And to the woman, who held my hand when the Beatles’ sang “I wanna hold your hand” (missed you guys)

On our first day in Goa, we visited the Stone House Cafe, in Candolim on the road to Taj Aguada. We were a gang of 11 and we thought the music was amazing. The food was good too as was the cocktail called rocket fuel. We ate and drank and went back to our respective rooms.

On third day, some of us had already left, we decided to go back to the place. It was the beginning of a night that I won’t forget forever. Pasqual – the crooner and the master guitarist – was sitting in his seat, playing his songs. We fortunately got a seat right in front of him. He acknowledged us, and dedicated the next song to Harish and his gang. Harish – spikey – the wall nut – had his face filled with happiness. And the song was “Wish you were here.” There have been few better starts in the history of the evenings I have lived. And all of us were remembering all the people we have loved and shared a bond with, particularly in relevance to music.

Then he sang “Light My Fire,” I had been mouthing the song all along in Goa. It was probably some kind of happy intuition. Pasqual was in my head. Choosing artists and songs that I have loved and adored since eternity.

When we started making requests like Dylan and Beatles, Reginaldo, a friendly British man came up to us like an excited 20 year old and asked us, how we knew all these songs. And then we went on to bond on artists like Leonard Cohen and Rolling Stones. Soon everyone was mouthing the classic rock platter that was served to us. Pasqual had become larger than life and even if he stopped singing, everyone around was singing. Chris the bartender joined Pasqual for American Pie. Chris the gracious man gave us a huge discount on our bill.

But the two songs, that rocked the most that evening were songs by the Beatles. The da-da-da-da…. part in Hey Jude was sung over and over tirelessly. The Stone House had ceased being a cafe and had become a Beatles concert, which is an almost impossible event to witness today.

As the night was coming to a close – Reginaldo dedicated ‘Paint it Black’ for the Bombay gang. Looking at Reginaldo gave me a strange feeling of traveling in time and seeing how I looked and was in the future.

When Pasqual played, ‘Smoke on the Water,’ I realized that the evening (or for that matter life) couldn’t get any better, and I was ready to die. And boy and me realized that if there was a moment of beautiful death, it was now.

But it got better, the evening was polished of with ‘Yellow Submarine.’ Which for me signifies Utopia….

As we live a life of ease
Every one of us, has all we need,
Sky of blue and sea of green,
in our yellow submarine.

We all live in a yellow submarine,
yellow submarine, yellow submarine,
We all live in a yellow submarine,
yellow submarine, yellow submarine.

There weren’t people, whom I would take in the yellow submarine. But there were a few whom I would love to be with on the yellow submarine, you know who you are.

When I look at back, I realize that I am not there.

Post also dedicated to all who I promised to see the Yellow Submarine (movie) with but which hasn’t happened yet.

Shandy is a mix of beer and lemonade/sprite. I like it three quarters beer and one quarter sprite. You may like it differently. I had it at a beach near Aguada fort and there were kingfish kababs to go with it. The combination is quite a gastronomic delight.

It goes well with the sun, the beach, the water and the view.

From Maningoa

0800 hrs — get up thirsty, dry throat
0815 hrs — order for water and check out Iranian women running around cottages
0830 hrs — stir up fellow roomies
0900 hrs — go for chai (yeah who drinks chai in goa?)
0930 hrs — stir some more roomies to get up
1000 hrs — breakfast on a beach shack
1030 hrs — hit the water
1100 hrs — order fish and beer
1115 hrs — hit the water with the beer
1130 hrs — king fish kababs with shandy
1200 hrs — laze in lazy chair
1300 hrs — hit the water
1330 hrs — order port wine bottle and squids fried in butter and garlic
1400 hrs — gorge on squids and another bottle of wine
1430 hrs — hit the water
1500 hrs — king’s beer time (Goa’s local beer)
1515 hrs — another king’s beer
1530 hrs — laze
1600 hrs — water sports time (or get buried in the sand)
1700 hrs — shandy and prawns xacuti
1730 hrs — get back to room and get a shower
1800 hrs — watch the sunset
1900 hrs — have “discussions”
2000 hrs — play some pool
2100 hrs — visit a shack for dinner (preferably Britto’s)
2130 hrs — eat, drink, make merry
2230 hrs — delicious
2330 hrs — i am feeling happy (thanks to long island iced tea, red wine, and more)
0030 hrs — i am feeling happier
0130 hrs — chocolate liqueur time
0230 hrs — night drive in open gyps
0330 hrs — back to room, more discussions
0430 hrs — sleep (huh!)

Thank you Ashraf for making this possible.

From Maningoa