Panaji and Palolem

Happy New Year! We are a little late with this, but want you all to know that we celebrated in style, as we hope you all did! But before we get to our street party brought to you by Clube Nationale, settle in to read about the days leading up to New Year's Eve.

Panaji is the capital of the state of Goa, and it is NOT on the beach. But, it is a city that is easily navigated on foot, has lots of amenities (restaurants that sell great food) and a central bus station to whisk you away to wherever you'd like to go.

After our sketchy place, we found a better room and were off exploring! We found the local breakfast haunt, which served traditional food to locals and travellers alike. I could get used to eating dosas for breakfast! They really are delicious! And the juice these guys whipped up was truly wonderful. We're relaxing our no ice policy as we have not suffered for it, and an icy glass of musumbi juice freshly squeezed for 40 rupees ($1.00) is something I will really miss when I get home. In fact, I seem to recall you can't get much for under $1.00, right??

Fed and watered, we headed off to do what we do, wander around town. Our legs took us to the Church of Our Lady of the Immaculate Conception, which is huge, and white, and located on a hill. Not something that is easy to miss! They had a lifesize "crib" (that's what locals call the creche scene) at the base of the church and the top of the stairs. Interestingly, we have seen many creche scenes here in South India. Every church has one for sure, as do hotels, some restaurants, and at the entrance to many homes. But the prize for the largest goes to the church in Panaji.

Near the church was an optical store - maybe we should look for glasses for Mark? We'd heard they were very inexpensive here, so thought we should check. I had Mark's Rx in my wallet, so we sauntered in. After probably an hour of looking at frames, we found some that we both liked, and it was time to bargain for the price. This can be a painfully slow process here, and I fear I am not that good at it because I am impatient. But, I think we did well enough as Mark now has a good-looking spare pair of prescription glasses for the princely sum of $68. Not so bad, and really, if you're happy with your purchase in the end, you've bargained hard enough. I do always wonder if I've been successful or been had though.

We found a great spot for dinner - a very funky spot called Hospedaria Venite. They have a great little upstairs that has four tiny outset balconies (very tiny!) that you can sit on. Well, actually, I couldn't really fit as my shoulders were too broad, but the side Mark sat on was a bit wider (love that attention to detail) so he sat there and I faced the balcony but sat in the restaurant. We ate well, but I felt a little overserved. Must have been the weeks with no alcohol, I was out of practice! I was wise and stuck to beer, but Mark was very adventurous and tried the local brew, cashew fenni with coke. I think it must be an acquired taste! The traditional pork vindaloo was yummy, as was my shark. Mark even had bebinca, which is a coconut cake that is often served at Christmas. And, not dissuaded from his cashew fenni, he tried that local Honeybee brandy, which actually tasted like Butter Rum Lifesavers!

We went to Old Goa, which was quite a sight. It was about a 45 minute bus ride, but you know, when you're not loaded down with a pack, the bus is not THAT bad! Old Goa was, from the 16th to 18th centuries, Rome of the East, bigger than Lisbon or London for a time. There a few very large impressive cathedrals and churches that required visiting. One of them, The Basilica of Bom Jesus, houses the last resting place of Goa's patron saint, St. Francis Xavier. Every 10 years his remains are carried from the Bascilica across the road to the Se Cathedral, with pilgrims coming from miles away to participate in the parade. Sadly, the next time he'll be out for his walk will be in 2014, so we'll have to come back!

We made it back in time for a lovely lunch at a great Portugese spot - time for some more authentic food. Fish Balchao - new to us. Spicy tangy and rich dark red tomato sauce on fish - looks like there might have to be more cooking classes in my future! There was a very cool local older gent having lunch there as well. He was dressed in his white dress shirt, fedora hat, and was drinking a glass of wine with lunch. We're not quite sure how the wine part happened, as the wait staff brought a bottle of wine that had been opened but had a cork in it, uncorked it, poured him a glass at the table, and left the bottle there, presumably for more consumption if requested. Interesting. The other neat thing about the restaurant is that there was a desk for the owner of the restaurant in a corner. Locals would sit and chat with her, before having a meal. Sometimes I really wish that I could speak the local language so that I could figure out what is going on!

What to do for New Year's Eve? Well, the youngster waiter at Hospedaira Venite said we should go to the street party put on by Clube Nationale! So, we got dressed up in our best clothes (me in my new salwar kameez and Mark in his black dress pants and his new Indian shirt) and at 9:30 pm, headed off to buy tickets and enjoy the party. Well, at 9:30 there was nobody there, and when we enquired about tickets, they said that the dress code was "formal". Hey, I thought we looked pretty good! At any rate, it was too dead to go, so we headed to a neat little bar nearby, that was also dead. What up?? Finally, at 10:30, we saw some people heading in the gates to the street party, so we tried for tickets, unsure if we were formal enough. Everyone else was in their shirts, ties and jackets, and nearly all the women were wearing little black dresses. Just me and a couple of grannies had their Indian clothes on! There was a live band that was playing some pretty "interesting" music - who knew that there would be a bunch of oldies in the crowd ballroom dancing? They were pretty good, I must say, but this was not really what we were looking for. By 11:30, the party picked up, and at midnight, there was a 30 second countdown, not the usual 10 seconds that we do. A few fireworks, some hugging and kissing, and the start of 2011 was upon us. We left at around 1:30, when the first band wrapped up, but there were still 2 more bands to go, plus the crowning of Miss Goa.... These Indians are late night partiers! My guess is the party wrapped at 4:30 - 5:00 a.m. Interestingly, it seemed like most people were drinking Coke.

We hopped on the bus on January 1st to head to the southern beaches and are now at Palolem, ensconced in a little coco-hut, enjoying the waves and the sun (and sadly, sporting a bit of a sunburn. When will I learn???) The food is amazing, I actually had salad for lunch yesterday and was thrilled with it. It's been SO LONG since I had salad! And the most amazing juice - carrot, ginger and papaya. Mmmmmmm. This morning's breakfast was very traditional bhaji-pau, a fresh bread roll to be dipped in vegetable based coconut curry. Yummy, yummy, yummy. Speaking of food, it's been simply hours since I had my Kingfisher and shared the best chocolate brownie in all of India with Mark. I hear some food calling me.

One week left - the time is flying by!