when it came to appeasing our gods ( whose mainstay is in Goa) how could anyone of us refuse :D

So the idea spread and was lapped up like by just about everyone ... As the month passed, many more were included, some were cancelled, some were threatening to cancel... the last one allegedly to increase one's value :D .. so there was a stage where just about everyone had thought of cancelling the trip, just for the heck of it.. In the end 10 of us were coming in about 5 different ways... Nevertheless getting there was important...

Day 1 --- 23rd January... 7:30 am - Madgaon stattion, - Our train's arrived about an hour late, . At Dabolim airport, Sandu and co had just landed, so we would be meeting up at the hotel directly.. As we took in the familiar sights and sounds of Goa, it was like deja vu from a year before, Shobana and I had come for the same 'religious' reasons at about the same time ..

We reached Arpora / Bardez into hotel Marinha Dourada, our base for the next 3 days. With a sprawling property complete with it s own big lake, the hotel looked promising. Yes it was a little far from the beaches, but no one was complaining.. What caught our attention outright was the high Firang-to-Indian tourist ratio. almost 90-10. After a quick breakfast in the makeshift breakfast area, which surely was a tennis court a long time ago, we started with our pilgrimage... well the religious one anyway, the teerth would be served later.. But we had our goals clear.

With the help of really complex mathematical calculations, (which would have done a Mortgage Derivative trader proud ) we figured that God's range from his temple was about 1.6 kms... anything outside that and we could start with the real teerth of Goa .. Somehow this shop called Nikhil wines exactly matched that ominous place.. We had marked that place during our return from the temples.. the first visit was to the Mhalsa Devi temple, the kooldevi of the Sandu family.. only about a km away was our Kooldeva temple, the Mangeshi. Sandu turned a bright green with envy, when he saw scores of people visiting the Mangeshi, while a handful few visited his Mhalsa Devi temple..

Now I am not one looking for competition here, but it was his observation... and this despite the fact that Mangeshi as the so called Marathi supremacists in our group allegedly the tribal's temple . Beke are you reading this..??

After the temple visits were done, true to our word, the first bottles of Bacardi breezers were opened, a thunder from a cloudless sky, a thousand drums roared, the wind blew wildly......and thus began the Goa trip- 2009...

Our first lunch was right in the busy streets of Panaji ( busy by Goa standards, meaning about 10 people in the afternoon ), in a restaurant called Ritz... not to be mistaken with the Carlton Ritz, but nevertheless served an excellent blend of Goanese cuisine... The place was so full, we had to keep staring at a family out of their tables.... one of them was eating so slowly, our own Harshad Apte would have finished faster.. anyways the lunch was fantastic.. with all the fish and prawn curry flowing, set the tone up for our trip. We were back in our hotels and tired that we were missed, out the sunset that day. Husain and Perin were to arrive in the evening, and much to our surprise, Husain managed to reach the hotel, without losing his way half way into Karnataka.. I guess we should give Perin the credit for holding the map up the right way :) Shobana, Shabana and Padmini had a sudden urge to go shop in the evening... and once they were all done, we all met up at the Shining Star shack.. by this time Sandu had already sat up facing the beach and was on to his drinks .. Serving up was an innocent waiter, Mahesh,( in the background) who was to later on hear about how 50 rupees will be worth 50 lakhs.. but more on that in a bit...

Mean while, Husain and Perin had already started soaking in their first trip in Goa together... Husain was 'soaking' in more just than the trip... His antics of shouting (and quite excitedly) and pushing wildly, combined with the ever-so-innocent knack of forgetting , managed to soak in 3 cell phones by the end of that evening. His own, Shabana's and Sandu's; all 3 phones got to know how salty the waters at Baga are.. 2 days later, Perin also managed to get her phone to taste the saline waters of Morjim :) .. so i guess its contagious.. Back at the shack, we were all singing to the songs played... not in our shack but the one beside ours. Its always that way! Idhar ka khao aur udhar ka sunow...

Anyways the evening went on.. and the drinks and the food just piled on... some of us were drunk, getting there... and some like Husain didnt need to get drunk... we even coined a phrase for him.. You know how those North Pole and South Poles have ice throughout the year.. called Permafrost.. we called him Permadrunk.. he didnt need to get drunk to get high.. But he put it to good use entertaining us in his own, ways.. Then he suddenly had the urge to show us the Orion Constellation... Check him out in action below
By the end of it, we wanted to show him some stars of our own.. with our fists... you know.. Taare Zameen Par !! :)

Anyways, now during all this, there was this innocent waiter, Mahesh, who was serving us up and listening to our tantrums, Sandu s senti statements, everything hoping that he d make a decent buck at the end of the dinner... But at the end, when he got like a 50 rupee tip.. , he was obviously quite disappointed i guess. I mean firangs pay thousands and all. That s when our man Sandu got into action.. he started explaning him.. dekh.. teray ko baaki log 1000 deta hoga lekin tuu uska kya karega.. Girlfriend pay kharcha karega, daaru aur cigarette lega... ye woh karega.. sab salaaa waste... but yaad rakh ye jo 50 rupyaa mila hai.jo mainey diya hai.. iska 50 Laakh banegaa......how he would do that was quite unclear.. but the end objective was clear.. 50 lakh.. Mahesh was thinking of returning even that 50 bucks instead of listening to Sandu s gyaan :D

Thus ended Day 1 .. and with some more joining in it it was only about to get better ....

