GOA: 23-25th Jan 2009

Memories Recalled:

For any hospitality industry to be successful the three things necessary are location, location and location………but for us its Beach, Babes, Beer and Bikes; that’s four B’s of Masti.

That is what Goa is all about: Sexy beaches, babes, beer and bikes and fun gets on to its acme when you have your best pals along with you with a secret urge of having someone of opposite sex with you.

Sneaking out at the drop of a hat, is one of those prized habits which I thought I have lost in the dry dreary sands of monotonous daily professional life. There used to be a time, when a whim or a fantasy could have our gang trolling down around two kilometers at the inauspicious innocuous time @ 02:00 hours towards Lanka in pursuit of chai, sutta and dollops of gossip. Those days, we thought it was a passing phase and more as a sign of young restlessness, was quite right about the first one, though much later we realized that it was more a result of intoxication by life; getting a kick out of it! We had long been planning a trip down to Goa and fortunately we had it as a college reunion of sorts just after 8 months since we passed out.

Goa, thanks to ridiculous planning and an almost absent co-ordination! People landed from far and wide; Barauni, Mumbai, Jamshedpur, Gurgaon, Hissar and Rajkot. Some got a leave, some ‘managed to fall sick’ and some managed to make their relatives sick as an excuse to take Thu, Fri and Sat off. Thus we had 3 days (23, 24th and 25th of Jan) to savor Goa. It was as if we were re-living out college years these three days again, starting with the inevitable mess-ups’ that was trademark of any of our endeavors back in college. Some of the guys managed to loose their sunshades/sunglasses and spectacles; some forget their T-shirts and shoes and then there were a few discerning others like me who managed to loose something around 3.5K to a beach side gambler ending up in a way that all dinners at restaurants for the next three months will have to be stopped to compensate for the loss!

To save one day of leave I landed up taking a bus from Rajkot to Mumbai by Eagle Travels which only ply regular busses during odd hours; a bus service which was till now one of the worst maintained, most expensive and most impolite that I had come across till now. But being the monopolistic service provider to Mumbai during that time, I was left with little or no choice. So while I spend the night wide awake watching “Khatron ke Khiladi” Akshay Kumar was in full form those days and bearing the loud snores and the drooping head of my co-passenger. I kept wondering about the unpredictability of life, here I was meeting up with all my hostel buddies after such a long time, quite a few of us couldn’t make it and rest assured that very few of us would ever be able to take time out of their jam packed schedule driven lives to make way from another meet once they get full fledged into the Hustle-Bustle of life.

I reached Mumbai at about 1:30 P.M after a long journey of about 15 hours. The bus driver dropped me at Sion as I had to go to Chembur (Shukla’s place); he was a nice guy as he dropped me at right place otherwise I don’t expect this from Gujjus. As I got down from the Auto Rikshaw I saw Varun, Pandu and Ballu waiting for me; a moment of delight seeing friends after such long time. Everyone’s changed a bit as they picked my bag which can never happen in college; even some tried to pay my rikshaw bill which was quite surprising. We headed straight to shukla’s place which was stinking due to balli’s unwashed socks since ages and everyone was using shukla’s deodorant as room freshner. As I had not eaten for last fifteen hours I was dying out of hunger and only shukla was kind enough to take me to have something which was Vada-Pao After returning to his place full stuffed with vada and pao people told me that he was doing the same thing with them since last night as if the Vda-Pao waala is paying some commission to him. Everyone was waiting in shukla’s room except PP who has busy filling tax forms at Rashi’s place and after lot of efforts and pursuance PP finally came to his place and our gang was ready to move.

Journey begins:
We boarded the train from Vasai Road to Goa but prior to that we had lot of discussion like Jigyashu’s and Newton; Lanka; Patte and as usual tedha shukla and yeah again had Vada pao of which we were addicted by now.

We reached Goa sometime around 6:00 in the morning and drove straight to panjim but as it always happens with us all the hotels were full or out of our budget though our budget was quite high this time and people were ready to spend. None of us remained “leechad” although some were still called “leechad”. So we changed our plan and moved straight to calangute beach divided ourselves in groups in search for hotels. Finally because of excellent management skills of Amaresh and bargaining skills of Rashi we landed up in a guest house a rather nicely kept up hotel with a decent pricing for its services. Soon we planned to head straight towards the beaches. At this point it is worthwhile to mention the special preferences that some people had towards beaches frequented by foreigners, who were uncannily naked and took to sunbathing ignoring the gaping eyes of the natives and the Indian visitors.

We short listed three beaches as a part of our Itinerary, Calangute, Baga and Anjuna. Of these Calangute is by far the most popular of all beaches, Anjuna as per the highly reliable information is the more 'Virgin' one, rather less commercialized and a favorite amongst the peace loving, topless and sun bathing foreigners. Hence it found an irrevocable place in the ‘must see’ list of this college pass-out bachelors group. I must admit, I too was quite excited at the thought of getting a real peek into the nicely chiseled bodies of blondes and brunettes.
Beaches Along:

23rd Jan2009
On the very first day we spent grandiosely trolling in the Calangute beach and swallowing and digesting the beauty of the ocean and the sky and the horizon that holds them apart. Incidentally a lot of water and adventure sports activities are available in Calangute, these include but are not limited to water scooting, Para-sailing, paragliding, banana boat, speed-boating and paddle-boating. Because of baniya majority in our gang we were able to strike out a good deal and decided to take a package of three water sports including parasailing, water scooter and banana boat.

