The Goan Files : Part 4 : Night 1 Goa

Ok well, after we got through our first day at Goa with a lot of "sight" seeing and lots more fun, people decided that the fun we were having just wasn't enough and had to be taken to the next level. What with it being Hanumanth's birthday the next day, our soon-to-be birthday boy gallantly offered that the drinks would be on him. Not to miss such a golden opportunity, people jumped at the offer and stopped in the evening at a shop for some heavy duty shopping. You should have seen the sight. People bickering over prices, brands, percentage of alcohol and in the midst of all this me and Praneet were settling the Ferry ride matter with the bus driver. it took some time, but finally the bottles were ready to be packed and to be uncorked that evening.

Now, before we come to all the juicy part, i want to start it off with a warning to all readers.

WARNING :: ALL THOSE PEOPLE SHOWN IN THE PICTURES THAT I PUT UP MAY BE DRUNK OR MAY NOT BE DRUNK. JUST BY APPEARING IN THE PICTURES IT DOES NOT CERTIFY THAT THE PERSON WAS DRUNK. I HAVE JUST SELECTED SOME GOOD RANDOM PICS AND PUT THEM UP. MOREOVER, SOME PEOPLE HAVE ASKED ME NOT TO TAKE NAMES, SO GENERALLY I SHALL NOT TAKE ANY NAMES.

Now lets come to the important part. Well, after the day was over and the night dawned, all the people congregated in one room and decided that the party would take place right here and right now. Plastic chairs were brought in, set in order around a table, soft drinks bottles and packets of chips were opened, glasses arranged for everyone who was going to participate in the boozing session and then finally the bottles were brought out.

Explaining the real boozing session would be a big drag and a bore. it's what happened after was what was fun. Well, after most of us had managed to get drunk ( I swear i just took a sip of diluted vodka), they decided that it would be cool going for a walk on the beach at 2 in the night. not to be left out, everyone volunteered and we set off for the beach. More than half of us couldn't walk in a straight line and a few even complained that they were afraid of dogs and the dark and the likes. Finally making it to the beach, we non drinkers were afraid that some of the drinkers might do something unexpected. Goan beaches being unsafe at night, no one knew what lurked in the dark, so all the non drinkers walked around the entire group keeping a general eye over the others. After whiling away time till everyone arrived ( we were waiting for Praneet, Kicha and Arvind), we walked around 1 km and finally stretched out on the sand where there was some light. While the drunk monkeys made fun of each other and blabbered some shit, Ram Ishwar and me discussed some important matters ( If you are reading this :P) till people finally got bored of poking fun at each other and making silly jokes and decided to go back to the resort.

The fun was barely over. As we walked back to our resort, we came across a karaoke bar, where some of the more drunken people who were at the front entered the place on seeing some drunk chicks who were dancing and singing along with their drunk boyfriends. Not that they had a chance anyway, one of my close friends went inside and slapped a foreigner guy across his face and then coming to his senses apologised profusely. The foreigner guy, being equally drunk, kept winking at my friend and all i could do was drag him out of the joint before the foreigner made some indecent advances.

Walking on, we reached an open bar where some foreigner chick was dancing around in apparent ecstasy after consuming alcohol or maybe drugs and was slowly stripping down. Waiting to see more, we were soon shouted at by the drunk bar owner and thus disappointed we proceeded on to our hotel. Sitting opposite to the magnificent football ground for a few minutes we chatted a while and then took leave of the others and went on to our respective rooms. The clock read 3:35 when we finally entered our room and we were so tired that we immediately jumped onto our beds and fell asleep.

I may not have done full justice to this portrayal of the first night we had in Goa. It feels really lame and weak while talking about it. All i can say is that you should have been there and experienced it first hand, because it was a sight worth watching.

The next day was equally eventful, but it makes for a separate entry. Till then, enjoy some of the pictures we took that night.

P.S. :: Most of the drunkards don't look high. I leave it up to your imagination and knowledge to guess who was drunk and who wasn't, 'coz i ain't gonna tell you.

Till Next Time,
Ciao

~DUNNO WHAT THEY ARE DOING~

~ON OUR WALK~

~INTERROGATION~

~WASSUP WITH THEIR HANDS (EEEEKKKKKK)~

~CERTIFIED NON DRINKER~

~HMMM...SUSPICIOUS. DEEPU LOOKS HIGH~

~WATCHDOGS~

~SOME PEOPLE JUST LOVE THE CAMERA~

~I SWEAR I WASN'T DRUNK~

~VETTI PIC #1~

~VETTI PIC #2~

~VETTIEST PIC. PRABU SHOWING ATTITUDE~


Please do leave some comments guys.... if i have forgotten anything, just jot it down in the comments and that shall help me better this blog.

