So we left the ashram skipping down the street as we went to catch our train to Kochi, where we would spend the night before going to Goa!!
Once we arrived in Kochi, we caught a tuk tuk and asked him to take us to a cheap hotel. The second one we came across was a bit pricier than we'd hoped, but we were all too tired to care and fancied a bit of luxury after our bleak experience in the madhouse. Vicky and I marvelled at the clean white sheets/sky tv and HOT SHOWER!! A hot shower had been unheard of in my world for the last few weeks!!
We had a quiet night...ate out, watched a bit of telly and after the novelty wore off we fell asleep!! We awoke in the morning with plenty of time to catch the train, and took off for breaky and to find some much needed bathing materials. After stumbling across a little corner shop selling all our amenities and practically buying the WHOLE shop (which left the owner positively orgasmic!!)...we went back to the hotel to spruce up then caught the train!
I LOVE travelling by train in India. Watching the world go by before your eyes is simply magical, even if it does involve having to view the odd person taking a poop on the railway tracks. Our train arrived in Goa at 4am, we hung around for a bit before heading to Panjim where we had arranged to meet up with our friend ABI-who is a professional poker player and had just won 400,000 rupees or something ridiculous! We rocked up at his hotel (which I have to say for us was bloody luxury beyond belief!)....he welcomed us in and then very generousley offered to buy us breakfast at the Marriot hotel. Oh sweet jesus....this has to be one of my fave breakys ever!! All you can eat with everything you can imagine....even SAUSAGES...in india??!!... Soooo, after eating the whole buffet and admiring the grandeur of the hotel we decided to catch a taxi back to our favourite place ANJUNA!!
Although anjuna isnt the most beautiful of places, it has "party a plenty" and I fancied letting go before heading off on me tod for the final part of my trip!! We arrived and after finding a hotel, hit the beach immediateley! I needed to update this tan!!....Another reason for coming to anjuna was to catch up with our friend Mike, and before long we saw him ambling down the beach to which he was met with euphoric hugs!! We decided to go to a psy trance party in the evening...which wasnt really my cuppa tea, and was heaving with rather rude russians who kept giving me dirty looks...so we turned in early!!
The following night(and my last night with Vicky!)...we got glammed up and went out on the razz again! The beach looked relatively quiet...UV was pumping but the music in there is simply horrific, so we continued to walk to our fave bar Lilliput...where they were amazingly having a REGGAE/DUB AND BASHMENT night. I think I peed myself a little bit!! Anyway Vicky and I were immediateley on the dancefloor and I dont think I left for about 5 HOURS!! It was blooody ammazin'...there were a couple of guys who were in a reggae band , and omg they were such incredible dancers. There really is something about men who can dance!!! Anyway we got chatting to them for a bit and they invited us to their show the next day.....which left me with another dilemma, do i leave tomorrow or do i just stay in Anjuna for another week??!!!....Really I need to get better at making decisions!!
Anyway, dancing all night in Lilliput always provides so much comedy value!! Indian men really LOVE to dance and at one point I had about 6 different men dancing around me in a circle playing "Simon says" literally copying every dance move I was doing. There was also a bunch of old indian hippies getting down to the reggae....a man in a full blown suit bustin some moves and an array of other oddballs.....I LOVE this kind of craziness and this is why I LOVE india!!....After the reggae had finished they smashed out some classic dance tunes and Vicky and I held each other as we mourned our last night as travelling buddies!! ..As the night drew to a close I left Vicky with an Irish fella she had met, and walked around aimlessly looking for my hotel before deciding to head back to Tantra (remember the tree houses i mentioned in a previous blog!) to hang out with some peeps I had met earlier.
The next day I felt simply vile and mmmd and aaarred about whether I should leave that evening or not!! It wasnt until an hour before I was meant to leave, sat in Tantra eating curry with Vicky, Mike and Leon that I thought to myself I really HAVE to do this...go off on my own and do my own thing!! So I scrambled together my belongings, and said my weepy goodbyes to Vicky.....it was so sad to leave her, and driving off in the taxi towards the bus station I wept pure tears of sorrow for me travelling bud! When I finally arrived at the bus station it turned out to be the WRONG one, so had to get another taxi to the RIGHT bus stop...which turned out to be in the middle of nowhere on a random abandoned bit of road with not a tourist in sight. My immediate thought was to grab a taxi right back to Anjuna, but I decided to stick it out for a bit...
As I waited and waited and waited at the bus stop with no-one in sight, I came across a guy and asked him if I was in the right place! He assured me I was, so I stuck with it. I then saw a bus that looked a lot like the one I was supposed to be on driving down the road...so I asked another passyby if I was in the right place, and he was like "Nooooo!"...."You need to be down there!".....to which I grabbed all my bags and legged it, waving frantically at my bus, which thankfully stopped and let me on. This is one of the many things that pisses me off about India...you can't seem to ask anyone anything and get a straight answer, which if your not careful means ending up on the wrong train/bus/city entirely!!
Anyway I was on the bus...that was a start!! Onwards to Mumbai, and ready to start an entirely different journey to the one I had already experienced...
to be continued
