Colombo Agogo

Arrived in Colombo in one piece at 3am on Sunday after a ten hour flight......hadn't managed to get much in the way of sleep (got hooked on the computerised game of Solitaire on the back of the seat in front.....hadn't managed to clear a deck of cards by the time we landed, so I was all for turning the plane round and heading back for Blighty). A chap was awaiting me at the Airport exit with my name on a piece of paper, and I was whisked off to the Galle Face Hotel.....a forty-five minute taxi ride to the south. It being dark, I couldn't get much of a feel for the place beyond the half-built edifices and shacks that lined the route, but I could already sense the poverty.....pot-holed roads, puddles of stagnant water, copious wandering dogs and the occassional knot of locals idling away the nightime.

I managed to get four hours kip before breakfast.......my room was in the north wing of what must have been a very grand colonial estblishment in years gone by. It was sizeable, but pretty basic, with ensuite bathroom. They had recently refurbished the south wing, which was regal in comparison!

My sleep was disturbed by the very loud air-conditioning unit.....it didn't appear to have any controls, so I couldn't turn it off. Added to which, it made the room very cold, and being armed only with my M&S pyjama set and a thin white sheet, I felt the chill!

Breakfast was on the Verandha overlooking the Arabian Sea, and I tucked into the creamy potato curry, with Mung beans on the side, and a fried egg served in a bowl made out of a thin, slightly sweet pancake mix......yummy!!! I had seconds....

I had been warned about the touts that frequent the area by the staff at the hotel, but had to pop over the road to get some Sri Lankan rupees out of the cash machine....I brushed off a couple of approaches from dodgy-looking tri-shaw drivers, but hadn't got more than 50 yards when Roland introduced himself, saying he was the gardener at the hotel.....that's what clinched it! I presumed he would be as well-versed in avoiding these practices as his comrades at work, so instantly put my trust in him.

A Sri Lankan called Roland.....come off it!!!! Anyhow, he led me a merry dance, insisting I come visit his temple before finding me a cash-point....he flagged down a friendly tri-shaw driver, who was presumably in on the scam, and off we went. The temple was interesting, and Roland was obviously doing his best to make sure I was going to get my money's worth, bless him! I was shown the temple elephant, and met the tsunami kids who were being schooled there.....then it was off to his pal's gemstone shop, where they wanted $88 for a small piece of opal....I turned on my heel at that point, but the tri-shaw driver wanted $20 to take me back to the hotel. Not knowing where the hell I was, I had no choice. Roland then took his cut.....he was very insistent about it!!!! Welcome to the Third World!!!! I had to take my hat off to them.....they'd earned a month's wages in less than twenty minutes.....I'd lost the price of admission to The Madjeski Stadium....

Whilst in the hotel grounds I was approached by Mike, a youthful looking 63-year old who came over to commiserate.....he'd been conned outside, too! I spent the rest of the day mooching about, trying to get into the book I'd brought....Joseph Heller's Catch 22. Had a snooze in the afternoon, and met Mike for dinner on the verandah in the evening. He turned out to have been in the property business, and was now trying to set up a charitable development in Galle, where the tsunami had caused a lot of damage.

Got to bed around 10pm......had to be up at 2am to get the taxi to the airport. I was getting a bit worried by 2.30am, but he showed up, and we sped airport-wards. Had three hours to kill before the Goa flight boarded, so sat in the coffee bar. Had given my last rupees to the security guard at the airport, who asked me for them, very politely!!! Had to pay for my coffe in sterling, but got change in dollars! Still, should be able to use them on my way back home. Landed safely in Goa at 7.30am and entered another world!

Another Planet

The hour's taxi ride from Dabolim airport north to Assagao at 8 o'clock in the morning had a surreal air. Baked, dusty red-brown earth, palm trees and jungle, primitive huts protected from the rising sun by lengths of blue plastic tarpaulin, people walking and limping along the poured tarmac roadways, scooters and motorbikes and bicycles swerving in and out of the four-wheeled traffic, the occassional elephant carrying a load across it's broad shoulders, crumbling, stained, concrete buildings, garish advertising hordings.....I stared out of my taxi-van window with a vague sense of disbelief.

