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Source: The Times (UK), 6 Nov. 2004 at http://travel.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,10209-1345698_1,00.html
Stephen McClarence relished his homestays in Jaipur and Goa.
Excerpts:
Most Indian tourist centres have homestay houses. Their owners set aside a bedroom or two for paying guests, who share their meals and, if they want to, their day-to-day lives.
Woking-based [UK] Munjeeta Travel, for instance, has a network of 50 Indian families who play host for about �20 a night. "They will meet the guests at the railway station or airport and take them round and show them the sights and the culture," says Jogi Sohal, the retired engineer who set up the company.
"And they'll also take them to the market, show them how to cook and generally show them their way of life. It's a chance to see India through the eyes of Indians."
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We move on to Goa: it is lush, green, with marvellous beaches, friendly people, and, in Prashant Maurya, a guide keen to show it all off.
Maurya, who runs the India Invites travel company, gives us an exemplary tour of Good-Time Goa's attractions. We see vast, dazzling white churches and old towns that could be Tennessee Williams stage sets. We have a sunset beer at Fat Willy's Beach Shack. We see a spice plantation, but give the prawn cultivation farm a miss.
We retreat to our lodgings, near the quiet village of Loutulim. It's one of Goa's "Ancestral Homes", a sprawling, tropical ranch with shuttered windows, where the Miranda family has lived since 1755.
Its 27 rooms are packed with antique porcelain, crystal chandeliers, wind-up gramophones and, in the guest room, a comfortable four-poster bed.
Carmen Miranda (she's used to the jokes) has run it as a homestay for five years. Guests share meals with her and her parents, Antonino and Margarida, both doctors.
The family takes guests to Goa's (frequent) parties, and serves fine, light curries, though we decline the local delicacy, made from pickled pig's brains and liver.
We soon settle into the reassuring rhythm of country life. "At 5.30am, the baker will come - bang on the gate - to deliver the bread," says Carmen. "And then the fish woman will come round with her basket on her head . . ."
We leave reluctantly, telling our driver, in his Leonardo DiCaprio T-shirt, that in Jaipur we shared meals with Shashi Kapoor. "Shashi Kapoor?" he exclaims, wide-eyed with amazement. "Hero! Hero!"
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