Goa Freaks: My Hippie Years in India

by Cleo Odzer

  Next morning, I went to the Breach Candy section of Bombay, where the consulates were located. I'd been to so many countries my passport had been completely filled with visa stamps, and in Athens I'd had to get new pages glued to the back cover. They folded like an accordion. Before I left the hotel, I tore them. At the consulate, I asked for a new passport.

  "We could just glue this back, doll," said the consulate women as she looked over her glasses at me.

  "I'd rather have a new one, please."

  "It'll cost you twenty bucks."

  "Fine."

  The passport would he ready at the end of the week, and I left the building charged with excitement. I felt daring and mysterious, like a spy on special assignment. As I passed people on the street, I had a secret sin inside me. I looked like your average blonde foreigner on vacation, one more holiday hippie, a vacationer, but I was really this bold, brazen adventurer embarking on a dangerous mission.

  I stopped in a store to buy a Five Star candy bar and spotted astrology books in English. I bought the Aries volume for 1976 and looked the predictions for the end of February. Don't take chances, it said. Don't do anything out of the ordinary. Don't travel.

  I shrugged my shoulders and threw the book in a garbage can. If it had said something positive, I would have believed it.

  That afternoon, I went with Kadir to a shop near Crawford Market, a typical Indian store—minuscule, things piled to the ceiling, one on top of the other. An Indian greeted Kadir's "Shambo, man" with a sneaky grin and took us to the back room.

  True to Kadir's description, the cases were excellent. A large one and a smaller one, both made of expensive, light-coloured leather.

  "You see, man," said Kadir. "They are soft cases." He tapped the sides. "Nobody can get suspicious because there's no place to hide anything. The hash is in here." He pointed to the top, narrow sides, and bottom. "Now you know where the shop is, man. Maybe one day you'll do your own run."

  Before returning to the hotel, we stopped at an opium den on a roof across the street from the store. Over a few pipes, Kadir handed me a wad of hundred rupee notes to buy clothes.

  "You must have standard things to pack," he said. "In case they look inside, man, you can't have hippie stuff."

  Feeling super gutsy, this time I smoked the Opium without taking a nausea pill. I get sick.

  Three days later, Kadir gave me the news: "The other girl isn't going, man. There's a problem with her passport. You leave Sunday night."

  "Yippy! So soon?"

  He handed me the mirror of coke. "Are you ready? You have the passport?"

  "Tomorrow I pick it up."

  "Sharp clothes?"

  "I'm having a dress made at the Mj. It's disgustingly conventional. Uhlili! With a knee-length skirt in the most boring shade of beige."

  "What will you do with your hair?"

  "I'll make an appointment at the Taj salon for Sunday. I'll get it teased into a chignon. I bought a pair of nylons. Nylons! I haven't worn nylons since junior high. I have dumb little shoes . . . I even bought a creepy pair of clip-on earrings. Red nail polish—can you imagine me without blue nails? A hideous leather handbag . . ."

  "Good, man, good. Saturday you'll move to the Grand Hotel. No Freaks ever stay there."

  Sunday night at eleven, I was ready when Kadir came to take me to the airport.

  "All packed?"

  "Yup."

  "MAN! Look at you! What a hairdo!" he exclaimed. Wearing the dumb dress, the earrings, the nylons, the dumb shoes, I had hair piled four inches above my head and eyes lined with black in a style I remembered from an old Annette Funicello movie. "I can't believe it, man. You don't look like the same girl!"

  "Look at this handbag, it's worn over the arm. Do people really dress like this?"

  We snorted a humungous amount of cocaine and hurried out of the hotel. In the taxi Kadir gave me three hundred dollars cash. "They might ask to see money before letting you into Canada," he explained. He gave me three hundred rupees. "You might have to pay overweight." He dropped me at Bombay International and kissed me goodbye and good luck.

  The coke had been a serious mistake. I would have been nervous enough without it, but with it I was a wreck. As an added precaution, Kadir had timed it so I'd arrive at the airport just in time to board the plane. This strategy, he figured, wouldn't give anyone a chance to search my luggage. Another mistake. Since the hash weighed eight kilos by itself, I was way, way over the baggage allowance of ten kilos. After weighing my luggage, the airline personnel presented me with an enormous bill in overweight charges. Not only did the bill have to be paid at another counter, it had to be paid in rupees, of which I did not have enough. To change dollars into rupees I had to wait in a line that snaked the length of four airline counters and threatened to last all night.

