Friday, November 04, 2005

Goa

He sat facing the sands, thinking. Almost all money gone...only his camera and a radio left. He had not had anything to eat since morning. He had been at the beachfront five days. In Nepal he had heard about the tourist spot here, and had come over to take his chance.

There was no other option anyway. He had parted ways with his family, his brothers fluorishing handicrafts business, left college half way....he remembered them each night- his mother,brother and sister, longed to see them again. But he knew that it was unlikely.

A middle aged tourist with a British accent came down sat next to him and said hello. Another of them perhaps, he thought. Last evening an old man had offered him a ride around town in his SUV- then offered him a job of a tour guide to take him around the beaches and the churches, he needed a Hindi speaker,he had said. Next, he had asked they could sleep together that evening.

This guy was just looking for a place to buy grass. He shook his head. He got up and walked away, towards a beach hut that had appeared over the fortnight. Tourist season was nearing. Perhaps there might be some work here.

A young boy was practising lighting a large hookah. An older man,probably a head waiter, watched him intently.
"Good Bablu- I think you know your stuff", the supervisor was saying. "You will manage the 2 hookahs here from the afternoon till closing."

He went up to the supervisor. "My name is Raj, sir. You need any helpers at the bar, sir ? " His English was good- he was a college graduate after all, comapred to the poor locals who mananged to get by with a few phrases. The supervisor seemed surprised. He thought for a bit.
"No- but perhaps a waiter in the afternoon shift- if you can show up at five this evening", the supervisor said.

That is how he landed the job at the Fisherman's Cove. No one should know who he is- he told himself. There might be a warrant in his name by now at home. The government could not be trusted to ignore anyone who had had links with the rebels. So he called himself Raj and put his soul in to his work.

* * *

It was just another lazy October night- the patrons at the Fisherman's Cove sipped their cocktails on plastic chairs on the sand, as the sea roared and the lights of ships blinked in the distance. He had a half hour to go in his shift, before closing. The crowd had thinned a bit.

A young French woman had walked in for drinks. The local boys were having trouble understand her English- could he handle her order? He had a good smile that made guests order more than they wanted and leave behind big tips. He would involve his guests in conversation as he moved past their table.Some nights, the conversations would go past closing time. Hotel owners vacationing from big cities would offer him a job. There were drunks who would make him their best friend for the evening and forget his face the day after. There were instances, he had heard from other waiters, of groups of single women from the big cities offering huge tips if the waiters went back to their hotel rooms for the night.

Love and friendship were all lines in the sand, washed away by the tide the day after.

Closing time came. He had changed and was cleaning up. That was when he noticed that figure in white,far out in the waters, struggling with the waves. He ran towards the sea.

It was the French tourist. The water was waist deep. But she was drunk- she would try to get up, and lose her hold and fall under the waves. he grabbed her hand and pulled her away to safety.

After she had recovered a bit, they walked back to the restaurant and he made some tea.

She started dropping in at the Fishermans's Cove every night after that. After closing time they would walk southwards towards the fort. They made love in the sand a few times before she left for home. But soon he replaced her with a 17 year old Swedish student, then the older woman from Spain. Or was it the other way around ? It did not matter. They did not love him. They loved his body, and he returned the favour, and longed for his family at night.

* * *

Raj (name changed) is still around, working away at the beaches in Goa, hoping to reunite with his family someday.

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