Goa Freaks: My Hippie Years in India

'No, stay for the sunset,' said Richard.

'Yes, you must stay for the sunset,' added Georgette.

I stayed.

In groups and one by one, the beach refilled with Freaks. Their long hair flying loose, the men came in  lungis. The women wore long flowing skirts, and many were bare-chested. Both males and females were loaded with antique Indian silver jewellery on ankles, arms, necks, and waists. They lounged on the sand and focused on where the sun turned red as it touched the water. Pink snaked across the sky. Purple. Orange. People gossiped in lowered tones, almost whispers. A hint of reverence glinted in their eyes as they looked at the colours rather than at each other. From a variety of mostly Western countries, the Goa Freaks were young people who'd rejected their home fives and homelands and had come to India to create a new way of life. The communal sunset was a ritualistic part of it.

None of the Goa Freaks spoke about their families or countries of origin. As if their fives began the day they'd hit the road, reasons for their expatriotism remained private. The past belonged to the straight world they'd renounced. From their speech and mannerisms, though, you could tell they came from comfortable middle-class backgrounds, with well-balanced meals and well-rounded educations. They looked beautiful and healthy, and rich too, covered as they were in silver. They seemed to have it all.

I wanted it too.

I wanted desperately to be one of them. How could I support myself to five in Goa? Would I be able to model in Bombay? I didn't want to five in Bombay, though; I wanted to five on Anjuna Beach. How did the Goa Freaks make their money?

As the sun disappeared, people made plans for dinner. 'Come with us to Gregory's restaurant,' said Richard.

Great. Thrilled to be part of the gang, I put aside functional worries.

Waving to dark shapes, we left the beach to a litany of 'See you at the party' and headed inland. I turned on the flashlight I'd learned to carry at all times. Richard waxed a candle to half a coconut shell. Surprisingly, his contraption produced more light than my modern one, and it didn't extinguish as we walked. To reach the restaurant, we had to cross a corner of the paddy field, jump a ravine, and pussyfoot through a ruin.

Gregory's restaurant attracted customers by having the only delicious food in Anjuna. Gregory, another wrinkly Indian, had been a cook at the French embassy in Delhi, which accounted for his gourmet fare. Set in a garden of tropical flowers, the outdoor restaurant consisted of four wobbly wooden tables with benches and one small, wobbly plastic one with plastic chairs. The miracle of electricity had not yet graced Anjuna Beach, so petrol—kerosene pump-lamps—hung strategically from trees. A lopsided blackboard leaned against a wall misspelling the day's specials: carrot soup, prawns in wine sauce, and apricots and cream.

We entered the kitchen to order and then joined a table. At the head sat Alehandro, big and bare-chested. According to rumour, Alehandro belonged to an aristocratic family in Spain but had been banished from the country. No one knew anything else of his past, and no one would ask.

'Oh,' he exclaimed loudly to me before pounding Richard on the back. 'Ola, hombre, you want smoke chillum? You have hash?' Richard offered him a dusky, halvah-textured rectangle, which he took and smelled. 'What's this?' He sniffed again. 'Afghani?' A deeper sniff. 'Afghani, no?'

Alehandro moved aside an empty soup bowl and began the chillum making ritual, a ritual to be seen repeatedly throughout Anjuna. He emptied a cigarette's tobacco onto the table and, holding a match under the hash, broke the hash into bits that he sprinkled over the tobacco. Then he filled a six-inch chillum with the mixture. Next came a nicotine-stained rag that he wrapped around the clay pipe's base. Richard lit three long matches and held them to the top of the pipe.

'BOMBOLAI!' yelled Alehandro at the top of his voice before puffing out clouds of smoke. A loud and resounding  'BOMBOLAI!'— or  'BOM SHANKAR!'—was a blessing recited over hash whenever a chillum was lit. The louder it was said, the better.

Inevitably, the chillum was passed to me. I'd recently learned how to hold the awkward device and was eager to show off my style. I wrapped the rag, held the base just so, and cupped my other hand around it to block unwanted air holes. I took a little hit, again trying less to inhale and more to blow out so the top would light up. Luckily, this was a pass-it deal, and the business with the rag and the complex hand positions required such deft manoeuvres that, by the time the pipe came around again, the food had arrived. I declined. Uh! The tobacco had made me dizzy, and my fork now weighed a ton. I really had to stop smoking that stuff.

The tables filled up; greetings and news echoed back and forth. I heard again about Pharaoh's new speakers, which were compared exhaustively to the ones someone else had brought the year before. Everyone planned to go to the party.

After dinner I headed back to the beach with Richard. I dropped him off and walked alone by the sea. A piece of moon had appeared in the sky, so I shut off the flashlight. The sand shone bright and white against the pointy outline of palms. Occasionally a wave surrounded my feet with warm water. I raised my arms to embrace the night with the rapture I felt. Hello, stars. I stopped. I spun around. I sank to the sand, rolled in it, and tossed a handful in the air. I felt more satisfied than ever in my life. I'd found a home.

Nine days after I arrived in Anjuna, Tom and Julian were scheduled to return. I spent the morning on the beach with my growing assortment of friends and then, after a final dip in the ocean, prepared for the hike to Calangute. I wasn't sure I wanted to be with Tom again. Did I really want to share my wonderful house with those two guys? Would they hamper my efforts to assimilate as a Goa Freak? On the other hand, I sizzled with excitement to show them how I'd settled into the Anjuna Beach scene.

'Had enough sun?' asked Norwegian Monica as I tugged a white dress over my head. Her blue eyes squinted as she raised herself on an elbow. Perspiration speckled the tattoo of a butterfly on her naked left breast.

'I'm going to Calangute to meet some friends,' I told her. 'You should have left earlier. Hoo, boy—it's hot now.'

'Oops, I hadn't thought of that. Oh, well.' On my head, I draped the headdress given to me by a Bedouin in the Sinai. To hold it in place, I used a necklace with a metal teardrop I let hang over my forehead. 'Maybe see you later at Gregory's.'

'Okay.”

I stopped at Joe Banana's to check for mail. Nothing, of course. It was still too early. Old friends back home and the new ones I'd met on the road would only now be receiving postcards with the new address, but I enjoyed rummaging through the box anyway. It made me feel like an inhabitant. I nodded and said hello to familiar and unfamiliar faces hanging out on the porch. Joe Banana gave me a missing-tooth smile before I entered the bushes behind his chai shop and began the ascent.

As soon as I entered the Calangute square I saw the bus. I found Tom and Julian after a round of the chai shops.

'Well, hi,' said Tom. 'We were just wondering, you know, how to find you.'

I told them about Anjuna Beach and the house.

'How many rooms?' Tom asked.

'Two little ones, a big one facing the sea, a big halt, a big kitchen.' Tom was crinkling at me again. I noticed the exposed ears under his short hair. He looked so straight. 'Calangute is boring, but wait till you see Anjuna Beach,' I continued. 'That's where the Freaks five. Hundreds and hundreds of them. Nobody wears clothes. We throw all the parties. Are you ready to go? It's a long walk.'

'How long?'

'Oh, across the river and over a mountain.'

'Mountain? Why don't we, you know, take the bus?'

'No, NO! Anjuna Beach doesn't have roads!' I said indignantly. 'It's not for TOURISTS! You'll have to get used