  Close to take-off time, I was still in line at the bank. The woman in front of me had a daughter who had nothing better to do than play with the dumb bow on my dumb shoes. I would kill myself if the kid put a nun in the horrible nylons. The coke was wearing off, and I sweated with anxiety and post-cocaine depression. I grumbled and swore at the bank; ran to the line to pay the overweight charge and grumbled some more there; ran back to show the receipt and collect the boarding pass. By the time I reached Indian Immigration, I was a disaster. After Immigration, and a frisking for weapons, I still had to go to a baggage area to identify my luggage, answer questions ("Do you have any museum pieces?"), and watch as a man chalk-marked my bags. Finally, finally, I boarded the plane that had, by now, been waiting just for me.

  In the seat at last, heart pounding away, I worried that the man had not put my bags on the plane after he'd marked them, and I swore quietly to myself, that I would never, NEVER do coke again in tense situations.

  I only managed to sleep two hours during the flight. I arrived in Montreal exhausted and too excited about being in America to worry about anything. The nice Immigration officer gave me a smile, a wink, and a card in the colour that said "pass through." After watching, luggage circle the baggage wheel for ten minutes, I saw mine come down the chute. I collected my bags in a cart, walked smugly past the sign that said "Customs," handed over my card, and proceeded straight out the door.

  I could not stop smiling in the taxi to downtown Montreal. I'd made it! I was a successful smuggler! Toying with the image of dollars and what they could buy, I checked into the Hilton.

  The first thing I did on entering my luxurious room was turn on the TV. Oh, joy. Television! It had been years since I'd seen a program. To not miss a word, I turned the volume to maximum and swivelled the set until it reflected in the mirror on the bathroom door, so I could watch from the tub. I couldn't wait to wash the hair spray out of my hair.

  After the bath, I waited for a commercial break and ran to the loch to buy twelve dollars' worth of candy. Five Star was the only brand in India, and I craved a Chunky, a Twizzler, some Red Hots. Back in the room, I sank into fluffy pillows in front of the Four-Thirty Movie and spread out the cache of sweets. This must be Wonderland.

  Within an hour, the phone rang. A familiar Australian accent came through the line, "Hi, Cleo. It's Dayid. Everything go propitiously?"

  Dayid had once spent time in jail, time he used for self-education. By the end of his incarceration, he'd acquired an impressive vocabulary that matched well the majestic way he carried himself.

  "No problem," I answered.

  "Beatific! Tonight we'll convene with Junky Robert and Tish for conviviality. Do you concur?"

  "Yes!"

  I dressed in my favorite outfit, a see-through crepe in different patterns. At eight, Dayid came.

  "How winsome to see you!" he said, kissing both my cheeks. "You look resplendent!" He wore a purple velvet suit and had his silver streaked hair tied behind his head. I thought he looked delicious.

  "How'd you like the trip?" he asked. "A chef d'oeuvre, hmm?"

  "I loved it."

  "Tomorrow you can bring these cases
to my hotel and I'll defray you your money. Consider this the exordium of a new career." He opened a silver bottle in the shape of a swan. With a matching silver spoon he aimed coke at my nose. "We're to converge soon with Junky Robert and Tish. Let's egress."

  Brrrr, still winter in Canada. I shivered in a flimsy cape. At a nightclub, we were shown to a table near the dance floor, where the other couple sat waiting for us. I'd never met Junky Robert and Tish, though I'd heard their names mentioned. They greeted me warmly, as if I were an old-time Goa Freak. Tish, a Canadian, had brown, curly hair and bright, lively eyes. Robert, from Queens, New York, was lively one moment and fast asleep the next. Twice during dinner, he nodded off, his forkful of Hungarian goulash landing on the carpet.

  "Robert, my good fellow," Dayid commented once when, with eyes closed, Robert and his glass of champagne teetered dangerously to the left, "the people at the next table are speculating you have Trypanosoma gambiense. Which, by the way, is transmitted by the tsetse fly and is common in tropical Africa. It is a.k.a.—also known as—sleeping sickness."