The Goan Files : Part 3 : Day 1 Goa

DAY 1 ::

So finally after all the ups and downs we had and after encountering all types of weird people God could throw at us we made it to Vasco station and got down from the train and did a head and luggage check. The tour company which had organised our trip was expected to pick us up from the station and drop us at our resort and serve us for the day. Unlike our last IV where the bus kept us waiting for about an hour, this time the bus driver was already waiting for us at the station. Leading us outside we saw a row of tour buses standing in line. Moving from one AC coach to the other the driver stopped at the most rickety, old and broken down bus imaginable and announced that this was our bus. Spirits were high and we took all this in our stride and stuffed our luggage in and took our seats.

just to let the readers know, Panaji is about 30 kms far from Vasco Da Gama station and Calangute a further 15 kms from Panaji. Normally this distance would take about half an hour to about three quarters of an hour in a decent car or even a bus as the roads of Goa are mostly devoid of traffic and it seems like the Municipal Corporation does a good job maintaining the roads. But this was not the case with our bus, which on a level road had a maximum speed of about 30 km/hr but uphill it reduced to about 5-10 km/hr - just enough to counter Earth's gravitational pull and move ahead at snail's pace.

Lack of sleep, exhaustion and excitement added to the calm and quiet environs and soon everyone was asleep, but not before witnessing an awesome bridge and the breathtaking sight of a huge inlet of water flowing through; mostly a backwater or a lagoon. We all were jarred awake as the bus screeched to a halt and we were at our resort. Unloading our luggage we looked around to find the resort looked quite reasonable and had a huge professional looking football ground next to it. The only thing missing was the Calangute beach which was said to be 5 minutes away. Forgetting that for the moment we entered the gates of the resort with our luggage and Praneet, Hanumanth and Pradeep went into the reception to enquire about the rooms. In this "cycle gap" we looked around to find that the resort even had a pool, which had a maximum depth of 5 n a half feet and a length of about 10 feet, thus making it look like a small fountain instead of a pool. Anywayz, we soon got a room key and went up to the room and immediately made ourselves at home by opening our suitcases, pulling out clothes and other stuff, switching on the TV and throwing our slippers in some corner of the room.

Me, Prabu, Karthik and Pradeep had to share a room but RamIshwar joined us as one room was not free and would be given to us only in the evening. After we had settled down we realised we were so hungry we could eat a horse. On opening the Menu card we received the biggest shock of our life. The prices reads like this :

Plain Omlette : 65
Veg. Sandwich : 65
Pav Bhaji : 65
Cheese omlette : 75
Tandoor Dishes : 100-150
Butter naan : 35 each !!
Fresh juice : 100

And

Whisky : 25
Vodka : 20
Fenny : 20
ScrewDriver :120 (ONLY!!)

We decided to share the expense and ate something to fill our starving stomachs and then proceeded to bathe and dress for the day ahead. Once everyone was dressed we all congregated to find out the plans for the day only to find that there weren't any, so some of us proceeded on to find Calangute beach and then head back for an update. Walking for about 15 minutes bought us to a beautiful beach: sparkling sand, foreigners lying about in various states of nudity and clear and calm waters. After loitering about for a while we headed back with this news towards the hotel to find that finally some plans had been made. the plan was to utilise the bus to go to Colva beach (another awesome beach) as it was available to us for the day. On talking to the driver, the old lunatic refused to go anywhere except 3 places : Miramar Beach, Dona Paula and Old Goa.

Agreeing to his plans, we first stopped at a restaurant and filled up a bit before proceeding on to Miramar beach , which was nothing but an empty beach, where only fishermen boys used to play. Taking a few pics, we then proceeded on to Dona Paula, where we found out that we had to walk for about 2 kms to reach the spot. Shunning this place too, we then proceeded on to Old Goa to see St. Xaviers Church. I'm sure our driver was drunk as he hit the pavement with his wheels and gave us all a moment of panic. Finally making it to the Church, all of us disembarked and got ourselves some drinks to quench our thirst before actually going in and seeing the beautiful Church.

On returning the driver tells us that we need to catch the ferry ride which the Resort booked for us without even asking us and when we refused to go to the ride, he stopped the bus and started shouting at us. After a call to the Resort, which involved Praneet shouting at the Receptionist and the Receptionist shouting at the driver, things were sorted out and we stopped at a bar to buy some drinks for the evening as it was Hanumanth's bday the next day and the drinks were on him, we finally reached our resort. On hearing the Calangute reports from us , all of the others decided that the beach was worth checking out and so we proceeded on to the beach, where almost all of us go jumped into the water and enjoyed for about an hour before it became dark and it was time to head back.

