It could be that "all that glitters", heading for Ervell's column, may be partly true considering the latest news that gold lies underneath Goa's soil in some remote areas. Rhetorically, this unexplored gold does lie underneath layers of corruption and other things Ervelle mentioned. However, he calls it "underneath that glittering front...", the beaches. As with the hippies of bygone days, the "rave parties" have turned Goa into a "bitch of a state." Unmistakably, Goa's sea shores are said to e golden. Not only Goans say that but western tourists and, above all, the brochures issues by the tourist department. The world has many such golden beaches, from Hawaii to Thailand. I recently saw a special report on Bali's Beach Cowboys, young and married men making money working as gigolos. They cater to the sexual desires of mostly European women, some in college who come there for sexual gratification. The documentary showed at least one German university student in love with a young man who admitted cheating on her and she forgave him. She said that she may not take him to Germany in case she marries as he may not fit into German society. She said she would continue to remain married, a sort of long-distance arrangement. During the Hippie era that Ervelle mentioned, many Goan boys got "lucky" with foreign women. The trend has continued to a lesser extent and we have seen cases where things have gone wrong. I have stayed in Calangute during the 1960s but never ventured into the sexual arena or pot paries. To me, a Bombay boy, it was a curiosity as I and many friends heard so much of this new development in Goa when we were in school/college. I also wrote a piece for a Goan newspaper on how young Goan boys are studying the anatomies of foreign women. Tourism has its bad side but in the absence of any viable money-generating business, besides mining, it is the best provider of jobs. Dr. Willie D'Souza, when he was tourism minister, once told me that he wants "better quality" tourists than what Goa got from Israel or from England. The wealthy Englishmen could afford to go to better places than Goa, who received "charter" tourists. As with the hippies and the "r Promoted now as "wedding destination" perhaps Goa wants to match Las Vegas where couples go fo "quickie" marriages. Or maybe to Nigara Falls, where couples come in thousands for their moneymoon, giving the place the moniker, Moneymoon Capital of the World." Maybe Goa can added touches of Goan tradtions like applying "ros", "bikaranchen jheuun", "chuddo", etc. Some foreign have had their weddings in Rajstahn with all the fun and fashion that make the weddings very colourful. The wedding promotion is much better than the bikini-clad women and the unkindly portryal of Goan women in billboards of yesteryears. Whatever it takes to keep the hotel industry jobs for Goans not lucky enough to land in the Gulf or on cruise ships. Goa must survive, though I wish not at the cost of moral degradation or natural destruction. It must have a healthy economy.
Eugene
