There is no Greater Love than the Love of Crab

The food in Goa has been outstanding. I’ve eaten impossibly fresh fish or seafood every day, and amazing Indian dishes knocked up by the chef at Bougainvillea where I stayed.

For sheer authenticity, the best place has to be Milly’s, a few kilometres out of town down the road to Agonda. A little house, a few tables held together with parcel tape and a veggie patch out the back. Cows lean over the wall from next door, and a dog and a cat sleep on the floor.

Milly prepares one meal a day, a thali. That’s some rice, pickles, dhal, sauce, and something else. I’ve had little fishcakes or spicy fillets of fish fried in semolina. She makes her own Kombucha, and everything has been grown in her little garden. Dining here is exactly the kind of experience that you travel for.

The other side of Patnem, a ride away down among the pine trees that line Turtle Beach, is Surya. It’s all fish and seafood - fantastic oysters, beautiful soup, and crabs from the lagoon behind the beach. You sit in dappled shade under the trees and watch the waves rolling in.

Surya, Turtle Beach

I chose a pretty big crab from the basket, its twin claws tied up with string. I love crab. Love it. I love the animals themselves, and I love eating them.

There is something very noble and dignified about a crab I think; they seem so ancient and primitive. I love how they change colour so dramatically when you cook them, and how that symbolises their passing from one thing into another. If you are going to eat animals, you really need to make this connection with them and understand what it is you are doing. You are asserting your place in the food chain; the natural supremacy of your species that is integral to the evolution of our planet. Kill and eat animals, but know and understand that you are doing it. Know that you have a duty to them during their life, and when you have taken that life, turned an animal into food, you have a duty to make that food taste as pure and delicious as it can.

I’ve cried eating crab before, and if I hadn’t been surrounded by people, I probably would have again. Just the sweetest, juiciest, most wonderful thing in the world to eat. I thank my little red shelled buddy, and pick slowly and deliberately through his body, making sure not a single scrap of him goes to waste.

I came back a few days later and ate another one. Walking along the beach after the meal, tiny baby crabs, their shells soft and translucent, are darting into little holes as you approach, out of reach of your heavy feet and the crows that chase them all day. Round towards the shore of the lagoon the sand became suddenly very soft and our feet sank inches deep with crisp, clean edges to their imprints. A strange pattern covered the surface, miniscule balls lying all around long, random scratches.

It was sort of comforting knowing that they were under our feet all the time, emerging only to scurry about the sand searching for their own little morsels to feed on, and I wondered how many of them would eventually find their way into the wicker baskets, and when, and make some lucky soul very, very happy.

Patnem: Paradise Found

Round about now I should be easing my stifled body from the flat bed of the overnight coach from Cancona to Hospet and unceremoniously unfolding my creaky limbs. But instead I am walking once more along the soft, homely sand of Patnem beach and limbering up for a spot of morning tennis. For the first time, but not the last, I’ve decided to extend my stay in a place I love.

Among the sadnesses to reconcile oneself with when travelling is having to leave places that you love, but to which you know you will never return. But it is part of the deep joy of travelling too – embracing the impermanence and transience of life, and rejoicing in things that make you happy while they last. To lose something you love, first you must have loved.

So maybe you stay a few extra nights, or weeks here and there to prolong one flirtation or another. Maybe not. But every now and then you go somewhere to which you know, beyond all doubt, you will return, and so it is with Patnem.

The greatest thing about life here is almost intangible. It’s not just a sense of community or warmth of spirit. It feels as though everyone is somehow unburdened by being here; lighter, happier and that the essence of the place fills them and makes them better people, more content. The gentle pulse of the tide is like a heartbeat, slow and strong, and in the same way that people walking together eventually step in time, so it is that everyone here seems to find harmony with that unique rhythm.

The civility of people can often be measured by their attitude towards animals. Resident dogs live on the beach, but to call them stray would be pushing it. They are extremely well fed and loved by everyone; basically communal pets. They reciprocate this love by loitering around the dinner table pulling sorrowful faces that their fat bellies belie, and by noisily fucking one another throughout the night (or in front of you while you eat - dinner and a show).

The sunsets here might not be the most spectacular (there aren't enough clouds) but they're a special moment nonetheless. The dogs join us humans and we head to the sand to watch the daily celestial wonder with a sort of reverence and gratitude, before spraying ourselves head to toe with mosquito repellant and slinking off to enjoy whatever the night time has to offer.

There are hundreds of huts along Patnem beach and beyond, all made of plywood, bamboo and covered in palm leaves. The cafes and bars are of similar construction, and for good reason. Because though for over half the year, the beach bathes in tranquil sun, come the end of May, the rains will arrive. 

