Groundhog Day: Goa Edition

We have come to realisation that we are living our very own Groundhog Day. 

I am under no illusion of how lucky we are. We have a very comfortable and functional beach hut, with a great bed, a shower and even aircon. We have a balcony to have our meals on, and even a small space in front of the hut. I alluded to this in my last blog, but this little space has become our whole world. 

India introduced a 21 day lockdown 2 days ago. The police have moved into Agonda, and we are trying our very best to be completely respectful, mind our own business, stay away from anyone we don’t know, and generally just try to live a quiet life. 

With that in mind I thought I’d share with you how we have been embracing lockdown life! 

At 11pm two days ago, the word went around that the corner shop was opening for half an hour. Thankfully we have become very good friends with the people here, and they thought to give us a call to let us know. We grabbed the bike, and the rucksack and rushed down there. We bought as many snacks and potential meals as we could, with the awareness that we literally didn’t know when this next chance would arrive. 

We are trying to keep everything positive here, for example I am thinking of things to do to keep myself busy - and, by proxy, to keep Bertie busy too, who has absolutely fully embraced the role of BEAR Grylls. (I appreciate not everyone will get the joke here, but I have called my husband “Bear” for many many years.)

I set him to work finding some rope to fashion me a washing line. Obviously we are no longer able to take our clothes to the lovely washing lady (who I have always called Doris, despite not knowing her actual name) and we need to have clean clothes. At the very least, I need to have clean knickers, because I only bought seven pairs with me, and that is not enough for a 21 day lockdown. 

Bertie, on the other hand, bought a thousand pairs of pants and about a million T-shirt’s. He’s fine. 

But I set up my little washing shop in the bathroom, and I must say I felt very proud of myself once I was done. Even if I was the sweatiest I have ever been. It’s hard work, manual washing, and I’m not entirely sure I’m cut out for it! The washing line was also brilliant, so I feel comforted that no matter how hard times may be, I’ll always have clean knickers.  

I’ve also taken it upon myself to teach Lucky some new tricks, but unfortunately he’s as thick as two short planks so it’s fortunate time is on my side. 

We have moved mainly into taking our meals on our balcony to try and keep our distance - not that we don’t all chat and have a great laugh together, but we’re all being very mindful of each other’s safety, which actually is really nice.

Our flights home are constantly being cancelled and rebooked, and as it stands we have one flight home currently booked from Mumbai on the 16th. That’s the only thing we currently know. Thankfully this week the British government actually decided to wake up to the fact there are thousands of people in India, and we have been asked to provide them with our passport numbers and all relevant details for them to arrange rescue planes. Hopefully this comes to fruition - I know Germany and Russia have done this - England is clearly too slow having sat on the sofa for the last week, eating biscuits from the packet and wanking too much. 

The restaurant are looking after us amazingly - it’s obviously not quite the same as it was two weeks ago - there is no bread or milk, for example, and I’ve had to entirely deviate off my set list of “breakfast items”, but I’m rolling with it. They also know I can’t eat eggs so, so far, we’ve been fed some delicious things. Hindu’s also believe cows are sacred, so there’s no beef on the menu. This works quite well in my favour! 

I can’t imagine there will be a lot to update you on, but I will try and fill you guys in on how we are coping. It’s only day two and we’re a pack of Pringles and a pack of biscuits down already! Send love, and Oreos xx