Days Blend

Well Okay,

 

The Radhika Beach Resort looks strikingly like a miniature golf course from the early 60's.  A nice one, but a mini-golf nonetheless.  There are winding concrete pathways, a large swimming pool, lots of statutes of mermaids (with hair strategically covering nipples, dammit), and at night there are racing ant lights that can be rivalled by Lakeside. 

 

Which is to say I like it a lot.

 

My original plan was to sit for three days here, since I very literally, had gone across, around and through the country as fast as I possibly could.  I was thinking that I would then head back to G. and do, in a word, "nothing."

 

Then I met far-out Sam at the poker tournament.  He lives/works in an ashram in Pune.  You may not know the name Osho, but you probably do recognize the name Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh, and if you don't know that, you may recognize what my dad always called him, "That goofy son of a bitch with the high voice and all the Rolls Royces."  Sam had offered me a chance to go hang with him in OshoLand and I was going to get all over that action.  I've spent time with the Moonies, the Krishnas, Trappists, the LDS, the Jehovah's Witnesses and yes, even some Jews in my life, so I'd love that chance. 

 

I sat here in the easy-land of D. and I thought, okay, I'll stretch it to four days here, jump to Pune on Friday and spend two nights there before the big leap out from M. early Monday morning.  But it's problematic because there's only one flight a day off the island and that doesn't get into M. until the early evening.  The ashram has a curfew of 15:00 when they close the gates which means that it would end up costing me a couple hundred bucks just to go in, spend a night, and go out.  I'll do that for tigers, I won't do it for hucksters in orange robes.

 

So I've stayed in D.  I've been here ever since.

 

It's very reminiscent of G. -- beautiful beaches, laid back people, very little direct government intervention.  I make it a point to do something every day, but I'm not doing much.

 

For one thing, writing these damn entries has taken a remarkable amount of time.  For sure, writing this for you is more than any damn thing you've ever done for me.  You owe me an Apple Pancake, at the very minimum.  I've spent so much time in the Internet cafe here that the staff know me by name and reserve a very specific machine for me -- they even run errands for me like buying plane tickets.  I give them history lessons on America.

 

For another, I needed to just settle down a bit.

 

The old city of D. is completely surrounded by fortified walls and there's 17th century fort on the vulnerable edge.  I spent one day walking the dividing wall, another going through the fort (it's everything you could want: 2-story drops, cannons, cannonballs, bats, sweeping views, secret backways, mixed architecture, Portuguese on walls, newer H. temples, incredibly steep steps, unbelievably long ramps, a jail, a well, it goes on and on).  One day I went to sunset beach and walked five miles back to the hotel.  Another I just walked to the far side of the island and hung a left -- I found myself on a tan sand beach, probably three and a half miles long, with only one other person on it.

 

I keep hitting low tide and the ocean edge of the beach has extremely old volcanics in the water ... It creates tide pools that fill with minnows, crabs, snails and mussels.

 

The palm trees here are a species I'm not familiar with ... They start as a single trunk and then split into two's, three's, four's or five's.

 

It gets hot in the middle of the day -- hot enough that the dogs don't even chase you -- and super-pleasant at night.  There are cows everywhere, of course, but they're fat and happy -- not bony and gross.  They're too stupid to realize it, but they're the luckiest cows in In.

 

One day I was walking down the main highway (I've taken to walking on the road, instead of the shoulder) and a tourist gave me a lift on his scooter, incredulous that I'd walked the four miles it took to get there.  I asked if he wanted to go to dinner, but he demurred and said that he and his wife were going to eat at their place.  I bid him farewell and thanked him for the ride.

 

About an hour later I had a phone call, which of course, will be interesting.  It's the front desk, there's a delay and then I'm talking to the guy that'd given me a ride -- he and his wife want to know if I'll join them for dinner at their hotel. 

 

Sure.  I'd love to.  I haven't had a conversation with another human being since I sat on those skinny steps in J.  But first, I've got to know ... how did they find me?

 

They went back to the hotel and asked about "a white guy with a hat."  Bingo.  It's gotta be that guy in 502.

 

Dinner was good -- I had a large seafood plate (crab, shrimps, pomfret, tuna and some whitefish I don't recognize).  They're both from Germany (although she has a very heavy Irish accent) and of course, of course, if you're talking to Euros the conversation is going to be about politics ... We talk and the majority of the conversation focuses on Uganda and The Congo. 

 

This is the very edge of the stuff I know about -- I can name the succession since Amin, and know about all the bizarre stuff that's going on in The Congo -- but I struggle to keep up in the conversation.  They haven't met any Americans in In. (of course) and aren't surprised that I know what I know -- they'd be very surprised if they knew how few Americans knew this stuff ... In fact, I don't know any who live in America who do -- I talk about stuff like this to David Levy (and he's in Scotland).

 

The conversation winds along and it's going fine -- we talk about where we've gone and where we'd like to go when the trip-up happens ...

 

I'm talking about Malaysia and the woman says, "I've always wanted to go there.  You know why?"  Do tell.  "Because they won't allow anyone from Israel there."

 

It's nice to have friends everywhere, eh, Special K?

 

The food at my hotel is known for being the best not only on the island, but in Gu. as a whole.  I'm eating about a meal and a half a day now ... mostly prawns in various sauces and concoctions ... Think of your third favorite In. restaurant in American -- it's easily better than anything I've had before D.  Now think of your favorite place -- the food I'm eating now is better than that.  So it's pretty good.

 

Nagoa Beach -- the place where the Radhika is situated -- is famous throughout In.  There are many families in-and-around the beach that have saved for months or years just so they can go wade in the water with their clothes on.  The restaurant in my hotel is talked enough about that some people set a life goal of someday eating there -- and of course I'm there daily.

 

I sit and read before and during my meal.  The staff hovers and is overly attentive, but they're adapting to the fact that I can serve myself from a dish of food -- they're also no longer embarrassed by the fact that I tip a little bit.

 

The way I've travelled on this trip isn't my preferred way -- I don't like being way up-and-above the population, but I've done the whole meet-and-greet In. thing and I was after something more check-boxy than that.  I've had a great time, it's been a super trip, but it's been one of almost complete isolation.

 

Although I'm alone, I'm not lonely.  Personally, if this trip shows anything, it shows how much "better" I am.  A trip to a place like this has the ability to mentally break me -- the last one here nearly did -- but the long walks, the dead silences, the meals alone have all just been a part of the deal.  I would loved to have shared much, if not all, of this with someone -- the trip would have been better if I had -- but I wouldn't go so far as to say it was worse because I didn't

 

I'm not sure if I'll ever come back to In. -- I don't feel like I "need" to -- but Bangladesh is right next door ... there's some stuff there I'd like to see, including swamp tigers.

 

You damn well better thank me when you see me,

b1