I have got to the stage when I have finally relaxed. The sun is setting and the Honeybee brandy is at my side, and the gardeners are watering the grass. In some palms beside the frangipani tree some crows are making a big song and dance about feathering their new nest with weird bits of wire and are at present hacking off twigs from a bush to add to the fortress they are building.

Nick and Katharine have finally arrived, shell shocked from their long journey, and have slept all day. I wish they would wake up and come and party! I am all set for a curry and a catch up, but I think I might have to wait. Tomorrow we are off to Margao (a big ‘small city’) just a bus ride away; it only costs 10 rupees to get there. We are getting my ‘visiting cards’ printed and have already had all my blogs printed, right from when I started. They look amazing and with all the photos and all the memories, it is just wonderful to flick through and read about random things that tickled my fancy at the time: kauri trees in New Zealand, mosques in Oman, and goodness knows so much more. We chose for a cover the two fishing chairs that we bought in Kiev and took to Doha and finally abandoned on the beach when we left. Not exactly Samuel Pepys, but still a fun record.

But it was all go on the beach the other day. We were sunning and drinking fresh lime sodas, the sea was sploshy and beautiful, and suddenly we felt we were watching an opera or a Chekhov play. The Russians next to us had a huge private drama, and we had ringside seats. I looked on unashamedly as the two couples wept and paced and drank beer and wept some more. They hugged, then stormed off, and were called back to be embraced, while the child who caused all the troubles seemed to be unconcerned and played with a crab. What on earth had happened? There was a tray overloaded with empty Kingfisher beer bottles, so perhaps that might have caused deep feelings to be exposed. It was difficult to return to my book. It was so dull in comparison.

Walking home we found another dead sea snake brought in by the fishermen’s nets (I hope) and a couple of grown men who were having the time of their lives!

We do like to sit at the German Bakery in the morning and peruse the Indian Times, and we were quite taken with the latest scandal on the trains. Headlines jumped out:

40 policemen found hiding in the train toilets

Agra: A drive against ticketless travel, launched by railway magistrate V K Singh, led to the unmasking of some unusual suspects – as many as 40 ticketless cops were found hiding in the toilets to avoid being penalized.

Ha Ha! I love it, though I cannot imagine wanting to stay longer than necessary in such a place, having being locked inside one on the train from Delhi.

The other great news comes from Margao, where there was a contretemps in the Municipal Council Offices. All the leading councillors decided to stage a group squat in protest of a colleague being sacked. The picture shows the gentlemen all dressed in their shirts and ties squatting together. United we squat! Funny.

Later

John and I went out for another bird watching trip with Professor Shiva,

but this time we went as the sun was setting. We took a different route and marched through dried up fields, along sandy embankments, clambered up little hills and swooped down on the scree. The humidity was awful, and we were both tired having walked for miles already along the beach in the morning. Still, we followed closely, obeying the sharp demands, ‘Quick look there – the female marsh harrier,

and there – five black headed ibis

and beside them several red water lapwings.’

Paddy pipits darted about, and the yellow pied wagtail zoomed out of a tree.

Kingfishers were in abundance, and suddenly Shiva shouted out in Gaelic, ‘By the grace of God’ and ‘Amazing Grace Kelly, there is the Asian nightingale, can you hear it?: “ko-yelle ko-yelle.”

Then we saw a leafless branch holding a record number of blue tailed bee-eaters.

Shiva said they had eyes like red rubies, as though they were made by a Swiss jeweller and certainly not by an Indian as Prince Philip might have commented. I think the Prince had made some faux pas on an official visit, when he viewed the chaotic overhead wiring he saw in Delhi. He had a point.

From bee-eaters we scrambled down a steep slope, slipping and sliding, with Our Leader holding out his arm, ‘Be careful little darlings,’ and then he launched into a recital of Wordsworth’s  poem about Lucy –  a young girl who had passed away, and Wordsworth sees her loveliness transferred to nature, and all the joys in the natural world:

And hers shall be the breathing balm,

And hers the silence and the calm-

Of silent insensate things.

