There are villagers here who see foreigners as a threat to their way of life. As an elderly fisherwoman whom I met in a queue (of all places) told me in some anger, 'First it was the Portuguese who conquered us, and now it is the tourists who will take over.' The woman lives at Palolem beach, and though she can earn good money from foreigners, she says: 'I will never rent out my rooms to the goras.'
Yet there are many who are happy to do business with the goras. And more and more foreigners are settling down here, wanting to invest in property or simply to rent, thought it's nothing like it is in North Goa (where an entire village is inhabited by Russians).
They live here at least eight months in the year. The funny thing is that most of them say they cannot afford to live in their own country.
An Irishman I met, who was a mason back home, told me that in England all he did was pay bills. 'Bills, bills and more bills,' he said in disgust. 'Here it is cheap.' The Irishman has built himself a nice house here where he lives with his wife and son. The son goes to school in Margaon, the nearest town, 35 km away. And the Irishman works here as a kind of contractor, helping other foreigners to build.
An elderly, retired Dutch woman, married to an Indian, has bought a house here and converted half of it into a hotel. Back home, she says, it's hard to make ends meet on the pension she gets.
Two women from Amsterdam have for years been living in a little rundown house which has a loo outside. One of them makes costume jewellery which she tries to sell to tourists in season, the other gets the odd assignment to be a DJ.
An elderly Italian with a ponytail runs a pizza joint by the beach.
A retired cop from England has opened a shop with some other foreigners where they sell mostly Indian exotica at extravagant prices.
An elderly, artistic couple from France live here eight months in the year,France being too expensive.
A Brit couple runs a popular hotel listed in Lonely Planet.
There are many such people whose euros and pounds and dollars buy them the bit of paradise that so many crave.
The question is: where do Indians go when they can't afford to live in their own country? Africa?
Friday, January 16, 2009
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How do you think these IT companies make money- they are hi tech labor contractors- they hire well educated engineers at $500 a month- ( even a beggar cannot survive on this in the US) they charge the client a minimum of $25 an hour- so the techi literally earns his salary in 2 days- even if you add a lot in terms of expenses etc etc- they simply mint money-a women from the UK told me that she was living like a queen in goa by saving on the very high heating bills in london-in winter-- the Osho ashram has a lot of waiters, plumbers, etc because the exchange rate is loaded in their favor –I don’t know if you have heard this joke
Description of heaven- American salary, British house, Japanese wife, Chinese food,
Description of hell- Chinese salary, Japanese house, American wife, British food
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