Saturday night in North Goa is all about the Arpora night market, so we thought we would get S a babysitter and head down to see what all the fuss was about.
First we had to get there ..... and we nearly didn't. Our taxi driver was a crazy man and had terrible/amusing taste in music. As soon as we got in the car James Blunt's 'Your beautiful' was blaring out of the stereo system. This hideousness was nearly over but we had to pull into a servo to fill up with fuel. Once we'd done that and the engine was turned back on... yes we started back at the beginning again of 'You're beautiful'. I thought this was bad until the follow up song was by none other than teen heart throb Justin Beiber - I don't even know how I knew this. We then moved onto Punjabi techno and trance.... it was painful!!! It was so loud and pretty intense as we ducked and weaved through traffic and came head to head with massive trucks.
He then proceeded to yell that drugs were becoming a problem in Goa..... isn't that interesting he said as trance music filled the background. I can't help feeling he was gauging our interest level. We continued ....high beams from other cars burned my retinas and we attempted to smash the land speed record until we reached the inevitable speed bump where we came to a screeching halt.
Anyway we did get there. This market could have been anywhere in the world - tourists from all over the world. We had a wander around and tried to find some things to buy but didn't have a lot of luck - there was heaps to buy and everyone else was having more success than us. One of my searches was for shoes but unfortunately I had no luck.
Given the reasonably close proximity to their homeland their were lots of Europeans enjoying themselves in Goa and someone, somewhere was selling them Ed Hardy t-shirts cheap, nearly every man had one on....and all of them had seen a bit too much sun and if they wanted a little slice of home they could drink beer and watch the football with their fellow countrymen.
As expected Goa paid tribute to hippie land... lots of people dancing in spirals with their face looking to the sky for inspiration or paying Rs 50 to have their glimpse of outer space.
This market was massive, there were rows and rows and rows of different things for sale - sarongs, shoes, Om t-shirts, Bob Marley t-shirts, bangles, bags and bracelets.......
Then there was the food. You could have eaten Russian, Polish, Mexican, Indian, Italian... there was plenty on offer. T had the tandoori chicken which he thoroughly enjoyed.
and I had one of the best wood fired fungi pizzas I have had in a long time. It was delicious!
So in the end it was a market...... Goa would be loving it though and doing pretty well out of all these people coming down and spending up big and good on them - everyone was having a really good time.
But my highlight was probably getting back in our taxi and the brilliant music and death defying acts of the journey home. I have never heard the particular Man U song that was on in the car but it was hilarious and certainly helped distract our attention from his driving.
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