A Day Out in Mapusa (Mapsa)

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Thursday - Day 22

Oh my god, I actually just said 'have you tried turning it off and then on again' to an Indian waiter in a bar...
The Mango tree network is a bit sketchy and there are also a lot of power cuts, which usually only last for ten minutes or so, but can distrupt one's internet session massively, especially if you're uploading photos or talking on Skype.

Today, we went to Mapusa, Kelly, Denis and I. I woke up early enough to be ready and aimed to get to Mapusa by ten ish. Denis tuned up at mine, but realised he needed to go home, so I went to drop my luggage off at Kelly's house because I didn't have a room in the guest house any more. She was pretty much ready, so we got on my bike and went to meet Denis. As we were waiting, Kelly remembered she'd left somthing at home so left me to wait for Denis. Denis then turned up and realised he'd left something else at home so he went back to get it... They both eventually arrive back and we made a move at last!

Denis on one bike and Kelly and I on the other, we started off on our journey to Mapusa. After getting stuck behind a few slow drivers, we overtook them and sped along the rural India roads to our destination. We hit Mapusa in busy traffic and after beeping our horns lots and swerving in and our of traffic (as is the norm here), we parked up.
We started off by going to the post office to find out prices for sending stuff home. I have quite a bit of excess stuff to send home and was planning on buying more today to send for the future - pretty things I couldn't be bothered to carry around the rest of India with me. The post office was a jumble of queues, so we got into the shortest one saying 'multipurpose' above it... little did we know that there was a reason for it being the shortest and that once we'd realised, all the counters said they were multipurpose. After waiting around ten minutes, we asked the lady behind the counter how much postage would be to the UK and she simply told us to go to the first counter where they dealt with packages. We submissively did what she told us and went and stood in the longest queue of them all. We waited around fifteen minutes to get to speak to the lady behind this counter, only to be told that the packages counter was the fourth counter. This was enough. I'd had a bad day yesterday, we'd stood in the queue for long enough and weren't prepared to wait any longer as it was getting late and the shops shut in Mapusa for lunch. We'd aimed to be done in Mapusa by lunch time, so we could eat lunch in a lovely restaurant called Navtara and then go back to Vagator.

Kelly and I waitted outside for Denis, whilst having a crafty cigarette almost outside the police station but behind some steps so the police wouldn't have seen us. Denis eventually appeared and had been asked to provide a copy of his passport to be able to send something off to Ireland. We walked over to a shop that did photocopies but he said he'd sort his post out and go home. So, Kelly and I ventured into the midst of Mapusa in a bid to cheer ourselves up and buy some nice things and to then probably send them from Anjuna rather than Mapusa where the queues were bound to be smaller.

Both Kelly and I were annoyed at the rigmarole surrounding ANYTHING in India. Nothing is easy. Everything ends up being a huge hassle and if you're in a hurry, forget it. I'm looking forward to getting out of India and seeing other places which aren't as much of a stress. Even Kelly was starting to be bored of her time in Goa, so we decided to continue my journey to Gokarna and Hampi together! It's going to be lots of fun and I was really happy she'd decided this. Our ranting to each other as we wandered around Mapusa market actually cheered us up and we continued the rest of our day on quite a high!

The list of things we needed to do in Mapusa included sorting out Kelly's phone at the Nokia service centre. We headed there and left her phone there whilst we went around the market. I looked at some fabric to get a Salwar Kameez (a tradition Indian/Pakistani dress consisting of a long tunic top and some baggy trousers) so I could blend in more as I was travelling around, we drank sugar cane juice, which probably helped massively in perking us up a bit, we saw old Indian ladies selling heaps and mountains of Jaggory ( a really sweet, sugary substance used in a lot of sweets in India), people making flower garlands, little boys behaving like adults and selling their wares with such confidence, women selling baskets of dried fish but nice things mixed in with not so nice things, such as lambs and goats for the slaughter (very sad and the most disgusting smell you can imagine).
Kelly had bought a bedspread and cushion covers the last time she was here, so we went back to the stall as I wanted to have a look. I decided on a few things and told them I'd come back after lunch to collect them so I didn't have to carry them around.

We caught a tuk-tuk (my first time in one and this one was quite rickety) to Navtara restaurant where we ate massive paper dosas and dranks lemon soda (I'm getting quite into those as they're so refreshing). Afterwards, sitting outside having a cigarette, a cow arrived to eat the left overs fom the back of the restaurant. A young lad came out from the kitchen and at first didn't notice the cow next to him... his friends however, had noticed it and locked him out of the kitchen, which they found hysterical. He didn't and actually looked quite scared of the cow. It was funny :-)

We walked back to the market in the heat, crossing busy Indian roads and dodging traffic, to go back to the bedspread stall and the fabric shop. I purchased some lovely, soft purple cotton and the same in turquoise green, then took it to a tailor across the road. Up some tiny rickety stairs was a very small room with a man and a lady inside busily sewing other people's garments. The man measured me up and I left him with my fabric to return on Monday on the way to Palolem to collect it. I was excited... I hope it fits!

We then spent a long time sitting with the people on the stall selling bedspreads - John (18) and Barathi (19). I bought a beautiful wall hanging, decorated with the most decorative beads and embroidery I later found out had been made by Barathi and her family. She said that one double bedspread with full beads and embroidery took a family of six, two months to make. The money they made from selling kept them going through the monsoons. I talked to them about possible wholesale opportunities and got their email addresses for the future... maybe. They were so nice - they gave us a souvenir silk scarf each to remember them by! I also bought a silky double bedspread with two pillow cases and two cushion covers in blue. I'm looking forward to having a residence to use them in!

We collected Kelly's phone, tried once more to find out prices at the Post Office... the people there were so rude and told us to go because they were closing. They had no interest in even giving us rough prices, although a really sweet lady from a shack over the road told us she had a list of prices and to go with her! I nearly cried at how helpful she was even though we were not going to buy anything from her. She simply wanted to help.

On the way home, we took the scenic route past the bus that had overturned a few weeks ago. Someone had up-righted it and it was sitting a bit battered looking in the same place half-way down the hill. We had a cigarette and then went back to Vagator where the internet at Mango Tree didn't work and I didn't sleep very well at Kelly's. Must find somewhere else to stay although I'm grateful to her for letting me kip there.

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