Mumbai to Goa by Air.

They say experience teaches you much. In my case, I learn everything through making mistakes. I’m quite an expert at that, make new ones every day. Or so saidShri Husband and Bai Goanna once. I’m going off-track. Let me tell you about what happened recently. We were going to Bombay (sorry-sorry, Mumbai… just tells you how old I am) by aeroplane (I refuse to say ‘fly-by-air’ like some people do.)Shri Husband and Bai Goanna were discussing the nitty-gritties of how kitty (rememberlittle ‘Maows?’) was to be taken care of in our absence. Fish had to be bought, cleaned, sliced and frozen in meal-sized packages. Maows eats only fresh bangde, sans innards, heads, fins,tails. A packet of cat-biscuits (dry, stinky stuff that comes in sturdy plastic packets) was fetched from our friendly neighbourhood ‘supermarket’. The latter is neither ‘super’ nor quite a ‘market’, but keeps essentials. These days, pet food (for fish, dogs, cats but not cows/buffaloes/goats) is listed under essentials. We bought it just in case the bangdefell short (growing kitties have surprisingly big appetites). Introducing her to the insta-food was easy. Like humans, cats figure out that all things fresh and healthy aren’t as tasty as the made-from-scraps, full-of-vitamins, dehydrated-first and reconstituted-afterwards, well-advertised titbits. One sniff and Maows fell in love with the ‘niblets’. Sigh. Poor local ‘bangde’. Going by aeroplane is a big deal for me. I recall reading about pilots who bought their licences and were candidates for crash-adventures. My ears pain. I feel like vomiting. If I get a middle seat I have elbow-stabbers on either side. If I get a window, it’s either above the wing or on the sunny side. As for the aisle… either the trolley gets stuck just where I am or the others in my row have enlarged prostates/undersize-bladders. Or the flap of the luggage-bin above my head keeps snapping open, threatening to allow a heavy knapsack or five to descend upon my skull. (“What’s to fear?” Shri Husband wants to know, “When there is nil grey matter to spill? Nothing to lose.” Harrumph, I snort, but only in my mind.) I worry about picking up someone else’s bag from the carousal and (the consequence of seeing a mystery-movie in college) being the innocent victim of a murder. “Paranoia,” Shri Husband insists.“Without reason.” “Crazy,” Bai Goanna agrees. I say nothing. They won’t understand. No one understands. I let it go. Anyway, we didn’t get tickets on the same airlines, but the flight-timings were identical. Considering only one aircraft can take off at an instant from Dabolim… it didn’t take me long to figure out how they worked it. One flight took off on time, the other was delayed, naturally. Also, the timings indicated that the flight-duration was over an hour and a half. Goa-Mumbai, I read, takes, or should take, fifty-five minutes. So, even if the flight is late for technical snags, security reasons, VIP movement, quarrelling crew, when it lands, it’s mostly ‘punctual’ and gets some rating for the feat. Neat trick.(The next time Goa Today’s editor asks me how long it will take me to write a piece for him, I will say ‘six months’. Won’t he be impressed when I mail it in as many weeks? Ha, am I a good learner or am I a great learner.) FYI, Goa airport food outlets can compete with airlines’ meals, so bad is their fare. We didn’t suffer. Like good(read ‘kanjoos’)Goans, we carried with us water (drank it up before Security) and sandwiches (half were finishedon the way, well before we reached Vasco), wafers (same as ‘chips’) and curd (later mixed with aforesaid water and a packet of homemade masala to get instant buttermilk.) At the airport, as we moved towards our respective gates, our ‘cheerios’ turned to ‘oh-nos’ when we realized that although we were headed to Mumbai, one flight was landing at T-1, Santacruz, the other at T-2, Sahar, a distance of 30 mins. (In India, lest you be unaware, we measure distance in the time covered by taxi. We in Goa measure distance by fare; like, my home is twelve-hundred bucks from the airport, and it’ll shock you to know how little that is in kilometres.) Railway stations have no such complications. Tivim or Carmali stations may force you to ‘land’ on the tracks because the platform is shorter than the train (has happened!), but it’s not Mapusa at one end and Margao at the other. My village mind is imagination-deficit; when I heard this T-1-T-2 thing, I gave up wondering how big Mopa airport was likely to be. No connection, just my wandering mind a-wondering. Through the journey, we pondered what Maows might be doing. The moment we landed-- two on-time and one delayed by an hour-- and until we met again, yet another hour later, we phoned our neighbour to check on her (Maows, not the neighbour). Over the weekend that we were away, the ‘wado’ kept an eye not on our property (jungle, really) nor possessions (no self-respecting thief would covet them), but our cat. V, who had the key to the house and access to cat’s food, told me Maows wouldn’t touch a morsel unless she stood by. She had to wait until Maows’ meal was over. In spite of the fact that we had trained Maows to use a particular window to exit and enter, she made V’s life miserable by wanting to use the ‘human’s’ door. Cats have intelligence, don’t let any dog-lover dispute that. Mumbai has its charm. The Metro-digging is going on from Andheri-Seepz to beyond Churchgate, which means more than half the city is semi-paralyzed. The very-slow-moving traffic reminded me of the Mandovi-bridge jams over holiday weekends. But none was seen pouring beer-froth over another’s head in the middle of such a jam: tourists in Goa give us entertaining moments, don’t they? Back home now, with Maows on lap and laptop on table, I’m making a list of ‘lessons learnt in the first month of 2018’. 1. When you leave a cat at home, alone, keep out only those clothes you don’t want shred. 2. When you have forgotten to switch off a light or fan, keep aside extra money for the electricity-bill of the next month. 3. …(word limit up, more next time.)

