The Goa Airport

Hideous statues at Goa airport. I mean, who commissioned these monstrosities? And then grouped them for Christmas? Like that's doing anyone a favour.

Back dated post (such a bad habit) from my Goa Trip & New Years Eve. 

The next morning, while still buzzing from the night before, I went for swim after breakfast. The ex was still groggy and refused to leave the hut.

It was amazing. Really it was. I think I was still high, which made it feel even better. I wore my sun glasses in the water.

Then me, the ex and PhD all smoked one last one before we left for the airport.

PhD got into an argument with a young, mustachioed policeman at the Goa airport entrance about how they should open both airport entrances, therefore making everything more efficient and that he shouldn’t just accept the status quo but try to change things! Yes We Can! Jai Ho! I have dream! Friends, Foes, Countrymen!

Clearly the effects of the smoke had worn off.

The ex tried to drag him away but he wouldn’t budge. This lecture/debate lasted 15 minutes. His hindi is only marginally better than mine, so it was with some horror that we left him to it and joined the line for security (X-raying the bags)

Maddening bureaucracy and pointless red tape cripple the Goa Airport. (PhD had a point after all, but don’t annoy a cop just as you are about to board a flight is all I say).

One Goa airport rule is that all airlines have their own security stickers for your bags post-screening. Imagine that – Printing all the different types of stickers for each airline, then managing who is being screened for what flight and then matching the stickers correctly. Logistically it’s one of the stupidest things I’ve ever witnessed.

Since my mother made us reach the airport some 2 hours in advance for our flight – She fucking tricked us! She told us there might be lots of traffic and we should leave early! It was a scam. I’m sure of it. There was no traffic. She loves to get people waiting at airports. Some OCD thing – So security weren’t even ready for our flight – Surprise surprise, our bags got the wrong sticker.

When we went up to the check-in counter, the counter lady said,

“Aare! You can’t fly with the wrong stickers on your bags! You must screen them again.”

PhD promptly had a fight with the counter lady. Most definitely the mal had worn off.

“What difference do the stickers make? They are all generic anyway!”

The counter lady seemed baffled, both by the use of the word ‘generic’ and his casual rejection of the immutable laws of the Goa airport. Then he said,

“We’re leaving the bags with you. This is your problem! You made the mistake and you should sort it out for us! Why should we screen them again? Come on guys, we’re going to the waiting lounge.”

I thought, I’m not leaving my bag unattended you madman!

Luckily no one listened to him. No one ever listens to the academics, thank god.

By this time the ex was getting rather hot under the collar. The ex gets very agitated with unforeseen occurrences. It’s so cute.

The ex then scolded me severely for taking that photo above of the mind blowingly hideous airport statues instead of sorting out our luggage issue.

Plus I had 2 lighters in my bag because Goa Airport, unlike all other airports in the world, still implements the ‘no lighter’ policy (even if the lighter is in your checked-in luggage), just because they can’t be bothered to change it.. So I had to open 2 suitcases to hunt for the lighters.

There was a hidden 3rd lighter which I only found back in Bombay once I unpacked! Hah! Take that Goa Airport!

Then we settled down to find some snacks. While we stood in the queue at a food counter waiting to buy some samosas, PhD got impatient, (Yes We Can! Challenge the status quo! Jai Ho!) went off on his own and returned with an armful of samosas.

Unfortunately everyone else waiting patiently in the queue had just been served. So in the end we had nearly 4 extra plates of huge samosas.

I told PhD he really should run for Mayor of Goa.

Reminder!

BBQ framed in white. Quite nice I like white. I'm usually quite conservative with frames. I go with walnut or black.

Someone found my blog by typing in

i am sad for no reason

Wow.

I mean what more can be said?

Although, what does that say about this blog, hmm?

Reminder: Only 2 days left for free world-wide shipping!

Free Shipping offer ends 29 Jan 2012!

Burn that date into your memory.

Just 2 measly days to decide on which print/skin/Tshirt you could buy from my shop, that would change your life forever!

Ok so it probably won’t change your life much, except that visitors to your house (should you hang it there) would turn to you and say,

“Oh my god, what is that drawing?? And why are there so many naked bird people? That’s a little weird.”

Which could be highly entertaining for you.

You could also hang it in your loo or a corridor, or if you really liked it your living room.

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New Years Eve In Goa

Last sunset 2011. How sentimental of me.

That's it. Sun is gone. Thus ends 2011.

Back dated post (Well, clearly.)