DAY 2 - 24th January..

According to another complicated bit of Mathematics by Ashish Beke, 24 Jan is supposed to be the saddest day of the year.. Whether he made it up cos Harshad had blown up enough Eagles in Tank during our childhood or not one is not sure.. But anyways this was Harshad s 30th Birthday.. and considering that Beke was not in Goa, it surely must have been the saddest day atleast for himself :D... Harshad and Manjiri were there bright and true in the early hours of that day.. Suhas was supposed to land up by about 10:30, and he did, so that completed just about everyone.. we were 10 us ... and laden with 3 bikes and an Innova ( AC shivaay suukh nai)..

We were off to Chapora fort.. first stop.. Padmini decided to stay back and not climb the fort, given her condition, and for good reason. It was so bloody hot, that the climbed seemed arduous than usual.. All of us were huffing and panting by the time we reached the top.. We WERE gettting old !!

ON TOP OF THE CHAPORA FORT

With Chapora fort conquered, it was now time to go over to another fort... Aguada... we reached there in time for lunch ... Lunch for us is anytime some one s not having breakfast or dinner ... we anchored up at a shack at Aguada...while some of us went for a dip.. Husain and Perin even managed to get some water sports activities out there.... Apte caught a power-nap.. Sandu was upto his statements, Suhas making contorted faces while looking into nothingness and I was drinking.. Business as usual!!


Then a short stop at Calangute... an awesome sunset... and then and booked a place for 10 at… Souza Lobo.. Apte s party place !!

The evening was awesome and had all the makings of a typical Goa evening... Souza Lobo... the stars, the beach, the lobster, the crabs, the fish.. the drinks.. the live music and the dance.. But before that came, the cake... Apte s birthday cake... which Suhas had managed to get fr0m the Calangute market.. The crab cakes were simply mindblowing and so were the prawns..As the evening went on... everyone broke up into a little bit of dance inside Souza Lobo... and our dear Harshad's party was rocking !!!

Day 3 – 25th January

Next morning, while everyone was still recuperating from last evening, Sandu, I , Shoabana and Suhas managed to get a bit of the early sun… and visited Anjuna beach … Sandu even managed to find a dolphin ride boat and we got a truly mindblowing video of a Dolphin Jump. Such videos are always tough to get so it was the best we got… See attached.. Meanwhile the rest of the party was just waking up and had their breakfast and were ready for another day in the sun..

Next Stop :- Morjim Beach.
Our next stop was Morjim Beach, which though in North Goa was not as commercialized or crowded and quite well hidden from the crowd.. Everybody had a bit of a dip in there.. This was exactly where Perin dutifully followed her husband and gave a saline treatment to her mobile phone .. that’s 4 phones conked off in one trip.. Single handedly, we had managed to give the cell phone industry a boost !! Sandu trained Shobana and Perin the art of ‘riding the wave’. Sandu, Perin and Husain later had a full body massage done and joined us for drinks and food soon.. We all broke up into a bit of a song, with my guitar and our voices. I was annoying the hell out of Sandu by asking only Apte to sing.. but what to do I could not sing in the “third chord” style. After some Rock on.. and some Hotel California, it was almost 5:00 pm and time to leave for the sunset.. We missed the sunset yet again though… Some of the ladies went off to shop… for the billionth time.. while we took in the last bit of the twilight at Baga…


In the evening, we decided to be in the hotel itself and sit out on the lakeside with our food and drinks.. We broke into a bit of a song out there as well.. and some Brit guys asked us to play Mamma Mia… I was like .. catch me dead.. hold me upside down, torture me.. but you wont catch me playing a pansy ABBA song… It was almost 26th January, yet another Birthday, this time Suhas.. so at the stroke of 12, he cut a cake.. and another guy stepped into the 30s.. In walked an old Brit lady.. 85 years, could barely talk.. and walk. but still stepped in to wish Suhas a happy birthday .. it was very nice of her.. she could break into a song after every line.. Monalisa being her favourite.. That night ... the ladies went into their rooms together for a bit of 'girl talk' and we were all left alone in one room playing Teen Patthi.. good fun and the line.. Lakhon Kamaayega. Karoddo gavaaega held true.. I won about 50 bucks in the end.. We went off to sleep about 3 am..

Next day was our last day.. I was waking up with a cold so skipped the early morning travel. Sandu and some others did that and we decided to have lunch at Britto's at Baga.. Last meal in Goa.. truely awesome menu, great food.. and generous desserts.. what a way to end our trip.. As we took in the last bit of the sea.. we were jealous of all the others who had taken the next day off to stay back in Goa...

3 Pm at Madgaon station.. The train was late... so we played some Teen Pathii on the platform Sandu could have easily passed off as a Sattaybaaz.. out there... the greatest shock awaited us later.. when Sandu confessed that the tickets were non-AC .. it s been a while since most of us did that.. It was one helluva tiring journey.. complete with some adventure where the train stopped for about 75 minutes.. becuase of engine failure.. But we were back home... at about 12:00 am..

Thus ended an awesome redux to Goa.. A trip that will be etched in memory for ever as one of the best !!!