Saturday, March 8, 2008

The Rash and Tony's Tattoo

After my long stint in the WiFi shop, I was not feeling right at all. A lethargic nausea was taking over me.
I was slated to go to Tito's for dinner that night to see Ivor's son play and have Goa's famous fish curry rice. I could not let this momentary setback stop me!
So, I headed over and by the time Haydn stopped playing and the Australian hypnotist took stage, my face felt like an orange peel and my lips were like peeling paint. Not good. Awful, in fact.

Watching the hypnotist try to lull some drunk English girls into submission, I felt like I was in Muriel's Wedding. It was uncanny.

I headed back to the hotel and by the time I reached my room -- it was clear that I had developed illness #3! A full body rash. I took some Claritin, the only tangentially related medication I had on hand and crossed my fingers.

The next morning the rash was not better -- it was actually a weepy rash now. I was scheduled to check out at noon, so I packed up my stuff and decided to go down to the beach one last time, rash and all.


I sat at Swally's Beach Shack, the one I had sat at the first day I was on the beach. The people I had met that first day were working and came over to say hello. No one mentioned the rash, which was heartening.

At the urging of the woman who is in charge of seating people, massage, and mani/pedis -- I decided to get a pedicure, complete with rhinestones and other sparkly things. I was unsure of how she was going to manage to do this considering we were on a windy, sandy beach.

But she did. And it was beautiful! I talked with her a bit more as we waited for it to dry and then I headed back to the hotel to check out and get a ride into town to buy some Benadryl!

The Benadryl just made me sleepy and I did, in fact, fall asleep in my chair as I passed some time in hotel's outdoor restaurant.

I was panicked at this point. Did I have malaria? Did I have Dengue Fever? I had no idea what the symptoms of these diseases are -- but they had entered my hypochrondriac vocabulary somewhere along the way to India.

I took another taxi ride into town to get whatever else the pharmacist could offer. She gave me Allegra and some cream. I slathered on the cream and took the pills!

I was not feeling any better and just sat, moping, in the outdoor restaurant again, waiting for it to be time to go to the airport with Vinesh.

Then I saw Ivor coming up the walk. He came over and we chatted for a bit. He had come to pick up his paycheck from the hotel and also encouraged me to have a meal of curd rice and papadum to help calm my system. Never one to turn down a meal -- I decided this was a good idea.

Earlier in my trip, curd rice turned me off completely -- but it had really grown on me since my bouts with the mutton keema. Now with the rash, it started having the comforting power of okayu, a Japanese rice porridge my mom would make for me when I was little and ill. Okayu is the Japanese version of the more well-known Chinese jook, or congee.

I said goodbye to Ivor, happy to have seen him once again before leaving Goa.

A waiter, Tony, came over to clear away my curd rice plate -- and I noticed a tattoo on his arm that made me go -- "Whut?!"
I was sure that he was just another Goan horn dog -- with not-so erotic translation skills.

I questioned him about it, saying "That's a pretty controversial tattoo..."

He said that he inscribed this tattoo on his arm after his father was murdered by police in his home country of Burma.

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