The build up for New years Eve is such a killer. All that expectation, all that fear of failure.

The first part of the evening was excruciating.

I mean, I was sober.

With my parents.

We went to a restaurant in Goa called La Plage, which we had already eaten at two evenings out of five – It’s managed by 2 very attractive French women (Older, of indeterminate age. 45+ I should think.) who were very touchy-feely with all their patrons.

They made everyone feel like they were supremely important. Case in point: My PhD bawa neighbor (I’m just going to call him PhD from now on) was convinced one of the ladies was trying to hit on the ex because her hand lingered in what was assumed to be a highly suggestive manner.

The PhD’s and the ex’s thoughts, whatever the context of the situation, jump straight to sex. They both have uniquely one track minds. All I saw was a woman who knew how to do her job beautifully.

Ordinarily La Plage was excellent. Unfortunately they had succumbed to the New Years eve temptation – The greed had gone to their head and were massively over booked. So much so that we didn’t see dinner for 2.5 hours. I was nearly gnawing on the table by then. Starvation rarely adds to the convivial feeling.

Our PhD neighbor’s younger brother and his girlfriend also joined us for dinner, but since they seemed to be either on drugs or coming down off them they were in no position to contribute to any kind of cheer.

Our plan was to eat, watch the fireworks on the beach, then ditch the folks shortly after midnight and find some wild party. Dinner came just before 12. Mine was inedible. Half the patrons left their plates to watch the fireworks. We couldn’t leave the folks until 2 and I was sober until then.

YES! FUCK YES SOBER! STONE FUCKING COLD SOBER! Man I was irate.

Eventually the folks left and the ex managed to strong-arm us into a party, just by looking furious and saying with a thunderous frown

“We were just in here 5 minutes ago! Give us a stamp!”

I saw the man’s face. It’s an expression I’ve had many times on mine. It’s resignation and a desire to avoid a confrontation. He was clearly thinking,

“I know they weren’t here 5 minutes ago but I can’t be dealing with this at 3 in the morning. Just give them a stamp.”

The party was rubbish. I mean, it might have been fun had I been un-sober. But rave music is intolerable even on vast quantities of intoxicants. Sober it was excruciating.

I told PhD and the ex I’d had enough. Screw this night, I was going back to the hut to smoke the measly amount of mal I had managed to scrap, beg, borrow and steal together from kind, charitable souls.

Then just at that moment, coming out of the darkness of the beach, like a saviour, like Jesus, was some Bawa that PhD happened to know. We greeted him so joyously he might as well have been Jesus. (Or Zarathushtra, which would be more fitting, but the name is such a mouthful.)

“Do you guys want to party?”

Yes! by god yes! We do! We really really fucking do!

After that the night picked up.

We found other people we knew at another party with many more intoxicants.

We didn’t really have any other friends in Goa and sort of tagged along with this one group, which I must admit, felt a little uncomfortable. I don’t like satelliting around a group of friends. (But I’m uncomfortable naturally so that doesn’t count for much.)

I think my major tip while tackling the Goa party scene is to carry a roll of toilet paper in your bag. I wish someone had reminded me.

The loo was….*shudder*. I can’t even bear to remember it.

We rolled off back to our huts and I immediately had a shower and stiff scrub.

*shudder*

Sigh. All my stories seem to end in poo.

Tramp Stamp: The Update

The Tattoo

My mother, true to her word, went and got her tattoo.

It’s a blue and green chinese dragon from the neck down to her shoulder. (No tramp stamp, thank god.). Took over 3 hours to tattoo I’m told. Impressive stuff, I couldn’t stand the drilling after about 5 mins.

When she first told me she was getting a Chinese dragon I told her she might look like a take-away menu.

Also let me just break away here to say: If your mother is getting a tattoo, then it is a sure sign that the trend is has peaked. (Unless you intend to wallpaper yourself like this guy here.) I’d suggest that rule for about just any trend.

So she asks me, what did I think of it?

This is all via G-chat by the by, with my father typing because my mother hasn’t yet come to terms with technology, even though she’s been using her iPod lately and has a new baffling high-tech phone. (Which I can’t use at all – It’s too complicated. By comparison to mine at any rate. Mine has no call button and doesn’t connect to the internet.)

“So what do you think of Mom’s tattoo?”

“Very nice.”

I mean it, even though that sounds like a half-hearted attempt at diplomacy.

“Wait, what do you mean ‘nice’?

She asks suspiciously.

“I mean it doesn’t look like a takeaway menu.”

