Delhi Belly and Anjuna Beach

I usually don’t heed many warnings when travelling through less developed countries.  I use local tap water to brush my teeth and wash fruit when I shouldn’t, eat street food as it comes my way and never using hand sanitizer (insisting that it is simply not good for you).  But as with all travellers who throw caution to the wind, my time had finally come.  

I woke up in the middle of the night, overcome with an unfamiliar nauseous feeling as I quickly ran to the washroom and threw up as I had never thrown up before.  Spasm after spasm, my stomach convulsed into sharp and exhausting knots.  In the background, I heard a yell from the other room as Vic noticed a giant cockroach that had crept under our mosquito net and onto our bed.  As I cleaned up the mess, Vic was madly scrambling around the bed trying to find our elusive creepy crawler.  “Wow,” Vic said when I got back into the room, “I’ve never seen you throw up before.  Between you throwing up and me looking for that cockroach, that was just about the weirdest twenty minutes ever”.   

That one trip to the washroom turned into two and then three and then four before I lost count.  I started hallucinating and was convinced at one point I had caught meningitis, “tell my family I love them if I don’t make it to morning”, I moaned to Vic.

Fortunately, I did make it to morning and, my stomach completely empty, I finally felt better as we packed up our bags and headed to our third beach town, Anjuna Beach.  Anjuna Beach is another hippie/backpacker town, an even older and larger version of Arambol.  On one end of the beach, bikini and speedo clad foreigners strung out on “E” are dancing to loud trance and techno beats.  They are the leftover remnants of the previous night’s party and though it’s 2 pm, the party is still not over for them.   

Getting ready for the next beach party

On the other end of the beach, Kenny Rogers lookalikes sporting g-strings are doing everything from yoga, to running, to practicing circus tricks.  And in between it all is the more usual sea of foreigners, Indian vendors and cows.   Back at our room, the same dude keeps knocking at our door at all hours trying to sell us hash.

Coach from Survivor

We only get to spend 2 days and 1 night in Anjuna before taking the overnight sleeper bus to Hampi and to depart the province of Goa for good.  

I leave Goa having learned two new things.  Firstly, that the hippies of the 60’s are still alive and well, are still wearing the same outfits and  partying it just as hard as they did back in the day. 

And secondly, how to tie a mean turban…