The most exciting of these was definitely Para Sailing.
The sheer pump of adrenalin as the jet of cold air thrusts on you and jolts you high up in the air, can be scarcely put to words. Initially it is scary and you hold on to the safety harness, wondering when it will slip through your torso and engage you in a free- fall, slowly the realization takes over, that its probably not going to happen, and even if it would, it would probably be better to enjoy the breathtaking beauty all around. Soon the muscles begin to relax and you are finally enjoying the spread around you. The splendidly Turquoise Blue water and the golden sands with little 'ant-sized' people hustling-bustling around the shores. Its truly a breathtaking experience. What makes it all the more exciting is the sudden jerks that you are bound to get as and when the speedboat decides to increase its velocity, with an effect pushing you higher up in the air. One such jolt, and your worst thoughts come dancing back, are you finally going to drown & die? Oh No! you are not even Married, and even worse you are still a Virgin!!

Followed by water scooter and banana boat were we tried our best to balance it without realizing that the guy standing at the back is responsible to topple it; after all it is what he is getting paid for. It’s because of his experience in this field he easily finds out whom to topple and whom to not as some one finding it difficult to get up on it again in the mid-sea then it wll be his responsibility. But they still have a feeling that they balanced it.

Water Scooter was like riding a racing car on the back seat because even after a lot of efforts the attendant never allows you to touch the accelerator. Though it was fun because the water splashes and bends and curves of 60 degrees to the vertical makes you feel the thrill of speed.

It was followed by the much patented game of ours that is keechad holi of which PP is an expert taking advantage of his huge size. Myself and paddy took a safer route and went out to explore baga which is at walking distance and we were able to see something for which we were at the beaches. When we came back most of the people were drinking to get rid of the tiredness of traveling and beach sports as an excuse and we gladly joined them.

We came back had a tight sleep as Tito’s was waiting for us with all its hands wide open. All of us headed straight to the Tito’s, some including myself tried to talk to girls standing outside for accompanying as a partner but all of us were unsuccessful even at an offer fully sponsored party. But we as engineers never loose hope and the search was still on even inside the club. The experiences inside were mind blowing and myself and Varun without thinking of anything ended up having shots after shots ending up in a state were we have to be carried away by others( Responsible guys) although we were not that drunk. Rest experiences may be shared by others as comments.

24th Jan of 2009:

We talked something about planning on the very first day and this day was a perfect example of worst planning. As this entire day we spent on search of bikes and cars. Entire Mumbai shifted to Goa that day as an after affect of 26/11 and this was the first extended weekend they got. As luck always does with us, the gypsey we managed refused to start and finally we were able to move at around 4:00 in the evening. Because of the help of Just dial and Rashi’s efforts, it was her department; some were busy arranging bikes, some returning the gypsey back and some having lunch; we were able to land up in an overnight cruise with complimentary drinks and dinner and a live band performing accompanied by a DJ on the deck. We were sailing on a cruise with not much guys around and Band performing songs of our choice made us all feel like entrepreneurs sailing on private cruise. Pandu falling in love for the band member (I admit she was cute, other one was cuter) and as a result thrown out the cruise. PP and Rashi not allowing us to cry on “ Friends forever by Vitamin C”; shukla as usual puking in the sea and keeping mum of the incident and was still on the cruise because the bouncers were not able to find out about his incident. PP finally managing to get band members email ID and telephone Numbers (The KY convener is still alive).

25th of Jan 2009:

It was our last day in Goa and we had our best intentions of exploring it as much as we can and I think we were successful in it.
We started our journey by moving ahead for Aguada. Biking on the roads of Goa is an awesome feeling we call it “Meta Roadies”. I feel people go to Aguada for photgarphic sessions and Aguada management committee should thank Dil Chahta hai for making it a tourist destination. We too did the same….purchased DCH/Cowboy hats gave various poses and fought over which was the exact location for DCH. Pics came out be really kool and are memories forever.
We straight away moved to Anjuna beach were we sat, chatted but found nothing as it was expected or we went for. Had lot of memories at Anjuna and I am sure people will share it as comments.

We had plans for Palolem Beach at night but one major thing was still remaining that is preparing the balance sheet so could not go ahead with it. It took around three hours to prepare the balance sheet by two baniyas (Rashi and Myself) and yeah it tallied in one go, Balance sheet of something around 1 Lac rupees (14 people and assuming an avg of 7K per person) many had no idea of their expenditures. I wish Satyam contacted us this would not have been the state of Raju’s.

26th of Jan 2009

This day of Jan we left for Mumbai by road and the journey for Goa ended with plans for our next reunion(As per PP it would be international this time, guy who thought of calling Bryan Adams and Pink Floyd at our college fest).

P/s: I have cut short a lot of incidents as it was already four pages and I never written such long article or even answers in exam. So rest is left to be shred by others as comments.