It’s hard to know how to compliment the tattoo. I was mostly relieved it wasn’t something terrible. Or somewhere terrible.

“That means you think it does look like a takeaway!”

“Aare no! It looks cool, very cool.”

It does, it does. I mean it.

“By the way, have you noticed that it’s an ‘S’ for Sonja?”

“No I didn’t but that’s a nice touch. Although, all dragons are drawn in ‘S’ shapes. What if Mom’s name was Gonja?”

What if her name was Gonja. I don’t think I’d like having a mother with that name for a start.

“She says there’s a method to her madness. The dragon could be the other way too.”

I have no idea that ‘the other way’ means. I let it slide. Sometimes it’s better not to ask.

“The head has to be inwards because that way it gives her power and strength. That’s its significance.”

What maha bakwas (hokum). I love how tattoo artists and branding people tend to spout the same garbage. We’ve had to do a couple of branding exercises at work and man, the nonsense you have to make sound legitimate is amazing.

Then my father had the audacity to tell me my mother has more ‘guts and balls’ than me because her tattoo is bigger.

I know. Like, gasp.

And whatever!

So I told him she was a copy cat. I got mine over 10 years ago. So there.

“Now now don’t be like that…”

I like that he says “Now now” even though he clearly was stirring.

“But yours is so wimpy!”

The cheek!

My mother didn’t speak to me for a week when I got my navel pierced and was dead set against my getting a tattoo. I had to hide it for 5 years. I got it done in a shed in Goa by a man with the most appalling black nails. I have had no desire for another.

“It cost Rs. 350! What do you expect?”

Apparently my Mom’s tattoo cost Rs. 12,000. Holy crap.

Also I can’t believe I’m having to justify the smallness of my tattoo to my father. The world has turned on its head.

She wants to get another one now. On her ankle.

Seriously. The trend is totally over.

Heart breaking, I’m sure.

Goa

Beach at Gopal's Shack. He took 2 hours to serve anyone they were so busy. But I was sympathetic so he was nice.

Sunset

The ex and I are in Goa for a week over the New Years.

With my parents and the neighbors (also Bawas).

I’ve always gone with the family, and really never been to Goa with a jing styled a lá Riddhi and her court. The only other friend I’ve gone to Goa with is Leo. We visited Riddhi and her jing at the slum they were living in Anjuna once to pick up our mal. I say slum, because there were 8 people (including her current and ex-boyfriend) to a double bedroom. The thought of it frankly terrifies me. I like the mal and all that, but 8 to a room is dreadful. I can’t do it anymore, even if I was hammered out of my skull I couldn’t do it. I’m too old.

I haven’t been blogging as often for obvious reasons.

One being that the hotel we are staying at turns off the wi-fi at night. Which is a typically Indian notion. Like the wi-fi will run out or something.

The other reason is that it’s Goa. I’m too busy lazing around, eating and drinking.

Right now I’m sitting outside our wooden hut rooms, with a watermelon juice and my laptop, which only has about 1:30 mins of battery time left. Fucking macs batteries.

So I’ll re-cap the last few days as briefly as possible.

Day 1:

I love how the light looked on the curtains.

That being said it was a full free show if you were changing.

'Designer' Huts. 24/7 Room Service but no telephone in the hut.

Room Window. It was nice to just sit on the bed in the afternoon with the AC on and chill.

Coconut Trees. Well its fairly obvious.

We took the morning flight out from Bombay on the 26th. My mother, using her usual tactics didn’t stop nagging until we were in the car and on the way to the airport.

My god that’s an exhausting way to wake up. Seriously, how are you supposed to drink your tea in peace with constant yakking?

By the end of day one even the ex was exhausted with the friendly familial bickering that is common among bawas and semi-loudish Indians and my family in particular.

Back in our designer huts – Yes, designer huts. Ac, Wifi & 24 Hour room service provided! (No telephone in the room, if you want room service you need to go to reception.) – we are a little thrown to find a tiny frog perched on a step in our loo. We try to find someone who will remove it for us.

Later a boy who seems highly amused by our request, comes with a mop and bucket to take the little fellow out. I tell him to be careful not to hurt it. Once the froggie has been safely dispatched, the ex, in triumph, promptly confiscates his mop.

I am them made to mop the loo and floor where I’ve tracked in sand and mud. Even on holiday there is no respite from this hateful cleaning, a fact which I mournfully complain about. The ex is unrepentant.

Day 2:

Lights in the hotel garden.

