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Published: March 27th 2013
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We decided to forego our first Indian train ride from Kerala to Goa and flew with P. from Portugal (honestly, I don’t know what protocol is when using people’s names, and I didn’t ask him for permission, so I’ll just call him “P.”) after we’d found a good deal in a flight. We’ve had plenty of interesting train rides since then…
Back in Portugal, P. works for a charitable Christian organization and was visiting (inspecting?) a children’s home in Goa for which he’d procured funds some years ago and took us along with him, assuring us that he’d help us find a hotel room after the visit. What began as just a free ride from the airport turned into a wonderful visit when we were greeted by the smiling faces of 32 children, fresh-squeezed pineapple juice, and a tour of the home. P.received a bouquet of flowers.
The children’s home is part orphanage, part religious school run by an Indian Christian couple. They started the home several years ago as a place of refuge for poor and/or displaced children in the area; the majority of the children live at the home, but some only attend
classes there. Being humble people, we didn’t hear about the many accomplishments of the home from its coordinators, but P. praised the home’s children as having the highest marks in school, with many of them going on to college and professional careers, becoming contributing members of society – in other words, from impoverished streets to productive lives. The home also educates the inhabitants of near villages on women’s rights (if you’re tuned into Indian news lately, you know how important this is) and stresses education and careers for women versus the usual marriage at 12-14 years old. I was really impressed with the place myself, and immediately saw ways I could assist in their mission. Once I get a job again, I know where my donations are going: the place could use a fresh coat of paint and the children sleep on hard, worn mattresses, and some on just a slab of wood under a blanket.
As we were leaving the home - with our shoes already back on - to search for a hotel in the neighboring city of Panjim, we were abruptly invited back into the house; we caught a glimpse of one of the
older kids coming out of a car with two bouquets of flowers and quickly understood that, because we were unexpected guests, they did not greet us with flowers as they had done with P., so they sent out one of the kids to buy flowers for us as well. We graciously accepted and then snapped some pictures with the kids. They’re good people.
With our visit truly concluded at this point, we piled into a van with the home’s organizer, P. and a couple of the kids to search for a hotel in Panjim, which is, objectively stated, a filthy, rat-infested hole of a town. The first couple hotels we tried would not take foreigners (later we learned that the Indian government is dutiful in keeping tabs on the whereabouts of tourists, requiring certain paperwork to be filed by hotels that provide amenities to tourists – not all hotels wish to file this paperwork, however), the next few we tried were so foul, we gagged at the sight of them. One in particular will forever be emblazoned on my mind, with brown grime and green slime leaking from the toilet and – which I barely missed stepping
in - cat poop sullying the floor (we thought the cats were cute when we first entered this defiled establishment). We realized after a few more goes at various places that budget accommodation was just not going to work out for us in Panjim (so...“this” was the dirty India everyone was talking about) and went mid-range with a place recommended by Lonely Planet called Mayfair Hotel. It was clean, run by people with some sense of standards, and had an adjacent restaurant that no longer served dinner, but only breakfast, due to, according to the owner, heightened competition from the casinos built on the Mandovi River. It was a shame too: the restaurant had a Portuguese charm, surprisingly comfortable concrete chairs that jutted out from the concrete floor, and a romantic black-and-white wall painting by Mario de Miranda depicting a man with a guitar serenading a young lady in a cafe.
The following day we took a 30-minute bus ride to Old Goa, a 16
th century Portuguese settlement that was once called the “Rome of the East”. The churches and cathedrals were imposingly beautiful, especially the Basilica of Bom Jesus, a looming red-brick structure that made me
reminisce of Chicago a bit. The basilica also houses the remains of Goa’s patron saint, St. Francis Xavier, which, due to the positioning of the coffin high above the viewers, cannot really be viewed, but can be peeked at through glass panes in the coffin. Some fantastic paintings by surrealist painter Dom Martin are housed in the basilica’s museum. On the other side of the street from the basilica stands Se Cathedral, which is the largest church in all of Asia, built in 1652. It houses the Golden Bell, which, in turn, is the largest bell in all of Asia. As is true in all of Goa, but most certainly in Old Goa, Christianity abounds: the Portuguese ecclesiastically spotted the entire state with Christian motifs and –as sacrosanct as religion is in general to Indians, and there is no reason it should not be so with a minority religion in this case - the Goans have made their staunch Christianity very evident in most of the state, to an almost fanatical status. Of note, most citizens of Goa take their religious demarcation from the rest of India even further and do not call themselves “Indians”, but simply “Goans”: independence from
Portugal occurred only a relatively short time ago.
We then headed to Palolem for some more fun in the sun and beach, visiting famous Patnem Beach as well. Again, as in Sri Lanka, the water was soup temperature, sometimes warmer than the air itself. It was here that - comfortable, laid back, relaxed, and well-fed on the best food India has offered us thus far - Klaudia and I definitely concluded that San Diego has converted us into coastal people. However, as nice as the beach was, we were beginning to experience the itch to intensively sightsee again and headed to a travel agency (an alternative to booking at the train station itself, although there is an inexpensive commission) to book a train to Mumbai. We did not have the requisite cash on hand, so the agency gave me a scooter to drive to the ATM – Indian streets are nuts, even a relatively simple and uncongested beach road.
Next day it was up to Mumbai for – as I now realize - some “real” India.
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