Shiva was feeling the one-ness of nature around him, as though it might have been Lucy’s spirit, the breathing balm. The quotation above is from the poem ‘Three years she grew in sun and flower’. And the original one starts:

Oft I had heard of Lucy Gray,

And, when I crossed the Wild,

I chanced to see at break of day

The solitary Child.

 All this thought as we searched the skies for the white bellied sea eagle, and traipsed through long grasses stopping to study the damsel fly, the hoverfly, a discarded yellow baya weaver’s nest that may have fallen from a nearby coconut palm,

and around us flitted the crimson rose, blue Mormon and peacock pansy butterflies.

Then Shiva rose up from melancholy poet’s mood to High Alert… for above us were two white bellied sea eagles and in the mouth of one was dangling a long green vine snake! Wonderful.

We walked home and soaked our flip flops in Ariel and quietly reflected on the evening:

Yet some maintain that to this day

She is a living Child,

That you may see sweet Lucy Gray

Upon the lonesome Wild.

Over rough and smooth she trips along,

And never looks behind;

And sings a solitary song

That whistles in the wind.

 Yesterday the sleeping beauties finally arose and shook off the jet lag and joined the party! We sped off to the Anjuna market and Katharine was the star bargainer. She stocked up her Sydney wardrobe with pretty dresses and tops, and bought a lovely leather computer satchel.

Nick grumbled that there wasn’t enough ‘man stuff’!!! True, there were a lot of earrings and pendants and dresses and peacock fans, but the humidity was fierce and it sort of put you off walking the miles around the shacks and tents. We did eat by the beach and enjoyed the breeze and it was lovely for me to see them and have them here in India with me. Back at the car, Nick espied a sloughed snake skin hanging out of a stone wall, so he pulled it, but the taxi driver shouted, ‘NO! The snake is still busy – he is still in the process!’ So that was good, and probably well timed!

To end our day at the market we got our driver to take us to Vagator, accessible by steep steps from the road. Vagator and Chapora used to be the scene of the wild hippie trance parties.  Nowadays it has all slowed down somewhat, and people just lounge around the boulder-studded sands. Our mission was to see the huge happy carved face of Shiva that gazes out of the rocks.

This done, I made my way up those endless steps, gasping in the heat, whilst Katharine and Nick were beguiled by the beach sellers and went to buy a large throw for the table where their pet canary sits! Well, they will have a memory that’s for sure.

And now it’s a new day; John is going to have a cut-throat shave and a head-and-shoulder massage at the barbers, and I shall have a ginger, lemon and honey tea while I wait. Nick and Katharine will be down in a beach shack watching the cricket: Australia v India.

I really think we may have been away too long. Each night we play three games of backgammon, and whoever wins crows for a while the victory song, and lately I have been very lucky – it’s as though Omar Sharif has been sitting on my shoulder guiding my every move. Well last night we were on our third game, and it was 1-1 and suddenly the Skype rang and it was Bonnie and Tasha calling for a chat. I immediately abandoned the tournament, and got lost in Bonnie’s new achievements; she can walk (!) and babble about and is just full of jumping beans. I particularly loved watching Natasha reading her a story about a little owl. It was just magical.

Anyway once the goodbyes were said, I found John asleep so I too zoomed off to the Land of Nod, but in the morning, before my eyes were properly awake, he produced the backgammon set and demanded a continuation of the game (as he was winning). And he did. He has been chuckling ever since. Now who is the sad git I wonder!!!!

More adventures await, a giant waterfall, spice farm and who knows what else. Nick and Katharine have hired a Honda Wave so they are going to be doing some local exploring.

But in all of this, I think of Shiva marching about showing birds to tourists and teaching them how to cook, and looking after his family, and while we all go about our business of holiday making, he is marching through the fields thinking about the poems of Wordsworth. How lovely is that?