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Goa:
Beyond The Beaches
Point
Blank
By Hugh and Colleen Gantzer
 Goa’s
travel and tourism trade aren’t worried; but they
should be. When we spoke to them last month, in Panaji,
we told them why they should be but very few of them
seemed to hoist it in. Perhaps it was way past their
feni time; or perhaps they saw no reason why non-Goans
should tell them anything about Golden Goa frankly,
the only advice most people like to hear is that they
are great, they are doing a great job, and the best
way to ensure a great future is to continue doing the
great job they have been doing.
The first two parts of that are probably right. The
folk in Goa’s tourism industry have every reason
to pat themselves on their backs: Goa’s beaches
have made a major impact on the world tourism scene.
And they have certainly done a great job marketing Goa:
so far. But that’s where we have to stop and take
a deep breath.
Not many people know that quit a few hotels in Goa have
sealed off entire floors to cut expenses and keep occupancy
statistics high. Though the chief minister believes
that his state’s domestic tourist inflows more
than compensate for shortfalls in foreign traffic, he
could have been given the wrong figures: many drive-through
highway travellers may have been recorded as overnight
tourists. And though we love Goan food, we were very
disappointed this year: at three places, including a
famed beach-shack restaurant and a very reputed old
hotel, we were served vindaloos which were sad apologies
for the real thing.
In other words, both the quantity and the quality of
tourism in Goa is taking a beating.
The reason is clear: for too many years they have put
all their eggs in the beach basket. Beach tourism is
fickle tourism, and it’s rock-bottom, bargain-basement,
cut-throat-competition tourism. If the sun and surf
are free, there will always be someone ready to give
it to you cheaper. And as prices fall, standards are
lowered, sun-tourism becomes slum-tourism, bad tourism
begins to drive out good tourism.
We don’t say that Goa has lost its reputation as
a great tourist destination but it is dangerously close
to doing so.
So what’s the solution? Take a leaf from the Sri
Lanka book. Not so long ago Sri Lanka was fast sliding
into a slum-tourism destination. Paedophiles, druggies,
the scruffy, nauseating, drop-outs of the, so-called,
‘developed world’ were setting up their grimy
doss-houses in Serendip. And then the Sri Lankan government
woke up; so did its travel trade following the advice
of the late Somnath Chib. Walkers opened its village
Habarana. This inland resort, far from any beach, offered
semi-rural cottages in a grove, an open-sided restaurant
overlooking a swimming pool, and tours to the Buddhist
paintings of Sigiriya and the old cities. Fairly soon,
others in the travel industry got into the act offering
attractive alternatives to beaches. In our last visit
to Sri Lanka we stayed in the beautiful Hunas Falls
and a grand old planters club resurrected as a hotel
in Nureliya. Thanks to this change of direction, a different
type of tourist started flying into the island republic:
people interested in Sri Lankan culture, its national
parks, its moonstone mines, its mask-makers, the stilt
fisherman of Welligama, its gem centre in Ratnagpura,
its tea country, and the great old capital of Kandy.
We could go on in this strain for a long time but we
feel we have made our point.
Goa’s travel trade must look beyond the beaches.
Inland Goa is a wonderful area ripe for discovery. Hinterland
Goa is quite different to coastal Goa. Tourists worldover
have been attracted to the Portuguese-influenced customs
and traditions of the coastal people of Goa. This is
Goa’s USP and must never be abandoned regardless
of the pressures of skewed fundamentalists. But, using
this image as a launch pad, attract tourists into the
hinterland, into the dense forests of its Western Ghats,
to it’s wonderful old temples and their colourful
festivals.
One year, when we were researching out book Discovering
Goa, we did a pre-dawn-to-breakfast tour of many of
the beautiful Hindu shrines during Shivaratri. It was
an unforgettable experience. All the temples were brightly
illuminated with flood lighting and fairy lights. The
shrines were full of festivity and welcomed everyone.
People smiled and stepped aside when we were taking
our photographs without us asking them to, and everyone
was able to see all the wonderful rituals.
Quite apart from this great annual festival, every temple
and every church, possibly every mosque too, has its
yearly feast. These are the people-encounters you should
market. And if we hear you murmuring that your tourists
will not get up at odd hours to see strange ceremonies,
you have obviously targeted the wrong tourists.
Or, perhaps, you like taking a beating.
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