Arrived, sweating gently, at 515 Bountavada where Tony, Ricky and James greeted me warmly. James is a convivial Mancunian, with a big smile and a bigger heart, who is in the process of traversing the globe on a motorbike. He and Tony have been here for some weeks now, and both appear bronzed and glowing with a healthy vitality. Ricky, on the other hand, is a fair-skinned Scot who has only been here two days, and by contrast has taken on a red and beetrooty hue. In him I perceive my own fate!

A cup of tea, then a quick guided tour of my accommodation of the next two weeks. It's a block and plaster apartment on one floor, with a narrow front garden leading from the little verandah. There are five rooms, four of which are given over as bedrooms, and a kitchen. My room has a double bed with sheet and pillow, a table (which turns out to be haunted), a metal construct on which to hang my clothes, and a ceiling fan.

The ablutions are basic, housing toilet and cold shower, plus wash-hand basin. I take note of the rather large black ants that appear to live round the toilet rim! I won't be taking a seat!!!

Tony assures me that a scooter has been ordered for me, but in the meantime I clamber onto the back of his, and we speed off to the nearest town, Mapusa. It's a small market town, the capital of northern Goa, and it's teeming with people and traffic. We park up in a street lined with parked scooters, and dodge the slow-moving, honking traffic. The market place is humming with traders pushing their wares at you.....I fall for a tee-shirt with the logo of the local brew emblazoned on the front. It's offered for 600 rupees.....Tony assures me it's not worth 150, but after much to-ing and fro-ing we settle at 200.

The fish market stinks, and we watch in vague horror as squads of wide-eyed children behead fresh sardines in the humid heat of the afternoon.

Tony ushers us into a small, squalid looking cafe....we find seats upstairs, and order brunch of bread pancakes and spiced chutney, washed down with masala chai. The food is simple and tasty, and the staff are friendly and helpful......I begin to feel at ease.

The Kids are Alright

I was introduced to my scooter today....I've never ridden one before, but after afew halting manouevres, I take to it like a duck to water. Helmetless, and with little thought for the finer points of the highway code, I join the busy, meandering by-ways that, mostly, lead to the beach.

The other road users appear to have even less road sense than I do, but somehow it all flows along. The roundabouts in Mapusa are the scariest.....it's literally every man for himself. If you are too polite with the opposition you risk coming a cropper.

The road infrastructure is pretty poor, and the lanes that lead to the beaches are largely narrow and pot-holed. It's OK as long as it's other bikes that are heading in the opposite direction, but every now and then you have to make way for a very wide and speeding bus, or worse still, a lorry with tyres as tall as yourself!

My scooter soon develops starting problems. The electric starter motor has become very temperamental, and I am instructed in the art of kick starting it. As the week progresses however, even that becomes hit and miss.....the starting mechanism seems to behave differently every day. On one occassion I arrived back at the apartment at midnight and turned the ignition off, but the engine kept running. It woke the neighbours up, who ventured out to assist, but to no avail. Eventually we had to syphon off the petrol!

I took it back the next day, but of course, it behaved perfectly in the presence of the hire staff, so I reluctantly agreed to persevere for a couple more days until Ricky was due to leave for Blighty, and I could take his keys. The evening I'd planned to take my bike back, it wouldn't start at all......I got a lift to the hire place and handed them the key, drawing them a map of how to get to our place.

The following day I take Ricky's bike over, and it starts first time.....I head out east into the hinterland; within half-an-hour my horn has stopped working! I don't think I was born to be a Mod!!

A Gentle Mugging

I'm getting the impression the locals see me coming. Tony takes us to the Shore Bar on Anjuna beach, which has become his Rover's Return, so to speak, over the course of the last 6 weeks or so. It's basically a number of deck chairs and tables set out on the sands, protected from the sun by a tented canopy of bamboo and matting. There are chilled sounds on the sound system, and a perfect view of the Arabian Sea, fruit juices and beers, and simple food.

On passing through the bar, you descend onto the beach itself via a series of stone steps, where we nab a couple of sun loungers. Unbeknownst to me, we are only a matter of feet from some tented shops, selling shirts and sarongs etc. I haven't been there ten seconds when the beguiling Gita introduces herself, asking my name with fluttering eyelashes, and taking hold of my hand (so I can't escape). She says I look like a ghost......which I suppose I do. She is a dark and burnished brown, her white teeth flashing when she smiles....I am smitten.

