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ALL TYPES MAKE GOA THEIR HOME: STORIES FROM THE COASTLINE By Joseph Zuzarte [EMAIL PROTECTED] Goa is irresistible for way-out people. All types come here and make it their home, at least for a while. But those who used to give it that distinctive 'Goa' flavour are becoming harder to spot in the rising touristic tide. Though they~'re there, a part of the scenery now, enjoying Goa and finding themselves. In my village of Candolim, there's a distinctive group of people who stand out, the Taiwanese. There's about a dozen of them who stay for long periods here, a few of them only a couple of houses from me. Sometimes I see them doing Tai Chi in an abandoned volleyball court next to the hill. They're all practicing the art of 'Living Zen' and all work with an entity called the 'Living Zen Trading Company' which imports consumer and other items from Taiwan, which they sell at the 'Taiwan Market' in Calangute. Life for them revolves around their leader, Cuckoo, a Zen master. "We're his followers," explains Elephant, the stout one amongst them who resembles a Chinese priest with a long wispy beard and moustache. Cuckoo is also the name of a restaurant on the beach where they and all their friends mostly congregate to eat some delicious food and discuss the finer nuances of life. Cuckoo is also a master of acupressure/acupuncture and used to heal at the Osho Commune in Pune. So the Osho types also hang out there. Why Goa? "Because it's a nice place," says Elephant in Taiwanese while a friend of his translates. "It's a nice beach, the local people are very kind to us, the surroundings are very comfortable. Everything looks natural and original," he concludes with a beatific wave at everything. He's been coming here now for eight years. "The first time we came on holiday, we used to cook for ourselves. Some of our new friends would eat with us and they liked the food. They paid us some money to share the costs. Then we decided to make a restaurant and slowly we started a shop here," says Elephant pouring me some more of the green tea which they also sell at the shop, besides soya sauce, Chinese food noodles, etc. It's all very nutritious, specially their food (also the most popular food outlet at the Saturday Nite Market, Arpora) as they use original ingredients. Cuckoo restaurant is well known in gourmet circles. What is Zen? "We don't know," he says matter-of-factly. "We're still learning. We're just following Cuckoo. He points out to us when we do something wrong and pushes us in the right direction. It keeps out energy going." They explain that their approach is to be more alive, more in tune with the simplicity of nature. How do they handle people who are different from them in Goa? "If people come with their cultures, slowly they'll cut down and become simple because our life is easy," he says. No unnecessary complications. What about the crazies? "We've got nothing to do with that. Some people will always be confused; some people will always be clear." Swami Jeevan Roshan first came to Goa in 1981. A German (from Berlin), he had been to Kovalam and was going back to Bombay through Goa. "When I came here, I knew I had come home," he says simply. With his money almost over, he was sprawled on Calangute beach watching the glorious sun set, wondering what to do next. Always a creative person, an idea came to him, so he called up his mother in Germany and asked her to send him a tattoo kit. Today he's possibly Goa's best known tattoo artist. "If you have art in you, you can do anything and the art will be reflected in whatever you do. It can be anything, simply cooking, for example. I have many engines going," he says with a pixie-like smile. For many years he ran a popular restaurant in Calangute and in between also took Osho sanyas -- "It was a joke, and it is still a joke," he says grinning widely. He also married a Goan lady, Yolla. Why Goa? "Really, it's just the climate, the trees, the tropical environment, the sun. I love the monsoon, then the season comes; full six months it's the season. I play the guitar in the evenings (at some restaurants), come home, crash, wake up, somebody comes to do a tattoo. It's the kind of work I was looking for a I love it -- creating, cooking, playing music." His latest production is a 'Goa Trance' album, Galaxy Bubbles -- Made in Goa. He has also noticed the changes happening in Goa. "Before, Goans were all smiling, but now you can't ask them the time. Now it's better because it's the monsoons -- it's relaxed, they're smiling. But after the season starts, they've got no time; they're trying to make money." Roshan feels the people have become tense because of the loans they have taken. "They're building buildings, they've got loans for cars. The way they go asking for business, it's sad, because they have to pay the loans. I say, full stop. End this, all this building. There are enough hotels, most of which are empty for half the year. I think the scene will change again," he says optimistically. He feels particularly sad, he says, because he has learnt the beauty of a simple life from the Goans, while the Goans themselves have abandoned their simple lives for the stress of 'development'. Karen Nelson Sheehy, now a matronly 65, has been coming down from San Francisco, USA, to Goa since 1969, one of the first 'hippies' in Goa. She has been on the hippie trail ever since. Except for a six week period this year in the U.K., she has been staying in Candolim non-stop for the last three years. "Goa offers an amazing range of possibilities, specially for people between 50-65. After having been all over, I'm ready for this." Karen wants to spend the rest of her life here and even die here. "I feel so nourished. Whatever you take in, it nourishes you. And Goa, now that I'm 65, it nourishes me in a way I never expected it to. My health, it's very taken care of; I've got a wonderful gynaecologist; they're very knowledgeable." Talking about the old days, she says in the late 60's Goa was filled with Haigh Ashbury hippies. She had come down with her husband and child on a BMW motorbike. "We came down with my son and put him in Kodaikanal." Why Goa? "The weather, the plenty of trees -- what grows here, the cost of things, of course. I like where I am. I look out and I like what I see (chickoo and other trees). I'm 65 now. It's not too old, but it's the time when you start to get a little spiritual, when you want to come back to one point." In the beginning, Karen was in Anjuna. "From no electricity in Anjuna, a completely naked beach (in more ways than one), to now. In 1982 I came this side (Candolim). We used to turn up for the season; in the season people were in Goa. We'd come in October-November, and leave on the first of March. Nobody would stay after that. The people who stayed on were in a really bad shape, completely off their face. "We used to go down to the beach in lungis and sing. Carl (an American) brought the first generator from the States and Gregory's (the first restaurant-shack in Anjuna) got going with its parties. I remember walking down from north Anjuna to the beach with a -- what do you call it? -- a Goan torch-light (a candle in an empty coconut shell). There was something so basic and sweet about the whole thing. It's almost like you want to recapture it, but you can't." Change, of course, is the only certainty. As Karen puts it, "What you're going to get here is a huge flood of people who have no money, working class people, who've never been to a beach before, who've never gone to a hotel before. It might end up with a whole bunch of English people, drinking beer and watching football. "But there are a lot of other people who're around here, who've embraced the culture and who will be around because they love the place. And the Goan people, I think they're amazingly good. Mama Cecilia -- write about here. I've seen the same people for 40 years. They have looked after people like nobody else would, this rag-tag, screwed up, drunk, whatever, crowd. These guys would get themselves into so much trouble. The Goans would look after them very well. They could never find this kind of thing in the West. I know how kind they've been." To keep her 'spirit going' she has a small group of women who meet, paint and discuss life in her garden, secure in the knowledge that they're in Goa. --------------------------------------------------------------------------- GOANET-READER WELCOMES contributions from its readers, by way of essays, reviews, features and think-pieces. 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