  Along with the vocabulary, Dayid had cultivated a brainful of trivia during his stay in jail.

  "Oh, yeah?" commented Tish.

  I liked Tish. She was smart, and with her stash of coke, we made numerous trips to the lathes' room to giggle for long periods of time. At the table, the four of us ordered everything expensive on the menu and laughed at the straight people who had to work in the morning. Now this was the life I was born for. When Dayid and I danced, he kissed my neck.

  Next we went to a discotheque where we ran into Esther, one of three Canadian sisters whom everyone knew from Goa, though they hadn't been there that year. While we snorted coke in the ladies' room, Esther told me she could sell hash for me if I ever brought my own into the country.

  "Really?" I said my coked-out neurotransmitter's making quick connections. "You could? How long would it take?"

  "How much would you bring?"

  "How about eight kilos?"

  "A few days. At fifteen hundred dollars a pound."

  "Wow. Maybe do that. I know where to get suitcases trade."

  When the sun rose, I went with Dayid to his hotel room. This time it was slower than the night on the beach, and the mattress was more comfortable than the sand had been—though not as exotic.

  "How would you like to peregrinate with me in the Caribbean for a week's vacation?" he asked. "My business here will be terminated soon."

  I was terribly flattered. But I hesitated to answer. Did I want to involve myself romantically with Dayid? First of all, he was a bit too macho for me. Then there was Ashley. The two of them seemed the classic couple, she playing the ancient female role to his ancient one. In India she'd had servants and seamstresses, and so was not expected to cook and clean, but she nonetheless played the role of the little woman who took care of details while Dayid engaged in commerce or played poker. I didn't want to break them up, but even less did I want to her slot. I didn't want to be Dayid's shadow. I could go out with him as a colleague, but as a girlfriend . . . I didn't think so. And now, perhaps, I had an opportunity to do business for myself with Esther. Rushing back to India in pursuit of enterprise enticed me more than diving in the Caribbean with Dayid. I liked the idea of having money. Flying in planes suited me better than third-class lathes' compartment train riding. The Hilton beat the Rex.

  "Well . . . planning to visit my mother in New York," I told Dayid. "Why don't you call me there before you go?"

  "Do you know," he said, "there actually were people called the Caribs who inhabited the southwest Indies and the northern coast of South America?"

  "Oh yeah?"

  I left him in bed and went to the Hilton to change. In the Lobby I bought a new set of luggage and repacked my clothes. I took the hash filled cases to Dayid, collected my eight thousand dollars, and kissed him goodbye. Mission complete.

  I called Momsy.

  "Baby! Where are you?"

  "In Canada. I'm coming to visit."

  "I'm so glad to hear from you. You didn't answer my last two letters."

  "I didn't get them. I left Goa a while ago. I tell you about it when I get there."

  Of course I didn't tell her ALL about it—such as how I'd gotten the money to come back to America. But she didn't ask anyway. Momsy wasn't interested in my tales of the East, and whenever possible, she steered the conversation away from things Indian and into her closet.

  "How do you like my new filch coat?" she asked, parading in her ankle-length fur. "Don't look at the collar; the furrier is fixing it this week."

  "We have buffaloes in our paddy fields," I said, stroking her sleeve as she passed. "Really skinny. Bones poke through their hides."

  "Tell me honestly. Do there pelts match?"

  I shrugged. "As far as I can tell. Momsy, you should see the sunset on Anjuna Beach."

  "But this collar isn't nice, is it?"

  It was nice to spend a few days in Momsy's Fifth Avenue apartment—sleeping on the floor of the library—but by the weekend, I couldn't wait to return to Goa and my friends and to make more money. Dayid called.

  No, I told him. I would not be meeting him in St. Thomas. I already had a ticket for the flight to Bombay. Knowing I'd made the right decision, I nevertheless hung up the phone with regret.

  Landing in Bombay, I felt like a victor back from battle. I felt bigger and stronger and awfully courageous. I was also a lot richer. I went to meet Kadir at Dipti's, a fruit juice place across the street from the Rex Hotel. Dipti's offered ice cream and the luscious fruits of the season and was the nerve centre of the Bombay Freak world. Everyone reported there on arrival. If you wanted to know who was in town and what was going down, you could find out from Bila, the Indian manager.

