I DON’T BELIEVE IN GHOSTS

I DON’T BELIEVE IN GHOSTS

‘I don’t believe in ghosts,’ said the young man walking by my master's side, in Hindi. He was a nice young man, personable and smartly dressed. And so he should have been; he was the Assistant Manager of Bolero Beach Resort, the kind of place where first impressions count a lot… and every impression thereafter.

My name is Barfi. I’m a cat, a fluffy, white one. My master’s name is Aarav. He’s from Jharkhand, and has been in Goa for a little over six months, working in Francisco's Fine Foods, one of the better shacks on Bogmalo Beach in Goa. That’s where I first met him, in the kitchen, where he works as a chef, rustling up some really savoury dishes for the tourists who frequent the shack. British, Russian, Israeli, North Indian, you name it, Aarav has a dish to suit everyone’s taste. He’s a quick learner, my master; in two months flat he mastered a variety of Goan dishes and sweets under the tutelage of his boss, Francisco, who’s an ace chef himself.

I used to be a stray cat until the day I strolled into Francisco’s kitchen and rubbed against Aarav’s leg. That was all it took; we’ve been inseparable ever since. He understands me and I understand him. We’re soulmates, Aarav and I. I firmly believe that.

But where was I? Oh yes, I was talking about the young man who gave us both a lift to town in the company bus, dropping us off, and getting down himself at Mangor sports Club This was a short distance from where we were staying. Were it not for him, we’d have had to walk a fair distance at 2.00 in the morning. Very decent of him, I must say. His name was Bennet, he told us. For a Goan, he spoke Hindi very well. It was the nature of his job, he explained. He had even picked up a smattering of Spanish, German, French and Punjabi, he said with a laugh, in addition to Portuguese, which he (and his family, apparently) spoke quite fluently.

‘I don’t believe in ghosts,’ he repeated, a lot more emphatically this time, looking at Aarav sideways with a sort of challenging look, as if daring him to dispute or refute his statement.

‘Teek hai,’ my master said cautiously, answering him in the same language, ‘I think that’s fair enough.’ See, Aarav is a migrant worker from Jharkhand, who got this job through his neighbour in Jharkhand, a guy named Anand, who had been working as a cook in the same shack, and had returned to his village for a long overdue and well-deserved vacation. It was he who had spoken to Francisco and had got my master the job six months before. Aarav was not about to complain, he told me (he confides a lot in me, my master); he loves Goa, loves the vibe of the place, everything about it except the rude, overbearing, loud-mouthed Delhi tourists (some of them, not all) who tend to order you around like a slave, get drunk and pick up fights, and are never satisfied with the quality of the food or service.

But these are small things, as Aarav said: flies to be swatted away, as he put it, and not taken seriously. He smiles and keeps his cool, my master, even with the loudest, most obnoxious tourists. His name – Aarav – means ‘peaceful’ or ‘calm’. It represents tranquility or harmony.

Besides, as he mentioned seriously, he learnt his lesson quickly from what happened in the shack next to Francisco’s: three days after Aarav had started working at Francisco’s, a tourist from Delhi who was drunk and stoned, had picked up a fight with one of the waiters from Bihar, a guy called Manoj. Now Manoj was a hot-tempered fellow who, unlike my master, could not keep his cool or keep his trap shut. The upshot of the argument was that Manoj had a beer bottle smashed on his head and was in hospital for almost a month. Of course the tourist was promptly arrested and is still cooling his heels in jail, I believe, but hey, either you want the job or you don’t, right? So Aarav, my beloved master and companion, smiles and keeps his cool… and picks up tips.

But where was I? Oh yes, this guy we (we, meaning Aarav) were chatting with in the wee hours of morning in a narrow lane on Mangor hill in the port town of Vasco. A really nice guy, this Bennet; it was he who had asked the driver of his company vehicle to drop us off to this point. Neither Aarav nor I were looking forward to walking the two kilometres to the rented room we were staying in, on a rocky and precarious slope. Normally Aarav and I get a lift to town from his co-worker, Santosh, on his Scooty, but Santosh had called in sick, so we were kind of stranded and all set to make the long trek from Francisco’s to our rented room, until we got that unexpected, providential lift.

As Aarav explained to Bennet, it wasn’t that he was afraid of being mugged or anything, but what if he met a ghost on the way? It’s been known to happen, right? But Bennet sniggered and said, in a tone that brooked no argument – ‘I don’t believe in ghosts.’

Now here’s a guy who’s just used his good offices to give Aarav and me a lift, so how can we argue with him? So Aarav was cautious and noncommittal, even though he saw things differently; wouldn’t you have been?

