Enthused by the epic proportions of England’s ‘victory’ over India, we took the bus into Margao to buy tickets for the ODI, which were supposed to be on sale from 10.30. We arrived at 11.00 and were pleasantly surprised at the modest numbers waiting patiently outside the Syndicate Bank’s – the sole outlet – door, where a uniformed guard, sporting a polished twelve bore rifle, stood to attention.

After waiting five minutes, we learned that tickets weren’t actually going to start being sold until 3.00. 10.30 was when the bank opened and official queueing could start!

Enthusiasm to watch the match drained away and we headed off to a tranquil spot for some lunch.

We haven’t been back to Palolem, yet. Too many things to do, too little time, most of my books still unread. 

Dear Dodman

I hereby give you fair warning that Sasha and I are heading for the aformentioned Palolem beach in one week from now. We are going very near Goa on the train tomorrow and then the next destination will be Palolem.

Perhaps we shall see you there.

Well, we finally got to Palolem, where as it turns out there are 150 rupee a night ‘tents’ – ie, huts on stilts – all over the shop. It’s not too crowded and the sea is calmer than we’ve been used to so we’ll probably move here in a day or two. 

Concerning the sitting room fire: remember to empty the ash pan underneath – spread the ash over the garlic plantation – and scrape every last fragment out of the ash pan socket or it won;t fit back inside.

We would willingly swap some of your cold for our excess of heat. Last night was horrendous. A pool of sweat gathered in the hollow of my breast bone and then overflowed to dribble in all directions. We’re continually blasted by the sun!

We just ate lunch watching Pieterson throw his wicket away wantonly. Good old Shah, is all I can say, whoever he is.

What did this ‘real’ dodman say about me, the fake one?

Jamie and I congregated in covent garden yesterday to finally redeem our ice-climbing vouchers.

I arrived early and performed an early recon, discovering that the ice wall was in a climbing shop spanning its two floors. Not quite the hundred-foot cliff that we had imagined!

When jamie arrived, we looked for a suitable place to have lunch before our allotted slot on the wall. We spotted a suitable spot called the “Box Cafe”. The two chaps we spotted in the window seemed to be eating tasty food, so we headed for the door. Beside the door we noticed a poster advertising the “Box Cafe Calendar”, which on closer inspection was composed entirely of semi-naked men. We looked and noticed there wasn’t a single female form inside. We exited stage left.

The climb itself was good fun. We were kitted out with all the helmets, ice picks and crampons we needed and after 3 mins of instruction, we headed up the wall.

There were two normal sections to the wall, 1 completely vertical and 1 with a very slight angle. We both set off up the wall and got to the top first time, though, as I took the first go at the vertical wall, it took me a little longer than jamie. He was wondering why I was making such hard work of it until he attempted the vertical wall. We both found it increasingly hard on the arms, and found that we’d have nearly reached the top, but barely have the strength to lift our arms to make that last few foot. After the hour we were shattered, arms aching and pouring with sweat despite the low temperatures needed to keep the wall frozen.

Afterwards we met up with Kit who had been delayed by the Iraq protestors and then walked the streets of london in search of a pub showing the rugby.

Back at the homestead, things continue as normal. The low setting of the radiators has virtually no effect on the icey chill round the house, but thankfully the good old fire in the sitting room is great, providing all the heat one needs as long as one doesn’t need to venture elsewhere in the house. Have purchased additional garlic pills to ward off lurgys.

The wire rat-trap has trapped a small crow the last couple of days so i’ve disabled it.

I made myself an administrator on the at forums and deleted one abusing post and banned it’s poster. He claimed to be the “real” dodman and professed some opinions about dodman. Not suer why he was posting on an alexander technique forum though!

We’ve found an agreable lodging place at two quid a night with a verandah on the first floor overlooking a small square so we can spend plenty of time watching the world drift pass as we scoop dribbling chunks of juicy papaya into our gaping maws. Vaddy beach is just down the road and the beach shacks go on for miles in each direction. We got seriously blasted by the sun on our first day, but apart from that are settling in nicely. My favourite thing to do is rent a bike and just pedal in any direction. Within minutes rural Goa manifests itself with wonderful backyard scenes of water boiling in large ceramic pots on wood fires, families of pigs rootling amongst the rubbish and sad eyed water buffalo chewing the cud. We’re currently in Margoa, buying fruit. The bus here had five foot headroom, which was a pain to stand up in. Word is that Palolam is now ovecrowded and overpriced. We’ll see,. I just stopped at a jeweller’s shop to listen to the cricket and was told that England were sliding to almost certain defeat.