India Mike is indeed influential!

GoanCanuck

India Mike has shown how influential it is. An article written by a Goan journalist which lamented the decline of the beautiful village of Anjuna titled 'Lost in Anjuna' has been revisited by the same journalist who has responded positively to the criticism which the original article attracted here on India Mike.



Return to Anjuna
By V. M. de Malar

Exactly a month ago, this column was entitled ‘Lost in Anjuna’. Here’s what it said – “the impromptu backpacker phenomenon of bygone years has given way to Goa 2005 and the tourism tsunami, everything is twenty times bigger and more unpleasant and dirty than it should be and there’s no controls, no assessment, no planning, and clearly no one in charge.

This analysis drew a vocal, mixed, response. Many Goans feel the same way, foreigner-oriented tourism enclaves have had an alienating effect on most locals; we’re not comfortable, not welcome, in large parts of our own homeland, they’ve become outposts of an unfamiliar composite culture. Many longstaying foreigners also agreed, these hermetically sealed outsider communities are not why they moved, it’s not what Goa
was always about.

But there was also cogent critical response; enough to warrant reflection and another look at the phenomena being discussed. The Indophile travel website, www.indiamike.com, ran a critical thread bout the column, participants raised valid points about who bears esponsibility for the creeping environmental, social, and sanitation disaster that’s spreading from the coastal strip inwards as tourism numbers just keep climbing.
http://oheraldo.in/node/7851

seventies'hippy

Thats pretty much spot on,,,,,,,,, I think

__________________
.
.
.

My Photo Gallery

Big Neil

Yes, it's a great article spot on.

I've been going to Goa for coming up for 5 years now. The very first time I went was after 9/11 so it was quiet.... I thought GREAT that's what it's going to be like early Jan'.

Was very dissapointed last year to find how busy everything was round Baga. Spent my time taking taxis to Morjim, couldn't handle some of the tourist attitudes towards locals. Moved down south around Benaulim and loved it, guess thats what the north was like 15-20 years ago.

Going to Candolim for 1 month in Jan and hope not to be too dissapointed. After all it is people like me spreading the word about how fantastic Goa is and creating more demand in package holidays. Still, those who speak to the locals know where you can escape to for that little bit of peace and quiet.

The main problem seems to be the great fascination and attraction of cheap lager, satellite TV the British have. What's that all about?

ColinT

Well the following article appeared in the New Indian Express on 25 Dec and looks at the not-so-pretty Calangute phenomenon of package tourism and the Brits who go there.

Nightmare in Paradise - New Sunday Express

Digital Drifter

From your article

Ouch! You are mighty peeved!

__________________
Click here for the Indiamike train guide in PDF

ColinT

Nothing at all gets past you DD!!!

seventies'hippy

Calangute caters for the now colin, We can't go back,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,

Old timers compare it to the "back when,,,,,,,,,,,,,,"
For the newbies it attracts today, 2/3 week Brit charters, it's everything they want, thanks of course largely to the niceties of the serving goans & what they'll put up with for the $/£,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,

Digital Drifter

Am I supposed to take that as

I dont miss much of anything you write and I catch the message you're sending

OR

I'm so thick that nothing gets to me?

Being wary of a writer is good insurance, you never know the back handed compliment you receive.

I remember reading the guardian or some other paper where a columnist was speculating that once Jeffery Archer was out, he was going to write a book about all the people who were against him during his trail. THe columnist was wondering who were all his targets and such like and ended with a pithy observation of the people you choose to anger/cross.

Big Neil

Good Article in the Express

It's a mystery to me why people would travel halfway round the world and not go further than the resort they stay in.

While in Benaulim last year I met someone who had spoken to a tourist who remarked: "it seems quite safe outside of the complex" .... the couple booked a 2 week holiday in the Taj Exotica andd managed to get out to explore after one full week! They apparantly thought they were going to get robbed, poisoned etc by bandits!

ColinT

No seventies hippy, we certainly can't go back. I'm not really yearning for the past, I just want to totally change the world!! Might be a bit difficult though.

Hypostomus

Hey Big Neil, I think some of the big complexes actively promote the idea that you'll be robbed and/or raped if you dare go out the gates. I was walking past the Taj in Candolim a few years back and overheard a staff member telling an English couple "If you go out you'll be bothered by people like him" and pointing at me. I didn't realise this immediately and was looking behind me to see what menacing character was creeping up on me - and then the penny dropped. Now, I don't think Goa is an especially dangerous place unless you go out of your way to find danger (drugs, girls, farmyard animals, whatever). So the only conclusion I can come to is that they want to keep people in so that they spend all of their money there and not at a beach shack, which incidentally our travel rep told us not to eat at because you *will* get typhoid or something equally unpleasant. Notwithstanding they probably get their food from the same markets of course.
cheers
Chris

Nick-H

Please post a pic! We want to know how menacing you look

I don't think there is anything new about living in walled compounds. If you can afford it then just one house here can be a walled compound with your own security staff.

__________________
.


Just one member of the IndiaMike Mod Team

Big Neil

Sorry for appearing intimidating. I'm usually just myself, a chilled out musician.

Everyone to themselves...

Can always find a little spot to chill in Goa.

Hypostomus

Agreed. I'm just a chilled out blues muso myself. I did have waist length hair at the time but I'm not sure how that's supposed to make me menacing. I should point out that I stand 5 foot 3 and at the time was showing my mother the sights of India. I'm trying to upload a photo taken in Marrakech last May but the website tells me it's too large. I'll try to shrink it tomorrow when I'm sober.
cheers
Chris