Cats

(10 Nov ’06)

            One quiet afternoon in Taleigaon….now that’s rare, for Taleigaon is full of hooting, bleating traffic all day long, but that’s another story… the peace was disturbed by the distressing yowl of a cat. It seemed close by, so I tried to trace it. A housewife in the building across indicated to me that it was on her terrace. It was actually the ledge above her window. How it got there is one of life’s mysteries, for there isn’t any approach to it. Anyway, I nearly dialed for the fire brigade when this creature took a leap, and whilst I pressed my palms to my cheeks and held my breath, she bounced off the first floor balcony, onto a pipe and thence to the ground. She was still for a second, then she limped away, probably with minor injuries. The housewife and I waved in relief and I went back to my work (no siesta for me, no rest for the wicked, remember?). It must have been about an hour later that I heard the desperate wail again. I thought she was injured badly or perhaps been hit by a passing car (am really surprised Taleigaon isn’t leading in automobile caused injuries). Again, it seemed strangely familiar. I couldn’t believe it. That cat was back where she’d jumped off from. This time, though, she was terrified, having experienced a torn ligament or something, and had to be rescued by an adventurous, animal-loving man.

            There was a fisherwoman who used to come to Porvorim, who had a pet feline that walked alongside like a dog would. When she was tired, she hopped onto the basket and took a ride.

            The cats at Subodh Kerkar’s and at Nilaya are attractions in themselves. Come to think of it, other than the west coast, I’ve never seen so many cats in markets or people’s homes in any other part of the country. They’re there, but discreetly so. Here, they are a major part of our lives. Go to any market and you’ll see how. Watch the little kittens playing with a tiny string or twig. There isn’t anything as entertaining. Watch them chew the titbits they get from the fish trimmings. Little tigers and tigresses, no wonder they’re known as waghahchi maushis (maternal aunts of the tiger). One cat at my mom’s place in Canacona has no voice. She opens her mouth as if to say something, opens it wide and shows that she’s putting in effort, but no sound comes out. Can creatures be born without a voice? My ENT friend tells me yes, if there’s something wrong with the mechanism or a particular nerve leading to the voice-box. Am surprised that more hotels and restaurants haven’t kept cats…well fed ones, so they don’t beg…for guests to enjoy watching.

            Those who believe that cats are smart aught to observe them. We had one who used to jump and knock at the latch so we could open the door to let it in. We were on the ground floor, but it never came in through the window.

             One at Panaji market recognized me and whenever, wherever I parked my two-wheeler, she somehow traced me out and mewed until I gave her some velyo to eat.

            Nevermind the domestic felines. Wonder what’s happening to the big cats of Goa. I haven’t read much about their well being in a long time. I hope Goans haven’t forgotten that in the long run, their wealth lies not in taxis and bars but in the fauna and flora that draw their customers to this state. Sanctuaries must be fiercely protected. Not by the government but by the locals if they want to make sustained money out of tourism. The beaches are dead if not dying. The forest cover still remains. Hopefully, we will now see sense and protect it. Large cats are indicators of forest health. May their numbers increase.

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