James and Cat’s Jazz-tastic Journey!

Hello, all. Well we’ve arrived in Goa and are now happily ensconced in the capital Panaji.  It’s a quaint little place with a definite European flare; Goa didn’t gain it’s independence from Portugal until 1961 and it shows!  There’s lots of little Portugese restaurants and an enormous Christian church (which looks beautiful during the day, but at night they light it up and the blue neon cross on top and the fairy lights round jesus’s halo just make it look gaudy!) and the whole place has a very laid back feel.  After the madness of Mumbai this is much appreciated!  We spent four days there in total and it was more than enough.  The main thing that hit me about the city is the huge gianormous gap between rich and poor; people are either really rich (ie living in houses made from gold) or so poor that they sleep in middle of the road and oncoming traffic has to swerve to avoid them! It’s a loud, smelly, dirty city but it has SO much character!  We took a boat over to Elephanta Island on Saturday, which coincidentally was Holi Day, so many Indian families were making the pilgrimage also (aswell as throwing copious amounts of brightly coloured paint over each other, which didn’t seem to come out too easily!)  The island was amazing; huge caves that had been carved out of the mountain, with enormous carvings of various Hindu Deities… it was truly awe inspiring.
The one thing I personally am having a hard time with, is the attitude of the Indian men. They stare CONSTANTLY! I’ve been really good about not wearing anything too tight or revealing but it doesn’t deter them.. it’s not a pleasant feeling at all, and I find myself instantly suspicious of any man who talks to me, which again doesn’t make me feel good, as I’m sure there are plenty of genuinely nice guys out there. Oh well, I think it’s just something I’ll have to learn to live with.
So there was my rambling… we’re heading to the beaches in a couple of days.. probably Anjuna next (I want to get my dreads done there!) where we plan to do… nothing.
We’ll keep you posted (And I’ll try not to waffle quite so much next time!)
Oh yeah, keep you’re eyes peeled for photos, as we plan to upload some next time we post, only this computer’s rubbish and doesn’t recognise the camera!

Much love
Cat and James

This entry was posted on Tuesday, March 25th, 2008 at 5:19 am and is filed under Travel. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.