Decorated tinsel tree

Dog that looked like a fawn. She became our friend and barked if house keeping went into our rooms.

Sunset through the trees, while walking down to the beach

The Goa vibe we all know and love

We all went off on our own. Thank fucking god.

I needed to lie down and read my Poirot in peace.

The ex and I were having a post-swim shower, and I demand the full use of the shower to wash my hair. Communal bathing is so annoying, especially when you are forced to wait in the sidelines to use the shower.

I like constant flowing water. (Sorry eco-friendly, bucket-bath type people.)

“Can I please use the shower now?”

(I ask the ex)

“NO! You have to bathe with me!”

My mother pipes in suddenly from outside the hut,

“I can hear you, you know.”

The ex and start giggling and promptly dispatch my mother on a shopping errand for Shampoo. (Since she is so conveniently near by.)

Day 3:

I read this as "Mass Marriage going on". I imagined lots of catholics lining up in pairs, down the aisle.

Poor puppy outside the main church in Old Goa. There was a horribly starved one outside the missionary hut.

Some church near another church in Old Goa.

Kid playing 'Catch and Cook'.

We made the colossal mistake of trying to sight-see in Old Goa.

I hadn’t been there in so long I had forgotten what an utter waste of time it was.

So really the entire day was lost in commuting to see St. Xaviers’s or St. Francis’s or whatever his name is, embalmed remains.

Like we gave a shit. And the worst part of it all was that we had absolutely no mal whatsoever.

None! I was so angry.

Day 4:

Tits Bits

Fire Thrower at Shanti's. We went there for some day-time rave.

A couple of days later I went up to some random bald dude and asked him if he was a fire thrower. He looked very similar.

Cat with kitty near Ganpati statue. I love its little face just poking out.

Cat with kitty near Ganpati statue. More kitties were hiding behind.

I discovered the ex has a highly entertaining posh habit of asking the waiters, no matter where we are, their food recommendations and serving suggestions.

So while we are lounging on our sun-beds and ordering lunch, the ex asks our shack waiter (in English), dead seriously;

“How do you serve your masala papad?”

As though this little shack is 4 star restaurant.

The waiter looks puzzled. There is a pause. He nods and says

“Masala Papad.”

and walks away. So I respond on his behalf to he ex;

“In plate.”

We then spent the rest of the time napping and ‘Gay spotting’. The ex was convinced this heavily beefed up guy in tight red shorts playing ball with a weedy looking boy was a homo.

I thought it was more likely he was not, even though the size of this thighs and the tightness of his pants were highly suspicious. The ex cited the dubious fact that his rugby ball matched his shorts exactly. It was assumed to be some sort of clear sign.

By day 4 I had succumbed to sheer beach-bum laziness and was using the sea as my personal toilet.

Look I know, I know it’s bad, it’s wrong. Haw haw thapad thapad.

But one Shandy down plus a dirty shack loo with no toilet paper is my excuse.

I try to rationalize that the salt in the sea would sterilize it. (Eventually)

And I only did it once… (Twice).

And I’m sure I won’t do it again… (Probably).

You’ll be happy to know I got my comeuppance when, just as I was mid-pee, a huge poo casually floated by me! I squealed and quickly waded in the other direction and hoped the sea would eventually wash it up on the beach.

I ran out to tell the ex immediately of this horrible event. The ex and I set about analyzing the poo based on my description.

Was it a dog poo or human? I ruled out women right away – It’s too hard for a woman to do a poo in a swimsuit.

It also seemed too big a poo for a child, but god knows some repellent brat could possibly push out big one.

Let’s just think it was a dog’s. It’s easier.

On that auspicious note I think we shall end the re-cap so far.

Good News & Jet Lag

I’m back in London and I have a lot of blogging to do plus sorting out the holiday photos (which is a mild OCD I have, organizing, naming, collating, renaming, colour correcting, even while on holiday), except I’m so jet lagged I keep falling asleep at 10:30.

So I’ll just post some good news.

I made my first EVER sale to a someone I don’t know! (It’s usually been sales to friends who are charitable enough to buy my shit)

How fucking amazing is that?

It was one of the silkscreen prints I put up on Etsy not so long ago.

Frankly I never thought anyone would ever buy anything, so when I first saw the ‘Sold’ email in my inbox I thought it was spam!

What a nice way to end 2011 and start 2012.

Sorry for the somewhat blurry photos of the silkscreen below.

There are only 4 left in my shop. Take a look if you have the time.

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I made a long list of things to draw.

Ok toodles now. Back to work.