Off to a great start... revised Jan.3/04 (Gokarna, India)

When you're sliding into first and you feel a sudden burst....

Diahrea! Yep, that's right folks, I got it a couple days ago. But surprisingly its already gone, well cross your fingers for me that it doesn't return. I'm kinda glad to say that I got it because it wouldn't have been an authentic Indian trip if I hadn't. Instead of me playing baseball and getting a burst, I was running to the outdoor toilet hut at my beach hotel and just missed by 15 seconds! Lets just say that I had to throw my undies away. Oh well. My friend Gerry warned me about this and says that it happens to everyone and don't worry about it when it does. I remembered this advice as I squatted there in the toilet going "shit, what the hell am I going to do now?"

I Scream, You Scream

I think I may have gotten it from this homemade mango ice cream I had here in Gokarna. They're infamous for their ice-cream, how can you resist? Now that my bad belly's actually gone, I don't really regret having that yummy, yummy mango ice cream for only 5 rupees.

On top of me having this ailment, my eye has been bothering me the last couple days but has passed as well. Not to mention, since my immune system was down, I caught a small fever the other night. Man, in these huts that you stay in (this one was just a hut, a couple beach mats and a tiny, tiny, lumpy matress with no pillows or blankets and no electricity!), there's no airflow amazingly. They get bloody hot at night, due to that I think I got a little too hot and I ended up getting massive chills/shakes, which then ended up turning into an immense amount of sweating!

When you've got the chills you just want to wrap up in like 5 blankets, but of course there wasn't one other than my bed sheet I brought and all the clothing that was being used under my head as a pillow. I luckily had my shawl there too that I used but still didn't seem like enough.

Prior to midnight

So on the New Year's Eve, during the day I wasn't very excited, seeing as though this was the day I shit in my pants. I also tried to take a picture of the last sunset I'll see in 2003 and right when the flash went off my camera froze. I also had my zoom lens out all the way and so it was like my camera was on viagra for the next 24hrs until I was able to buy a new battery for it. I was unable to take any pictures of the evening, or the day for that matter as I sat in a restaurant all day and hung out with Nils and this Welsch guy named Russel. We played cards for a while and I slept in a hammock.

I was being careful of what I was eating in order to prepare for the big night. We had heard of two different parties, one at my hotel/restaurant and one at this other placed called "Namaste" (Hello, in Hindi, why would you call a hotel/restaurant Hello?"). So anyway I was hopeful that I would have an exciting night and party it up. I have still yet to really dance off my booty since I've left home. There was one night in Goa, but that doesn't meet my expectations.

All by myself

I keep hearing that song, its some dance remix... how annoying!

After having dinner at Namaste (a yummy pasta dish) I was so tired I just couldn't wait until midnight. I ended up going to my hut at 10:30pm and just rested and waited for midnight. I was going to take a nap and wake up at 11:45, but I couldn't sleep. There was a huge party outside of our place and there was no way I could sleep with all the drumming and fireworks going off. I was able to see a bit of the action before I retired. It was actually quite exciting, there was probably 150-200 people outside on the sand, around this big bonfire. There were 3 drummers just beating away these cool tribal songs and people danced around the fire. Lots of them were westerners trying to dance all ethnic, it seemed fun and I kinda had an urge to join in. But no.

I decided that if I'm going to be myself this year, I'm going to be doing what I love the most, well one of the things at least. I set up everything for myself in my hut, mainly got my sheets ready, brushed my teeth and changed clothes. Afterwards I got my CD's ready, I chose what songs I wanted to listen to before and after midnight. Then I propped up a picture of Jeremy next to my pillow.

Up until 12 I just lay in bed and listened to some of my favorite songs and sang out as loud as I wanted to. I'm sure that nobody could really hear me, but even so, who cares. At about 11:55 I brought my candle outside the hut, along with my discman and Jeremy's picture and watched some of the fireworks that had been going off sparatically for the last 2 or 3 hours. I waited and waited to hear the crowd roar, but it didn't happen until 12:10 according to my clock. I think that they didn't even really realize the time, they were too enthralled in their dancing. So at 12:03 on my clock I decided that it was the start of 2004 and I kissed Jeremy and I listened to Stevie Wonder's "Stay Gold", a song about seizing the moment.

I can honestly say that this was probably one of the best New Year's I've ever had. Normally I stress out about what to do and who to celebrate with and where to go and what will I wear and how much $ will it cost, etc, etc, etc. This year was simple, do what I want to do.

Resolutions

The main thing I've decided is that I'm going to do what I want to do, be true to myself. I already try to do that, but I'm going to do it on a more conscience level this year. Or at least strive to.

Ã?'m going to try and find a harmonica to buy and put some effort into learning how to play it.

