The Irish Connection

I was in Anjuna beach for a few nights, but it wasn't great. Luckily, I managed to ditch my bag and hire a scooter fairly easily and cheaply, so I've nipped up north to Arambol beach. It's a lot nicer here and I've found a great little hut on the beach and have bumped into a cool gang of heads from Wexford/West Cork... tis mighty craic altogether.

Ground Control to Major Tom

I’m likin’ whats goin’ on Stateside… The pictures in the papers, and the snippets (heh, snippits!)on television, appear to portray a nation attempting to redefine itself… and lets face it… The Yanks ain’t exactly flavour of the month flavour in most of the rest of the world. Although having said that, the rest of the world isn’t so perfect itself.

The problems we face today; Fundamentalism, Sustainability, Technology Control, do not fall at the feet of the United States, they’re shared problems that implicate humanity. Finding solutions to these problems is what will make the difference between us being a continuing feature in the spectacle of nature, or merely a failed experiment scratching its surface*.

The US has been playing the protagonist in this story for a while, but I think the recent events, the inauguration of Hilary Clinton as the first female President ever to take office in the United States White House… wait a sec… sorry, that was the wrong version of reality!

So Obama… wazzegonnado?

I bet if you met Obama, he’d give you a lollipop!

Question is: What’s he gonna do next… I mean, he only has the hopes of the entire Planet Earth resting on his shoulders. Fuuuuckckk, I would definitely not want to be him! I wouldn’t be surprised if his first act of office was a lollipop for every human being on the Planet. He’d probably actually go quite a way to cooling things down.

I can just imagine Ahmadinejad, getting his lollipop, in his office in Tehran. He’d probably have a great laugh. Ahmadinejad would probably ask one of the mullahs to pass him the phone and he’d give Obama a call on the telephone and say: “Hey dude, thanks for the lolly… the mullahs love theirs too… Yeah… No… Khamenei mouth’s gone all red and he loves the flavour… here listen, don’t worry about the nuclear stuff, we’ll just stop it… that cool…? cool…! we cool…? Cool!”.

Well lets hope that he manages to pull some kind of rabbit out of the hat… cos if he doesn’t… well… then… I guess we’ll see what then, won’t we…. Until then, I've lashed up some pics from Mumbai below ;-)

Ur man in Hindustan!

Mouth munching madness

So I’ve hit Goa… have left from the hustle and bustle of Bombay. I had an absolutely brilliant two weeks there. I made a good few Bombayite friends and feel that I tapped into the live of the city for the short time I was there. I met a lot of people there that I had met previously on my travels (Bombay seems to be that kind of place), I also met a Canadian writer who took me along on his journalistic discoveries of the city, and through him I made a lot of local friends… who brought me under the skin of the city.

So I got the train to Goa on Monday night. I broke the cardinal rule of traveling on Indian trains and I didn’t tell the people in my compartment what stop I was getting out at. So… naturally… I missed it. I presumed that I’d be up and adam by ten o’clock but it turns out that I slept so long and well (as it seems I can only do on trains) that I woke up and we had already passed it. I jumped off at the next stop and waited for an hour until I could get a train back.

Now I’m Goa and things are different… Well, for starters, I’m all on my tobler’ again. Not that I handle that (I’m a big boy), but I suppose I have to make an effort to meet people again. My plan is to explore the small state in the next three or four weeks (it’s only 80km long) and I wanted to hire a motorbike to help me in my endeavours.

When I arrived here yesterday, I hadn’t the foggiest what beach to go to. I wanted to go as far north as possible and to rent a motorbike there, so I was advised that Anjuna would be good, which is where I am now. Anjuna is one of the most developed beaches here and is fairly famous for its party scene. When I got here yesterday, I was overwhelmed by the lack of English spoken on the beach… the main languages here appear to be Russian and Hebrew… although there are a few Brits banging around as well.

Last night, after some fine dining and book reading, there wasn’t too much going on, so I figured I’d use the opportunity to get a rare early night. However, it being my first night there, I thought that I would go for a quick walk on the beach first. Five minutes into my walk, I started to hear banging loud trance music from the other end of the beach. My curiosity got the best of me, so I ventured down to find a mob of people thronging a beach side club.

I think that I lacked the serious cocktail of drugs that everyone else appeared to be enjoying and although I had a few drinks, I couldn’t really bring myself to dance very much… after trying to start a conversation with a few Israeli teeth-grinders, I decided to abandon the venture and figured that my early night was still half achievable.

So today, while my Israeli friends were snoozing, I was uber-productive. I got my hair chopped, trimmed my beard, did an hour and a half of serious sunbathing… and rented a motorbike for the day (to see how it was). I went for a cycle and although my Enfield did feel very strong and powerful between my legs (ahem!) I couldn’t really get the knack of the gears and spent most of the time fairly nervous… And that was on quiet back roads. Any time I went to stop, I would cut out and it would take me ten minutes to restart, always belting off with my legs flailing out either side. So I decided (upon the advice of a good friend ;-) to abandon my testosterone driven quest and swapped my Honda for a scooter. Now, although I have no gears, I feel slightly girly… but I don’t care… it’s the safe option. (Ya hear that mum)…

So I’m probably gonna hang around Anjuna for another day or so and will then start my little road trip down south…

Until then… smellyalater…

goin' goan

I heart Mumbai... like I seriously frickin' love this place... In face I'm really falling for India in general. After two weeks in Mumbai, I'm dragging myself outta here tonite and jumpin' into a sleeper down to Goa for some fun and frolicing on the beach.
Peace out.
C.