Well, this was our first day at Goa. The night is a yet another tale and i shall tell you that in the next post. Till then, i leave you with some pictures of our resort, the beaches and the places that we visited on the first day.

~THE RESORT~

~THE POOL/FOUNTAIN~

~THE FOOTBALL GROUND~

~FIELD TOP RESTAURANT~

~MIRAMAR BEACH~

~OLD GOA/ ST. XAVIERS CHURCH~

~TIRED BUT HEADING BACK TO CALANGUTE BEACH~

~HAVING FUN AT CALANGUTE BEACH~


Till next time,
Ciao

The Goan Files : Part 2 : the Journey

Thank you for sticking around and bearing with me and my irregular posting habits. Let us now embark on the second part of the journey where i shall tell you about the trip from Chennai to Goa....

Starting off from Chennai Central, we were on the Brindavan Express to Bangalore which was scheduled to reach Bangalore Station around 1:30 p.m. Everyone was present and seated and the journey begun. Bored from watching out the windows and looking at the same old crap we all took to doing something else viz. listening to music, taking lotsa pics and playing UNO....Ahhhh...here is where our UNO proness journey begins...A journey within a journey....All in all i think we played UNO so much that if someone slapped us while we were sleeping at night we would have shouted UNO before saying What the hell..!!



So well, we played UNO, we ate bajji, drank lotsa Pepsi and coke and drove away an "Ajak" before Praneet announced that we were less than half an hour away from Bangalore. the first part of our journey was coming to an end as the train entered into the Bangalore City station. Our next train was from Yeshvantpur station which was a little distance from the City station. This is where i shall show you the honesty of Bangalore's auto and tour bus drivers. the common question put to them outside the City station was this

Question : How far is Yesvantpur station from here?

Answer 1 :: About 6 kms

Answer 2 :: About 15 kms

Answer 3 :: About 11 kms

Answer 4 :: About 12 kms

Answer 5 :: About 9 kms

Not knowing whom to believe and unwilling to take the risk of missing the next train which was slotted to leave at 3:15 p.m. we talked to a tour bus owner who settled on a price of 800 for about 12-15 kms which seemed appropriate to us. Starting from Bangalore City station we witnessed an eternal comedy, a universal law.

Law :: A tour vehicle operator's first stop will be the petrol bunk.

So after filling up on his gas tank at our expense he proceeded to take us to Yesvantpur station. Oh, i almost forgot about the bus. Ok, let your imagination run riot.

Holes everywhere
All seats broken
Cockroaches crawling all around
And an unworldly stink

thinking of the good times ahead (Kingfisher style) we bore all the shit silently and kept looking at the horrible streets of Bangalore. To our surprise, the driver proclaimed that we had reached and it was hardly 15 minutes since we had started ( including the tank filling session). After getting our luggage down, we had a long fight with the driver regarding his exorbitant prices and then finally managed to get the price down to 750 ( who knew that our bargaining skills will get better with time).

So well, after whiling away some time and walking a lot to reach the platform from which we had to catch the Vasco express ( Yesvantpur - Vasco Da Gama), we finally reached the train and went up to look at the seating list only to find that all our seats were separate but that there was a gang og hot girls ( all aged 23-24) moving with us to Vasco. Ah, the sight. Every one of us wanted a seat next to them ( typical guy mentality) and after lot of snap taking and sight-aditchifying the train finally begun.

Reaching Tumkur at around 6 we had our first break when all of us got down to stretch our legs and get some fresh air, whihc only resulted in Ela and me catching cold and Avinash catching a fever. None of us needed an iPod or a walkman as the girls next to us were in full flow playing antakshari.

Beautiful girls, beautiful voices, beautiful view....Ahh the life....And while we are at this how could i forget to mention Kichma's mokkai. Our MGR Krishnamurthy was playing UNO cards when one of the girls had to pass him and she said "Excuse me". Our Kichma instantaneously strikes back with a "Yes, Come in". none of the boys or the girl knew what to do for about 5 seconds, after which she passed and all of us were rolling on the floor with laughter.

Apart from this and a few more incidents like the Mortal Kombat remake staged by Praneet and me playing Scorpion and Rayden respectively showing off our fatalities, our cool boy Ashwath put kadalai to some girls and when the foreigner lady told us to switch off the light, we still didn't switch it off for another 2 hours, how we got food at Hubli station at 12:30 in the night, how me and Praneet shared a seat and couldnt sleep the whole night while Anand slept like a baby in all kinds of poses, how we finally got pissed and woke Ashwath up and told him that we had reached and when he got down Praneet grabbed his seat and i grabbed the other one and finally went to sleep.