I'm going to do a lot more writing in my journal, not only regular journal stuff, but I'd like to try and do some song-writing. I want to try and do some creative writing, like stories and character profiles of the people I meet in my travels.

OM

Om beach was really cool because the rocks in the sea formed the Om symbol. It's a beach just outside of Gokarna that we had to walk about an hour to get to in the mid day sun. On the way home we took a boat taxi which was almost just as bad. The boat went sideways along the waves and so we were rocking back and forth like crazy. I was scared of falling in, not because I can't swim but because I had my camera and discman.

There were tonnes of hippies there and felt really weird. When we first arrived it was kind of like the Twilight Zone. What's with all these travellers that turn into wasters and hippies, smoking pot all day with chilums and getting dreadlocks?

Happy Birthday Jesus

Sorry, I've got to backtrack a while. I've been slacking on my blogs lately.

For Christmas eve I was able to go to midnight mass with Paul (the guy from Vancouver) and some of women who lived at the house where our huts were. They were all dressed up to the nines. Lovely. We all began to walk to church which is like a 30min walk away in another town outside of Palolem. We were able to find a rickshaw though.

I ended up being the only guy sitting in the women's section of the church. I didn't realize until after the mass had begun, but oh well. I fit in in some ways. Everyone was all really nicely dressed and I tried to as well, but I only have so many clothes with me and only my nike runners.

It was really nice to attend the mass, the only problem was that it wasn't in english! I was able to understand some parts, but even the prayers were in 'konkan' so I didn't even know which prayers were being said. During the peace portion when you normally shake hands, they all just turn and bow with their hands together. Like the way Japanese people do, this is actually the way that all Indians greet and say thank-you to one another, but only when they really mean it, it seems. I already knew this from mass in Calcutta and bowed to the lady beside me, but she just kinda gave me an evil eye. I guess because I was a male in the female section perhaps. There were 2 occasions when we had to line up, each time the lady kept nudging me to go forward as if I didn't know to move. At one point she stood up and nudged me and then sat back down because she realized it wasn't our turn yet. I just kept standing and looked like a fool.

At the end of mass, the priest said in english "Merry Christmas to everybody..." and then started to talk konkan again. A birthday cake was brought out and we all sang "Happy Birthday to Jesus", this was english and so I was able to participate. After we all went up and touched the little baby Jesus statue they had in the nativity scene.

Outside there was chai tea and cake, (I had two slices of fruitcake...mmm) and the priest got up on this stage. He had a microphone and before I knew what was going on, everybody was grabbing bingo cards and the priest was yelling out numbers! That was a sight to see.

Paul and I ended up walking half the way back to Palolem because there were no vehicles available and Fatima and family had found a friend with a motorbike to go back with, we declined. The stars were shining brightly and I sang some carols. Paul borrowed some toilet paper and shat in the bushes and sang along with me as he squatted in the dark.

We were supposed to meet up with Alex, Sanne and Nils but couldn't find them. There was this huge rave going on, but they weren't there. I couldn't believe the rave, there were so many people dancing at this one secluded area of the beach and their was a big DJ set up and big boulders where people were dancing on. I would have liked to stay for a while and danced but was a little overwhelmed by the crowd and I didn't like the trance music.

Merrily on high

A few quick notes on my Christmas day.

I basically just hung out at the beach all day and had some fun activities. These included:
- snow angel making... in the sand
- one snowman with seashells for the facial parts with Kat ... in the sand (lots of people walked by and took pictures with good ol'frosty)
- boogie boarding
- a little black magic
- relaxing.

The evening was not what we really expected but was just as good. We were hoping for a real turkey dinner that we had paid RS 500 for. Well, all we got was turkey that had been cut up into these clumps and bbq'd. Most of it was burnt but I was able to get a good piece. I don't like turkey, never really have. The rest of the dinner was much like the same old Indian food I'd eaten previously. We decided the dinner was a rip off. We all bought a bottle of wine (each) and made some toasts. We sang carols, one of which I was forced to sing by myself but expressed the true meaning of Christmas in Sanne's eyes. It was Stevie Wonder's "Someday at Christmas". We did crackers, read a story, told some jokes. In between courses we opened 2 gifts at a time from our gift exchange. I ended up being the last one to choose and could pick from any of the already opened presents or opening the last unwrapped one on the table. I stole these red fisherman pants and a water bottle holder away from Kat. The last one that was left was a 1.5hr massage for the next day. Oh well, I'm glad I got the pants, they're really comfortable and I've been thinking about getting some. Sanne actually chose them with intentions for me.

At the end of our meal, we wanted to go and party but it turned out that there were no raves on Christmas, let alone any kind of party at all. Oh well.