So now we’re walking from the club to the end of the lane when he says, ‘I’ll tell you a ghost story,’ and gives a short, sharp bark of laughter. Apparently his cousin had narrated it to him and he was greatly amused by it; didn’t believe any of it, he said (‘I don’t believe in ghosts’). He’s telling us the story just to pass the time, you understand?

‘There’s this elderly couple,’ he began, ‘Called Ramdas and Seema, who sell fish in the Baina market. They’re a very nice couple, you understand, sociable and friendly, and not very well off. My cousin and her family used to buy fish from them quite often and spend some time chatting with them. You know how it is in Goa – you get friendly with the grocer, the butcher, the fish vendor… most people are friendly and gregarious.

‘Anyway, one morning when my cousin, Olivia, went to the fish market, Ramdas was absent; only Seema was there. So Olivia asked her why her husband wasn’t by her side, selling fish as usual.

‘“Kitem sangonk, bai? (What to tell you, Ma’am?)” she answered, sighing deeply, “Ramdas met with an accident two nights ago. He fell off his bike!”

‘“What?” asked Olivia, shocked, “Poor fellow! Is he alright How did it happen? Did he run into a stray cow or buffalo on the road?”

‘“No, bai,” replied Seema, sighing again, “It happened like this: You know that Ramdas goes to Baina beach every evening to collect fish, right? That’s the time the fishermen return from the sea with their catch, and Ramdas, he gets a load of fish, puts it in a basket on the front of his bike, goes to the market and keeps the fish under a pile of ice, to keep it fresh so he can sell it the next day. That’s what we’ve been doing for years now. Well, the other day he was returning from the beach at about 7.30 in the evening - the usual time – with his load of fish, when he saw a man by the side of the road thumbing a lift. A harmless-looking, middle-aged man, very ordinary looking. So Ramdas, you know, being the soft-hearted person he is, stopped and told the man to get onto the bike.

‘“They continued on the journey, chatting like old friends, after introducing themselves – you know what a chatter-box Ramdas is, and his passenger was just as bad, apparently. When they came to the darkest part of the journey – you know that long stretch of road after St Sebastian’s Chapel, just before Sai Mandir, where the street lights are never working – Ramdas asked the man a question… and there was silence.

‘“So Ramdas, thinking the man hadn’t heard the question – the wind was blowing noisily through the trees, he said, and a few drops of rain were beginning to fall – repeated the question. Still no answer. Ramdas turned to look behind… and there was no-one there! No-one! So Ramdas realised he has just been travelling with a ghost, and with the shock of that realisation he fell of the bike! Fortunately he was wearing a helmet, so he escaped serious injury. But he dislocated his shoulder and hurt his knee, so it’ll be a few days before he’s fit enough to come to the market.”

‘That’s the story Seema told Olivia,’ concluded Bennet, with a sly, sideways look at me, ‘What do you think?’

We had now reached the end of the lane and had begun to negotiate that precarious, rocky slope. At the halfway point was Bennet’s house – so he told us – while right at the bottom was the rented room Aarav and I had been staying in. It was dark – no street lights or anything, and since it was now past two in the morning the lights were off in every house on that slope.

We were making our way gingerly down the slope by the light of Bennet’s cell phone and Aarav’s own, somewhat dimmer, mobile torch as well.

‘Hanh?’ he asked again, ‘What’s your take on the story?’

‘I don’t know, Sahib,’ Aarav replied cautiously (cautiously, because he didn’t want to antagonise him and also because he was focusing more on keeping his balance on that tricky slope. He wasn’t as sure-footed on that little hill as Bennet was, see? And me, I’m a cat, so that’s the least of my problems

‘I don’t know,’ he said again, ‘I guess it’s possible he was a ghost. These things have been known to happen.’

Bennet gave a snort of laughter.

‘You know what I think?’ he challenged, ‘I think that at some point in the journey the passenger – the so-called ghost- realised he had reached his destination and hopped off the bike when it slowed down to negotiate a turn, that’s all. That’s the simplest and most plausible explanation! Nothing supernatural about it.

‘You see, as I’ve told you before, I don’t believe in ghosts.’

Aarav said nothing. I was having none of it and gave a low purr. I was about to meow a protest when with good feline instinct I sensed Aarav’s foot aiming a kick in my direction and stopped myself in mid-meow.

‘Did you hear what I said?’ he repeated, a little louder this time, ‘I simply don’t believe in ghosts!’

Again we said nothing, and he turned to look behind.

There was no-one there, of course, and he screamed and dropped his cell-phone (a brand new one gifted to him by his fiancé, he had mentioned in passing) and just like you see on the Cartoon Network in those Tom & Jerry serials, he went bop-bop-bop down the slope, his head hitting the rocks all the way down.

We’re best ghost buddies now, Bennet, Aarav and me. And we go around together almost every night playing pranks on people, like the one we played on him. Such fun, I tell you!!!

OOO