When i woke up, the morning was cold, the air nippy with cold and obscure with fog before we finally entered Vasco station.

Enough for now....Part 3 will come up soon and i shall continue from there...

Hang on guys,
Ciao

The Goan Files : Part 1 : The journey begins

So well...this is the journey to Goa through my eyes. Please note that the entire journey is portrayed through my eyes and is my rendering only, with some inputs if need be from karthik, prabu, praneet or ankit.

Moving on, please do not complain if you do not like certain parts or the entire rendering of the journey we all took together. It is my blog after all !!

THE PREVIOUS NIGHT :

Well, it was a warm and humid Monday night on the 10th of March and we were undertaking a life changing journey the next day. No one knew that during the entire trip we took together we would see new things, experience new sights and sounds, have loads of fun and some fights too thrown in here and there. We had our agreements and our differences, but in the end it all turned out well and we all made it through the trip in one piece with loads of memories and still more pictures which i would put in this blog as the chapters progress.

So, bringing you back to the Monday evening, we were supposed to catch a train the next day at 7 o' clock in the morning. Not that it is a problem for me, but from what i heard many were acting grumpy and dissing the Indian Railways for not having better trains at better times at even lower prices than those existing. So well, me having spent the whole day at MGM Dizzee World, which is actually so shitty now that people have completely abandoned the place and go to VGP instead, i was supposed to be excited and all worked up as we were actually going to Goa of all places. Getting the permission for the trip could fill another blog, but we would leave that for later. Sadly though, hours of traipsing through an empty MGM amusement park had sapped quite a lot of energy and i was dead tired and was just about falling asleep when i was jarred awake by a SMS.

Sender : Pradeep
Message : Be at Chennai Central by 6:45 a.m. definitely. Coach D7. And the others are asking you to bring your bat.

My reply was :

Sender : Kshitij
Message : Really. No chance.

THE NEXT DAY :

Getting this done, i put an alarm for 5 a.m and went to sleep at 12 midnight. Normally i am a 10 to 6 type of guy but well the excitement finally caught up with us ( ask praneet later) and 5 hours of sleep felt just about enough. After some hectic last minute preparation and being on the recieving end of some seriously heavy duty advice from my parents and my grandfather, i was finally ready to push off and push off i did at around 6:15.

On the way out ticket holder, Praneet, messages me and asks me which platform the train was coming as he had not even started and this info would help him cover some more ground. Sadly though i hadnt reached and i left him to his own devices for the moment. At the station, i looked up the info and relayed it to Praneet and set about finding other guys when i saw someone who looked like Archit. Remembering that he was not coming, i moved closer just to fin that he was some " vetti " guy who looked ike him. Turning back with diappointment, i see Easwaran walking past and calling out to him, we both went and met the rest of the people present - Ankit, Karthik, Easwaran, Hemanth and me. The 5 of us then moved on to find our compartment and on finally locating it moved on to look at the seat allocation when a familiar voice shouts out "Mr. Ankit B. Patel". For those of you who don't know who calls him that, it is our very own "MGR", Mr. Colour-Colour Krishnamurthy himself. Sitting on his allocated seat Mr Colour Colour had made it to the station by 6:15 itself, 1 hour before the train was scheduled to leave, and had occupied his seat for fear of losing it to someone else. About to enter the compartment, we spot Pradeep, Mahesh, Avinash and Arun making it towards us and decide to wait it out for them. Meeting up, we all kept our luggage inside and come back out on the platform to spot Mr. M and Jagadeesh weaving through the crowds towards us. On their tail was our hero Prabu along with his dad. As Prabu introduces us to his Dad, Gopi walks past shouting curses at Mr Flood, Gopalakrishnan, as he had still not reached the station and it was 7:05. By 7:10 almost everyone was there, including Hanumanth, Praneet, Ashwath, Guruswamy, Ela and all the others whose names i have forgotten to take.

7:13 and still no sign of Gopalakrishnan ( i'll call him Gops from now on), when after some hectic phone calls, word finally reaches that he has reached Park Station and would be there in 5 minutes. Sensing danger, it seems like Gops started running full pelt towards teh station and made it just in time to jump in and for the train to start.

Quite an auspicious beginning many may call it, but well, we had our share of thrills and chills, dangers and safety, and we come out of it all with a lot of knowledge about the world outside the state of Tamil Nadu.

The journey had begun. the rest is yet to come.

Stick around with me for the rest of the journey. I promise it would be someting you would loath to miss.

Till then,
Ciao