My home for the last week or so

First the tourists will leave, and then the travellers. The Goans, who have businesses here, baton down their little shops and head inland to their houses. And then every single one of these huts and bars will be dismantled, piece by piece, the plumbing and electrics, the walls, beds and furniture packed away in storage, and the roofs of dried leaves burnt or left to wash away with the tide.

The baking heat of the summer sun will raise a great monsoon from the Arabian Sea, whipped ashore by a ferocious wind, and the empty beach, Paradise Lost, will sit and take what nature delivers; a penance for the high season of blissful, beachside days. And then, in November, like a colony of ants, the people will return, unpack the little world from the sheds and garages, and reassemble Babylon again on the seashore. The tourists and travellers will leave their homes all around the world and file back here to recreate and relive the happy times. The coin will flip over, the world will turn, again and again, year on year, new people, new beginnings, but the same, heavenly place.

The Blood of Jesus Protects, Saves, Heals, Restores

Wonderful though Patnem is, I can’t stay on the beach every day. Nor can I spend all day running, playing tennis, swimming, kayaking, doing cooking classes, yoga, finding secluded seafood shacks for life changing steamed crabs, discussing life and the universe around beach fires with wonderful people, or visiting the colonial mansions of new found friends.

Well, I can, but to do some of those things you need transport, and that means the two-wheeled variety. This being India, there is really only one way to do this:

But no. I might have driven a convertible Mustang and a Chevvy Camaro down the west coast of the USA, and a Nissan Skyline around Australia, but on two wheels, I’m a chicken, so I’m riding this bad boy instead:

In case you can’t see it clearly in the photo, the sticker on the front reads "The Blood of Jesus Protects, Saves, Heals, Restores.” So far, mercifully, it hasn’t had to, despite the best efforts of a number of adversaries one inherits when turning the key. These are:

1. Potholes
2. Tuk-tuks
3. Scooters
4. Cars
5. Everyone else
6. Cows
7. Dead dogs
8. Live dogs
9. Sleeping dogs
10. Monkeys
11. Everything else

Despite all that, the scooter gets you out into the countryside, and what glorious countryside it is. It opens up this little stretch of Goan coast, and you soon realise that it's not just Patnem that's special, it's everywhere around here.

Inland and the lush greenery and tropical forests open up, crystal clear waters hide delicious crabs and tiny roadside homes offer incredible food. It really does feel close to paradise.

Riding along in the late afternoon light, everything suffused with that special, golden glow of the disappearing sun, a moronic grin stretches across my bug splattered face. The rush of the wind, even at a measly 60kph and with Jesus rattling like a broken axial fan beneath me, is exhilarating enough to make me just feel deeply, deeply happy to be alive. Alive, and on the road: protected, saved, healed and restored. Just not by him....

Today on the scooter, heading out to turtle beach, a huge eagle swooped down in front of us and glided, six feet from the ground, ten yards in front of the bike, and for a few precious seconds, it were as though he were towing us along in his slipstream, before he rose up and soared over the mint green treetops and out of sight.

Ayurveda Naan

Today, I went for my first ever Ayurveda treatment. I won’t pretend to know anything about this, so most of what follows I have lifted straight off the leaflet….

Ayurveda is the oldest continuously practiced system of health care in the world. According to Ayurveda, the health of the body relies upon the alignment of three doshas (psycho-physiological principles). Ayurveda uses different therapies, massages and treatments to restore balance in these three doshas, thereby boosting the immune system and rejuvenating body and mind.

Some of the treatments on the list sound pretty crazy:

Sirodhara: Medicated oils or butter milk are poured onto the forehead in a continual stream for 45 minutes

Njavarakizhi: A process by which the body is made to perspire by the external application of medicinal puddings (?) 

Pizhichil: Lukewarm herbal oils are drizzled over the body simultaneously by two technicians in a continuous rhythmic way for 60-90 minutes 

Nasyam: Herbal juices or medicated oils are applied through the nose 

None of these really appeal, so I plump for Marma Siddha: “An acupressure massage in which pressure is applied to the marma points in combination with massage strokes. This treatment is beneficial for any back or skeletal weaknesses, sports injuries and those wanting a harder massage”. Sounds perfect, doesn't it?

What it translates to, in reality, is that I walk into a straw hut and a friendly but slightly odd-mannered, pot-bellied Indian guy with an orange sheet wrapped around his waist spends an hour and a half rubbing ghee all over my naked body with his feet.

