I took a taxi upon arrival in Madgaon (Margao) train station to Anthy's guest house, which is located in the Sernabatim Beach. It is a quiet and lovely beach.
I was surprised by the city's darkness and filthy roads. The city's design and crowded streets did not appeal to me. Indians' driving is bad. I had to tell the driver twice to slow down.
After few requests I made to improve the hotel room, I settled in Anthy's guesthouse, had dinner, then went to bed. I was so tired: twelve-hour train (from Bombay) plus the stress from the taxi driver and having to walk on sand with my luggages and getting angry at the staff of the guest house who did not help with luggages. The hotel room cost 1400 rupees (or about $38) per night despite lack of air conditioning. It had no soap, toilet paper or trash container. I had to request all of that before I settle in the room. Luckily the bed had a mosquito net. But the location of the guest house was perfect, right on the Arabian Sea with a very romantic setting especially during sunset and evening time.
As usual in this trip I didn't sleep much and woke up at 5 am and couldn't sleep. After the breakfast (at 7:30 am) followed by an annoying episode with a near-by travel agency, I couldn't last beyond 1:45 pm. So I surrendered to sleep until 4 pm. Knowing that I am here for only four days, I considered half of today to have been wasted. After waking up, I immediately took a 20-minute dip in the sea and left at about 5 pm to the train station to cancel my train ticket and purchase a different one to Kerala. I also needed to make flight reservations from Kerala to Bombay. These errands took me three hours to complete with some dosage of aggrevation. While taking care of these errands, I passed by the main market, and other neighboring markets. The market area was crowded, dusty and with badly paved streets; not my idea for a vacation. So I looked so forward when I finished to escape the city and be at the quiet area where my hotel and the Arabian Sea were. When I returned to my hotel, I was instantly relaxed by the sound of sea waves, took deep breaths, had a delicious dinner, chatted with a stranger, and then went to bed.
The Next Days:
Thursday, December 6 was a day on which I did one hour massage, yoga, dancing and (more than yesterday's) swimming; all while at the hotel and Sea shore. I also walked to the neighboring Bernakulim Beach and bought few items. Overall, it was a slow day. Because of this and to avoid boredom, I decided to travel to a different area the next day.
Friday, December 7
Today, december 7th at 1:30 pm, I am sitting at Madgaon (Margao) train station waiting for the 2:30 pm train to Canacona station to visit the Palolem Beach.. The train staion smells like a fish market and is filthy.
I decided to go to Palolem Beach because I was told it was the most beautiful beach in that area. But when I arrived in it, I was surprised again, Is this it? I took video footage of some of the huts and restaurants. Goans are obsessed with the word "paradise". So one sees so many restaurants and geust houses/hotels are called Paradise, but in my definition they far from being a paradise. Overall, it is a small three-quarters of a circle, cozy and naturally beautiful beach, but it has been over rated. Also the tendency is that some waiters follow white tourists and ask them to dine in their restaurants. Something I hated watching. People's behavior tremendously affects the appreciation of beauty and the worth of a place.
The interesting thing was that knowing I look Indian, I was not approached by waiters to dine in their restaurants because this style of what I call begging is only done with white western tourists. Little do they know that westerners do not appreciate this approach. I was upset at Indians' and Nepalis' obsession with western music. At the restaurant, they play nothing, but American/western music, what a complex!
A Nepali waiter at a restaurant on Palolem Beach twice resisted my request to play Indian music. When he told me he doesn't like Indian music ( and began mocking and mimicking Indian songs in front of me), I asked him to play Nepali music. After another hesitation, he played Nepali music fused with western music, making it seems like a disease with no cure-:):)
In fact, his was the only empty restaurant on the beach. The restaurant's menu included Arabic food under an "Israeli Food" title. I brought this fact to his attention and that it should be called Arabic, not Israeli. He said, "you are the first one to make such a comment. Israeli tourists come here and they say it is Israeli." Had there been enough Arab tourists to visit India or good coverage about them in Indian media, people like this ignorant waiter wouldn't have answered so primitively. Had Arabs, again, not been obsessed with the west and spent their money vacationing and living in it, instead had they invested, vacationed, studied and lived in China, India, Japan, Korea and other Asian countries, they wouldn't have been so forgotten and under credited here!! Sadly Asians take most of their news coverage and references about the Arabs and non-Arab middle Easterners from the west. That is what I witnessed from participating in a conference in Amman, Jordan in 2006 on Middle Eastern studies, which was attended by Asians from and Japan and South Korea and from visiting South Korea in August 2005. When uneducated, in fact ignorant, people like this waiter know of Israel and the so-called Israeli food and know nothing about Arabs and simple matters like their cuisine, there is a serious Public Relations (PR) problem here! This is aside from the disappointing Indian politics since the 1990s by shifting toward the right; collaborating with the USA-UK-Israel politics and adopting the corrupt "anti-terrorism" program, which is literally anti-Moslem program! This is also evident in many Hindi films stereotyping Moslems as terrorists!
After I saw how much attention this Nepali waiter paid to white western tourists and how he relatively ignored my requests, I decided to have dinner elsewhere! So he basically lost me, and none of the white western tourists chose his restaurant; not appreciating his begging-style approach! So I had a delicious dinner elsewhere and ended the night with one-hr massage and Hinna foot design. It was a lovely night facing the Arabian Sea with candles all around. Then I took the taxi back to the Margao train station and from there I took another taxi back to Anthy's guest house. I gathered my belongings to be ready for my next-day trip to Kerala.
Part of Saturday, December 8th was in Goa. I enjoyed my last breakfast there, paid my bill and took a white taxi to the train station. This taxi driver's car was very clean and his driving was very good; the first positive experience (and only) with taxi drivers! On top of that, he drove me through beautiful streets and made me see the good sections of Margao city (for a change). He also drove me to a nice store to buy thermus and a tea cup for my train trip. He gave me a ride back to Anthy's guest house to finalize my packing, exchange currency and take my bags to the taxi. When we arrived at the train station, I gave him a generous tip and took his name and number to recommend him to others. He was so polite; the kind you see in movies with the rich and famous:)
