The Aftermath

Thursday 27 November 2008
Arambol Beach, Goa

I started the day by checking out the news. The death toll had risen to 100 now, and the reported places attacked grew to include the domestic airport, an office building, and a total number of locations increased to 7 to 10.

I emailed and texted a bunch of people back home to let them know I'm OK. I also read the reports on a number of sites but the news was roughly the same. The head of the anti-terrorist squad in Mumbai had been killed. There were apparently hostages still being held in the hotels. But apart from that things were still a bit sketchy and news organisations were still waiting to receive information from reliable sources on the ground.

Evan and I killed time around midday by playing a few rounds of pool at a cool bar (score an evenly matched 2-2) after which Tim and Pat joined us for a few drinks. Now it was mid-afternoon and the temperature was just about bearable to stand in direct sunlight, so Tim, Evan and I went for a jump in the sea. We had some fun generally messing around in the waves, trying a bit of bodysurfing. It's not really a surfing beach but there is the odd consistent small sized wave that you could surf on for a handful of seconds if you wanted. But there were more swimmers than surfers by a long shot.

I laid in the sun for a bit afterwards to try and catch some rays before it set. I was there for a short while when a cloud popped up just before the sun reached the horizon, so I ended it early.
We then all went back to the same bar with the promise of two for one cocktails, though we found out that the cocktails were a bit weak. However I at least was compensated by the chicken massala that I had for supper, which was super. I think massala is quickly becoming my favourite meal out here.

We went to the film bar ideally to watch The Matrix but we missed that. I can't remember what was on when we arrived but it wasn't very interesting so I chatted to some guys Tim and Pat were playing pool with. They were very posh, young, public school types who had taken their fashion tips from James Blunt it seemed. It turns out that one of them, who actually looked a bit like James Blunt too, went to Shrewsbury School, albeit ten years after I had been there.
More surprisingly than that, he was the cousin of Matt Randall, who was in my Basic Year group. Small world, eh?

Jackass the movie started playing as two girls joined us at playing pool. They were intially disgusted with it but, as with everyone, they couldn't stop looking. As the idiots on screen do their best to do everything but severely injure themselves, the viewer simultaneously tests themselves to see how much of it they can actually watch, and the adrenaline and emotions that result become more addictive as the film goes on. Everyone loves Jackass. I think we ended up beating the girls just about, with me taking the winning pot. My dominance of the pool table continues.