  "Hi, Bila," I said, climbing the step into the shop, feeling like an insider. I slid into a booth opposite Kadir and handed him the six bottles of vitamins he'd asked me to buy for him in Canada. India didn't sell them. Vitamin E was especially important for coke sniffers. The healing oil applied to the inner nostril assured a perpetually useful nose.

  "How'd it go, man?" he asked.

  "Great. Oh, Kadir, this is so much fun. I love this life. But, listen, I want to do my own trip. Will you help me?" I knew Kadir wouldn't mind losing me as an employee. I was now one of the Goa kindred, and India abounded in impoverished travellers awaiting financial inspiration.

  "Of course, man. You already know where the shop is."

  "I don't know where to get the hash, though. Or how much to pay . . . "

  "Dayid and I are planning another trip soon. I can have extra cases made for you. How's that? I will sell you a full set."

  "Wonderful. How much?"

  "For you, man, because you're my special friend, you can have them for two thousand."

  "Great. Great. Here, I can give you the money now."

  "No, wait, man. Pay me when they're ready."

  "Oh, Kadir. Everything's so wonderful. Do you think I should get a new passport?"

  "If you want, man. But you have plenty of time to prepare. Why don't you go back to Goa? I'll be coming down myself as soon as Dayid returns."

  Perfect! Now I was a real Goa Freak home-based in Anjuna Beach.

  Several methods of transportation existed for travelling to Goa. It was rare to find a Freak bus like Tom and Julian's. The public buses, I'd heard, were torturous. I wasn't yet comfortable with having money to spend, so I decided against flying. Another way—the one I took—was by boat. A thirty-hour trip.

  Standing in a crowded hall at the dock, I was approached by numerous barefoot coolies in rags. Before I could pick one, one picked me and shooed the others with gestures, growls, and a proprietary grasp on my bag. He pointed to a swatch of cloth pinned to his tattered jacket. Number II. He looked at my ticket and asked, "Blanket? Blanket?"

  Was I supposed to give him a blanket? I shook my head and shrugged.

  "Blanket," he repeated. "No blanket?"

  "Slee
ping bag?" I tried and pointed to the roll I'd collected from storage at the Rex.

  He looked at it a moment, then nodded.

  I had no idea what was going on. All of a sudden, the crowd moved. Number II vanished, and with him went my worldly belongings. Oh, no. I had a flash of panic, imagining everything I owned had just been stolen. I moved with the masses—I had no choice. Out a gate, I had my first glimpse of the boat over the turbaned head of a Sikh. The crowd herded me up a wooden plank. On deck, the fury grew as women in saris pushed past me, dragging two handfuls of children. A fat Indian in a white suit stepped on my foot, and I flattened against a rail as a pack of people rushed by. Why was everyone running? I looked around the deck. No chairs! Family groups sat together on the floor on pieces of cloth. Spread out here and there were cloths with nobody on them. Over one of the unoccupied cloths stood a coolie. Aha! That's why Number II had a blanket—to reserve me a spot. As I looked around, someone banged into me with an elbow. I must have looked confused, standing there in the rushing mob, because a man with a beard asked if I needed help. He looked at my ticket and pointed me toward B deck, one flight up. At the end of a slippery, metal stairway, I found Number II standing over my sleeping bag, which he'd unrolled, unzipped, and spread in a prime spot against a wall. My hero! I gave him a generous tip. He deserved it.

  The voyage down was curious and boring. I should have brought a book. Lone travellers sprawled on the hard wood, covered their faces with handkerchiefs, and slept. I took a walk to the stern. The roofless rear of the boat contained benches fall of people, baggage, and chickens—lots of chickens roaming and pecking free. I spotted a familiar Goa face. "Richard!"

  "Cleo, hi. Going to Anjuna?"

  "Yeah, just came back from Canada. I can't wait to hit the beach."

  "Canada, huh? I just returned from Thailand."

  We exchanged knowing smiles. Now I knew how the Goa Freaks made the money to splurge on so much coke. Now I knew, because I'd been initiated. I was really one of them. More foreigners appeared, and we gathered in a group. Inevitably, the chillum came out.