The guy is called Libin, and he's been doing this a long time. It starts out inauspiciously enough, with me sat in a plastic patio chair in my underwear, while he pours a warm, thick oil over my head. Before long my pants are on a stool in the corner and I’m lying face down, legs akimbo as he alternates feet in long, firm arcs from foot to hand on each side. I’m grateful my genitals landed in a safe place when I laid on the floor, because he is soon standing on my buttocks.

He continues, and the massage is incredibly good, and I do indeed feel rejuvenated and replenished. But all the while I am smiling to myself and wondering what Karl Pilkington would make of it all as he slid around the rubbery floor, greased up like a pig. It’s not just me who is getting a going over here – Libin is sweating and grunting noisily as he grapples with my slippery, inflexible body, attempting all kinds of stretches and chiropractic adjustments. (He later confesses to someone else that I was "Hard work").

We continue to dance the dance for an hour and a half. Libin has me on my back for a while, his feet back and forth over my shiny body, and he nonchalantly flicks my cock out of the way every time he changes sides. It’s always a worry, in any massage, that one might get embarrassingly and unwittingly aroused, but I can safely say that we were never in danger of that.

All the while the herbal smell of the “oil” is getting stronger and stronger and I’m mentally drifting through the library of aromas stored deep in my nostrils or wherever, trying to figure out what the main scent is. I finally, if unsatisfactorily, settle on naan bread.

I leave the hut after a rigorous toweling down, glistening with oil, rejuvenated, restored and thoroughly entertained. And smelling. Smelling good enough to eat.

Goa Trance

I must have been seventeen years old, sat on a wooden picnic table, probably smoking a joint, in between A-level classes. A friend approached and, removing a headphone from his ear, generously proffered it to share the contents of the TDK D90 twirling around inside a chunky Sony Walkman. That was the first time I heard Paul Oakenfold's "Full Moon Party" Essential Mix from 1994. The Goa Mix.

It was music that I had never really heard before. And like the music, the word Goa itself conjured up an image of far flung tropical beaches. Beaches thronging with sweaty people from all over Europe, wearing Thai fishermen's pants, matted dreadlocks clinging to their greasy, naked backs, dancing in a crazed, acid fuelled trance, possibly for days and nights on end.

I must say when I rocked up at Anthy's guesthouse on a stretch of golden beach, somewhere between Colva and Benaulim last Friday night, that image felt pretty wide of the mark. I was twenty years older, but if these were the same guys, they were twenty older still, their hair had either gone respectable, or gone for good. Half of them had turned Russian, and if any dancing was being done it was behind closed doors, and after 9pm when they all went to bed.

Colva Beach, Goa

 That isn't to detract from the innate beauty of the beach there, or the incredible hospitality of the people. (A special mention should go to the guy who came to unblock my hut's 'soil pipe'- cheerily crossing the grass and ducking round the back with a shovel slung over his shoulder). I had a nice stopover for a couple of nights and headed further South, to a place called Patnem.

The little street that leads down to Patnem beach isn't suitable for cars, so I'm backpack laden as I pass the tiny shops, and step out onto the baking golden sand for the first time. It takes all of about three seconds for me to fall in love with the place and wonder when, if ever, I could possibly wish to leave.

Patnem High Street, Goa

Patnem Beach, Goa

Patnem is a lot more like the Goa I imagined twenty years ago, but quieter, gentler, calmer. There is a spectrum of people here from all walks of life, of all ages and from all corners of the world. There are a few holidaymakers, a lot of American girls training to be yoga teachers, travellers, people here for months on end just checking out for a while, and old guys who look like they’ve been here for centuries.

It’s hard to express what these people share, but if I had to use one word, it would probably be humanity. I’m sure between them they harbour some pretty crazy ideas about the universe and our place in it, and I’ve heard a few. But mostly there is a harmony and balance to the community here, and it comes from within, from a collective belief in the innate goodness of the world and the creatures that inhabit it. There are friendly faces everywhere; warmth, kindliness and compassion. So many of the things lacking in our everyday lives.

Of course there are downsides to a life here. Beach huts fill the area 100m back from the sand and where they meet, a string of restaurants and bars line the fringe. My hut is one of the last in the line, at the quietest end, but its unique acoustics render it a kind of sound box, and everything sounds louder inside than out. On my first night, people were on the beach fifty yards away, sat around a fire playing their bongos. Later they let off fireworks and whooped and cheered into the early hours of the morning. So much for compassion I thought.

