We arranged for Sunil the taxi man to pick us up at 5pm and we loaded up. It would be a 1.5 hour ride to Margao Train Station. The train wasnt due until 23.40pm but we had wanted to see a bit of the countryside and so opted for this time to take in the scenery. It's different, I'll say that and we're glad we saw as much as we could. During the ride I asked Sunil about the foreigners who come to Goa on holiday.He pretty much opened up to us about the Goan Taxi Driver's lot.......Russians, it seems are not giving themselves a good name here and Sunil had lots of tales to tell. Russian women would jump in the cabs and demand to go on long rides into the cities where they could go night clubbing...prices would be haggled and agreed...then upon arrival, the young ladies would say they've got no money but offer their bodies to the taxi drivers in exchange for the fare...the taxi driver would decline such offers but the Russian ladies would grab the driver's hand and put it on their ample bosoms.....the taxi driver would recoil...and the word "Rape" would be screamed by the young ladies in question. That apparently was quite a common thing. Reports of rape in Goa are a big thing and there's always big articles about this in the India Times & The Hindu Daily. So you get the picture. Russian men as well have been known to cause problems with excessive drinking and refusal to pay bar bills. The Goans, Sunil told us, now have an arranged vigilante squad which deals with this and again he said it happens quite often. The Goans call them Kuski's, which means Dirty in the local lingo.

Did the Brits fare any better I wondered. Sunil said that sometimes there would be fights between British football fans when there was a game on......but it was a rare occurence and not a major problem. There was no slang name for the British.....or at least tht's what was said. When we walked around Goa we were always asked if we would like a taxi...........but one day we saw a drunk heat maddened white guy wobbling down the road..no one offered him a lift. The Goan guy we were talking to said "Russian.....always like this". The redeeming factor of the Brits was this, Sunil said that just like us, if the British said they would use you for the big lifts to the airport or railway station, they did. So there you go British tourists, please keep this tradition going as it gives us a good reputation here.

Now we were at the Margao Railway Station.......with a mere 5 hours to wait. This was going to be either boring or interesting. It turned out to be both.