The next day my notes remind me of a significant development. Remember when I left Jaisalmer when I shared a compartment with some British people and we locked ourselves into the First Class compartment and smoked ourselves to sleep? Well my note says I ran into Claire who was the girl who seemed to have been traveling with her Dad and his mate.
This was a significant development although the notes don't say a great deal more because the next note says "Stupendous Beach Party". It must have been a good party because the note says so but I can't remember anything. It is likely that I got really stoned and possible that I got drunk too.
The following day appears to have been a bit of a nothing day. There's note that I missed Anjuna. Perhaps I was supposed to go there with someone, I don't know with whom. Anyway I didn't go. I must have made an arrangement to meet up with Claire again. It seems I went to the tailor's "shop" in Calangute and missed Claire. The tailor hadn't finished what he had been asked to do so I had to go back again the next day.
Things were getting a bit boring. I was doing nothing, just cycling to Calangute to see the tailor or cycling to Baga beach. Life was a bit too easy. As I mentioned there was a young lad called Suraj who acted as a "house boy" and cook and another mysterious thing that I noticed was that the clothes that I had discarded the day previously would end up washed, dried and folded the next afternoon. The lady across the road who was the housekeeper was collecting it and did it without me noticing. I never ever saw her.
I remember on one of these days I got a lift into Calangute with Ute on the back of her motorcycle. She was, as I have said more than once, the essence of cool. Sitting tight up behind her on the back of her motorbike holding on to her slim waist was about as near as I was ever going to get to her. She knew she was beautiful and she knew she was cool. She probably knew that I might have enjoyed sitting behind for reasons apart from the fact that it was a free ride into town. She was a long term resident and being with her just added to the feeling that I was part of the cool scene. After visiting the tailor to collect the items I had ordered she and I sat in one of the lassi bars on the street that leads to the beach. Then she rode back to our village and if I hung on to her a bit too tightly I don't think she noticed.
Later that afternoon Claire turned up out of the blue and we sat and talked about our travel plans. Claire wanted to come with me. I have no idea where her father or his friend was and I think she was a little out on a limb. She was on her own and needed a traveling companion. She was young and blonde.
Claire's visit seemed to change the atmosphere. It seemed to me that a girl turning up at Jeannette's house to see me put Jeanette's nose out of joint a little. There had never been a repeat performance of Jeanette's parading naked as she had on the first morning after our arrival. My pretending not to have noticed that might have already had an effect. Anyway, a distance developed between us and I started to feel that it was time to move on. Jeannette also mentioned that I might contribute something towards my keep. I had been staying there for free, eating in at the house (and eating very well), getting my laundry done by an invisible woman, had free use of a bicycle and had the run of the place generally. My illness was a dim and distant memory. I had completely recovered control of my bowels. So it was fair enough. I had been there eleven days already and whatever I paid was well worth it. I don't remember how much it was but it was less than a tenner.
So my last weekend in Goa was upon me and I got my souvenirs together and headed to Panaji to post myself another parcel home. The notes are so sparse in the filofax pages that it is hard to think now what else I did. I do remember that on the Friday morning I had to ask Suraj what had become of my recording Walkman. I didn't think he had stolen it but I was right to ask him because he immediately handed it over having borrowed it (without mentioning the fact) before he went home at the beginning of the week.
That day there was a 50 over One Day International cricket match between India and Sri Lanka at in the Nehru Stadium, Fatorda, Margao which staged its first One day International in 1989. It might have been fun to have gone to watch the match because I am sure the atmosphere would have been better than the fifth day of the Test Match I had watched at Lords before I had set off on this trip.
It is probably just as well I didn't go because India lost very badly - bowled out for 136. Their top scorer was Sachin Tendulkar with only 30. They didn't even use up the allotted 50 overs. Their Innings was over in 40.3 overs. Although Sri Lanka did lose a couple of early wickets they reached the 137 needed for victory at a canter for the loss of just 3 wickets. A stand of 82 between P A de Silva and Sri Lankan captain A Ranatunga finished off India and there were 17.1 overs remaining. It must have dampened the spirits in the crowd and perhaps it wouldn't have been so much fun after all. The three match series had been decided anyway because India had won the first two matches.
It gave Suraj and I the chance to have a discussion about cricket. Cricket was something that generally united Indians but India's captain Mohamed Azharuddin was a Muslim and under pressure given the problems concerning the Babri Masjid/Ram Temple. One thing that does unite Indians is cricket against Pakistan and Suraj mentioned a controversy concerning a recent match between India and Pakistan. He was convinced that the Pakistani bowlers had been cheating. This was not the last time such an accusation has been made. What proved it for Suraj was the "unprecedented swing" the bowlers were achieving.
That night and the following morning I said my goodbyes to Jeannette and Ute and at 4.15 on Saturday the 9th of December 1990 Claire and I boarded a bus to Panaji and from there got a bus to Mangalore on the first leg of our adventure together.