When I finally woke after a restless sleep, the sea had got up in the night. The waves were crashing down outside and I wondered if I needn’t fear for my life. I stepped out onto the ramshackle terrace only to see soft little ripples lapping the sand. I stepped back inside my seashell of a hut to hear them rendered as a tsunami once again.

Maybe the place is rubbing off on me, because each night since I have slept blissfully and uninterrupted. Last night I fell asleep to a horrendous rendition of some U2 song or other at the open mic night next door. Fireworks get incorporated into my dreams, and the gentle rhythm of the bongos, and the sound of people laughing and enjoying themselves rocks me quietly and contentedly off.

Watching the Sun go down on Tuesday evening, I turned to look behind me and noticed that the Moon had already risen. I thought of the moon I watched rising over the Mekong before I entered Laos, four and a half years ago, winched quietly up into the night. Same Moon, same me. I turned west again because it struck me that the three seemed aligned, and so they were – Sun behind, Full Moon in front, and the Earth and I exactly in between.

There is no Greater Love than the Love of Eating

On my first night in India, when I was still unable to leave the cocoon like comfort of the Taj Palace Hotel, I ate the most ludicrously overpriced meal in their house Indian restaurant, Masala Kraft. I mean, it tasted great and everything, but the whole experience felt unauthentic and effortful. It's not what I came here for.

Not wanting to repeat this catastrophe, I enlisted the help of my friend Srila, who basically told me what to eat, where and when, and even treated me to dinner on my last night in Mumbai in what she neatly described as a "Muslim dive". The dive was Sarvi, the Muslims who run it from Iran. They make the most incredible kebabs imaginable. Not a hint of fat or grease, just soft, gently spiced meat, and unleavened breads that they insist on bringing to the table one at a time so you only ever eat them fresh. I'm deeply grateful for being taken here - it is one of those places that you would never, ever stumble across.

On my first day she sent me to Britannia and Company for lunch, a Bombay institution that has been there since 1923 and whose slogan reads: "There is no greater love than the love of eating". Amen to that. They sat me upstairs in the gallery where I looked down on the busy dining hall, packed with people from all corners of the city. 

Berry Pulav, Britannia and Company

I ate their specialty, Berry Pulav, a rice dish served with tiny half dried barberries that explode in little bursts of tangy sweetness as you eat. It's worthy of the reputation and the closeness with which they guard their recipe. Britannia is owned by a Parsi family, who import the berries from Iran. The Zoroastrians fled modern day Iran when the Muslims invaded Persia, back when the centuries were still in single figures. When they eventually settled in India they became known as Parsis.

Later that evening I dined at another Bombay institution, Trishna, a Southern Indian place specialising in seafood. They're famous for their butter and garlic crabs, which are indeed delicious, but the Hyderabadi Fish blows them out of the water (sorry). There are rare moments in life when your first taste of a certain food causes an almost transcendental experience. Your head rises as your shoulders drop. A smile edges across your face and you exhale an involuntary sigh of deep, spiritual pleasure as your soul is uplifted. This was one of them. Garlic, turmeric, black pepper, lots of black pepper, and who knows what else. The best fish I have ever eaten, end of story.

Hyderabadi Fish Tikka, Trishna

For lunch the next day Srila sent me to eat Gujarati street food at Soam, where a kindly waiter took me through the menu. Rice pancakes grilled between banana leaves, the Bombay staple of bhel puri, potato vadas and a paneer paratha with an amazing guava raita. It is all vegetarian, and all delicious.

Bhel Puri, Soam

I felt heavy after lunch, so wandered up the countless steps opposite the restaurant to the Shiva Temple of Babulnath, high up in the Gods. With every yard I climbed I wondered if I wasn't intruding on someone's home, so many people seemed camped out or asleep along the way. At one point, I was standing looking at a shrine surrounded by all kinds of images and icons, so much bright orange, that it was quite some time before I noticed a giant man stretched out among them. Perturbed by his stillness I moved swiftly on, until I reached the strangely quiet summit.

The original temple was built by Gujarati Hindus on land owned by the Parsis, who fought its construction until the 18th century. Zoroastrians believe that the earth and fire are sacred entities, and are unwilling to contaminate them with the bodies of their dead. Instead of cremation or burial then, a Parsi cadaver is disposed of by a process of ritual exposure. The agent for this is a Dakhma, or Tower of Silence, a round building on top of which the shrouded bodies are laid out to rot in the sun until consumed by vultures. A few hundred metres beyond Babulnath stands the last remaining Tower of Silence in Mumbai, still in use today, where the Parsi dead offer up their corpses in a final act of charity, as food for the birds. 

Tower of Silence, Malabar Hill, Mumbai