Om

Yesterday was lovely. I decided the previous day that I would leave Goa. Agonda beach provided some calm time and some good friends but after too much time to myself my mind starts to wither. I get really bored. So I decided I would leave. A couple of hours after that decision and I get an offer of a motorbike lift to my chosen destination. Always like dis!

So I packed my stuff, said my goodbyes and spent an hour or so trying and finally managing to affix my stuff to the bike. So I bombed all the way to Gokarna (about 100 km I think) clinging on to a Swedish man who is too good looking and groomed not to be in a boy band, and trailing a Swedish woman who resembles Sigourney Weaver in Alien – all shaved head and bandana.

The ride was fantastic. Clear flat roads, lush greenery, the wind my hair (the bits that didn’t fit in my helmet). A taste of freedom. Now I understand Braveheart.

I am now at Om beach, Gokarna. It is lovely – much better than Goa. The people here are nice, for example. No package tourists – just the infinitely friendlier, more approachable bunch of backpackers, like myself.

The waves are strong, there are signs everywhere warning how dangerous the place is and how people die here every year. Cool.
Last night I had a lovely singalong in a restaurant here. I did however have the most consistently disappointing repertoire – i.e.

“Do you know any Bowie?”

Not really.

“Dire Straits?”

No.

“Neil Young?”

No.

“Ben Harper?”No.

“Jack (fucking) Johnson?”

Er, no.

Etc.

It’s usually around this point that people give up and say “oh, just play something you’ve written.” Oooo-kay. No, I persevered and much fun was had by all. And then I went and spoiled it by celebrating with a quart of rum (which I compensate for now) and trying to pull some Israeli girl. Yada yada. I guess I should start learning some lessons quick.

The problem with trying to chat up anyone (or just talking to anyone!) when you are guitar boy is that it is kinda awkward and a bit obvious. All it takes is for someone (sabotaging my effort) to say, “hey, where’d the music go? Oh, it’s chatting up some Israeli girl.” You see, any attempt at flirtation is doomed by an accompanying ominous silence.

I need to cultivate some kind of wooing mood music technique where I can inspire romantic thoughts by maybe finger picking some delicious melody on the guitar while simultaneously whispering sweet nothings into the ear of some eternally exotic Jew. Then nobody would notice. They would say, “Look, there’s still music – we can forgive him for stroking some Hebrew goddess.”

So it didn’t work, but she did lend me her torch (that is no euphemism) so I could make the drunken walk back to my beach with some confidence that I would be able to find my hut. Somehow my own torch, lovingly donated by my mother and horribly valuable and useful, went missing last night. I produced it so some weird, crazy English guy could retrieve his fallen charas from the ground and when I came to find it at the end of the night, alas it had gone. Bum.