She takes my sunglasses from my nose, and puts them on (so I can't escape!), and before I know it I have been dragged through the burning sand and into her little shop. I soon find myself cornered, not just by Gita, but by half-a-dozen women, who all turn out to have a shop nearby. Each in turn implores me to come see their wares.....I'm having enough trouble with Gita, frankly! Ricky passes by the opening to the shop, and I beg his assistance in plaintive tones.....he grins a Glaswegian grin and hurries past.

I eventually succumb to Gita's hard sell, and agree to purchase a cheese-cloth shirt and a sarong to sit on the sand with. Gita's neighbouring shop owner grasps the said sarong, and disappears next door, on the assumption I'll follow her into her shop. But Gita hasn't quite got the money off me, and I still owe her 100 rupees.....I walk calmly back to my sun-lounger, saying that she will get her final instalment when she's rescued my sarong from her comrade-in-arms. After a fifteen minute stalemate, she eventually comes up with the goods, and I run, traumatised, for the cover of the Shore Bar.....and don't set foot on that stretch of beach for the rest of the holiday!

Barking and Dogenham

The usual bedtime seems to have settled around 10.30pm......after an exhausting day lying on the sun loungers, listening to the lapping of the Arabian Sea, there's not much left in the tank, frankly.

I turn on my ceiling fan, which has four speeds.....setting number two suffices at this time of year. I put on my pyjamas, more for protection against mosquitoes than for any other reason, and draw the white sheet over my gently sweating form.....it looks like a scene from Waking The Dead.

I turn off the light and close my eyes....there's a kerfuffle on the tiled roof above my head as the jackdaws begin to roost for the night. Their cawing is stark and loud, and they seem to be vying with eachother to see who can make the most noise. They are joined by a strange whooping sound....at first I assume it's a monkey, it sounds so bizarre.....but there are no monkeys here. It must be some kind of bird. I imagine it having a beak like a series of fluted trumpets, and a huge puffed up breast that it exercises in letting out it's disturbing shriek.

As I turn over, I hear James in the adjacent bedroom....he has the beginnings of a chest infection, and his cough is deep and gutteral. Scratchy, the neighbour's friendly mongrel, begins to bark in seeming reply. His barking soon transmits itself to the dogs next door, and before long there are dozens of them locked in an unholy chorale. In the far distance of the night I swear I can hear a wolf orchestrating the proceedings.

I stuff a pair of ear plugs into the sides of my head, and try to nod off. Just as sleep seems about to envelop me, I hear the distinctive whine of a dive-bombing mosquito. It seems to have honed in ignorantly on one of my ear plugs. I swat at it blindly in the darkness, turn on the bedside lamp, and grope in my baggage for my supply of insect-reppellant. I smear the stinking stuff over my exposed areas of flesh, and hunker down once more under my shroud.

By 2am, the canine chorus has begun to run out of ideas, and I begin to drift into deep sleep. It is then that I hear a scratching sound, a creaking that comes in short sharp bursts, so fast it puts me in mind of the rattle of a rattle-snake. It comes in three second waves, four or five at a time, then a period of silence. I involuntarily curl my feet towards my buttocks and adopt a foetal position, bracing myself for the poisonous strike. After half-an-hour I pluck up the courage to turn on the light and get out of bed. It seems to be coming from the little window....so at first I assume it's something outside trying to scratch it's way in. But I can see nothing through the mosquito gauze. My suitcase lies atop a small two-drawer table nearby....has something crawled it's way into my luggage? I stare in that direction for a long time, but there's no sign of movement. Eventually, I put it down to the expansion of the wooden rafters in the heat.

I push my ear plugs in a bit futher, and eventually nod off.

I am woken by the crowing of the neighbour's rooster, vowing to wring it's neck should our paths ever cross.....soon the jackdaws have woken up too, cawing at eachother like demented babies.

Over a mug of tea the following morning, I explain to my housemates that I was kept awake by (among other things), a sinister scratching noise during the night....."Ahhh, the haunted table", comes the knowing reply. Apparently, the previous occupant of my room was so disturbed by the mysterious scratching that she dismantled the table in a vain attempt to solve the mystery. And so the story of the Haunted Table passes into legend....perhaps I could sell the idea to IKEA!?