To forge the Goa life: Here’s a survival checklist from those who have called it home for a while

Ask any person their ideal place to settle down and eight times out of 10 itrsquos Goa Indiarsquos tiny beach state has long been the perfect getaway especially for those tired of existing in a constant state of rushAs Katharina PoggendorfKakar wrote in her book Moving to Goa 10 years ago ldquoWe had no desire to move back to a polluted metropolis with traffic snarls aggressive drivers and an infrastructure constantly teetering on the brink of collapserdquo And so many of them rushed to the state in droves during the pandemicmdashwriters businesspeople professionals and families all packed their bags in search of the ideal Goan life but did not find the endless coconutpanionbeach dreamldquoThere is no ideal Goan liferdquo says Heta Pandit founder of Goa Heritage Action group and author of 11 books on Goa one of them ironically titled Therersquos more to life than a house in Goa ldquoexcept the one you have created yourself Sometimes the idea of Goa is in your headrdquo A pioneer of sorts Pandit moved away from Mumbai due to an accident in 1994 and has stayed in several places across Goa over the past 28 yearsDeepti Dadlani whorsquos been staying in Goa for twoandahalf years says Goa is beautiful to live in but needs adjustment to adapt to the slowness of lifeLife in Goa many such pioneers found comes with its own challenges Getting around for instance is the major challenge While traffic is an issue in Mumbai or Bengaluru here the challenge is how to get from one place to another ldquoOne of the first things I had to do was to buy a car and learn to driverdquo says Pallavi Naidu who shifted to Porvorim from Mumbai in 2021 and handles the digital publication AlcobuzzAnother challenge is roundtheclock Internet connectivity Power cuts which are frequent shut down all connections Naidu says she installed inverters to deal with the power cuts Kirana stores and stationery shops remain elusive if one is in the interiors she says that when she used to live in Siolim she had to drive every morning for 510 minutes to get bread and eggs Plumbers carpenters and workmen are hard to find and slow to respondmdasha fact thatrsquos earned locals an unenviable reputation ldquoI remember the first time I called a plumber He came after four daysrdquo says Nolan Mascarenhas a financial analyst and food writer ldquoIn Mumbai hersquod come in 15 minutesrdquoKatharina PoggendorfKakar author of Moving to Goa planted her garden in Benaulim herself Gardening keeps her rooted to her identityComing to which ldquoSusegad means contentment and the art of living Itrsquos not lazinessrdquo corrects Mascarenhas who moved to Vagator in 2012 to get in touch with his roots The 39yearold says itrsquos necessary to lower expectations when moving to Goa itrsquos not the endless rave that films will have you believe He says this stereotyping of the Goan lazing around on the beach beer bottle in hand has limited the discovery of the statersquos true cultural identity However even he agrees that the passage of time in Goa is deceptive ldquoIt would take me four hours to do a task in Mumbai while in Goa it would take five or six daysrdquoThe slowness of life afflicts the metro resident in the initiation period almost like a malady Naidu recalls how during her first six months in Goa she would go to the beach every single day It took her nearly a year to adjust to how time works in GoaIt was the same for hospitality brand strategist Deepti Dadlani 41 who has been staying in Siolim for twoandahalf years For Dadlani the cramped spaces of the city didnrsquot suit her physiologically thus the intense need to work on the beach She quickly found it ldquotoo casual to do any structured workrdquo ldquoSlowly and steadily you realise you are going to the beach too muchrdquo says Dadlani ldquoYou may be living in Goa but you have to work office hours And you canrsquot take a beach break in the middle of themrdquoKatharina and her husband writer and psychoanalyst Sudhir Kakar have lived in Goa for 20 years nowDadlani adds that if yoursquore not equipped to build a life alone as an adult the transition will be harder ldquoMake sure that you have structure in your liferdquo she advises ldquoLook for a home that is close to resources that are important to you My advice would be to treat Goa how you would treat Mumbai Donrsquot come in trying to stay near the beachrdquoPandit says she wouldnrsquot describe life as slowpaced ldquoItrsquos just an opportunity to pace it the way you wantmdashyou can live slow or fast You can work from home or have a routinerdquo She adds ldquoTherersquos always some campaign that we are running Letters to be sent out people to be reached and convinced There are meetings to attend and festivals to be organised at timesrdquoFor those hoping to buy their own home Kakar says that it is important to know where onersquos dreams fit in with practicalities ldquoI think one should move hererdquo she says ldquorent first explore and figure out which part of Goa you like and want to settle down inrdquoHeta Pandit Nolan Mascarenhas and Pallavi NaiduHowever those whorsquove been in the beach state for a while agree unanimously how peaceful life is The state they gush frees their mind and gives them space to think ldquoFor me the most important part is being grounded and connected to a variety of natural elementsrdquo says KakarldquoI think Irsquove become calmer more rootedrdquo It comes from her garden which she planted herself She works in her garden for an hour every morning digging around and enjoying the scents of the soil For Mascarenhas it comes from the green of the paddy fields around his ancestral home For Pandit an environmentalist itrsquos the beauty of the statersquos heritage and local ecologyldquoI think people who come here need to adjust to the place rather than expecting the place to adjust to themrdquo are Dadlanirsquos words of wisdom Pandit has similar views ldquoGoa is not a useandthrow place Learn to love its environment its biodiversity heritage ecology its problems and roll up those sleeves and pitch in Once you have done that you can think about heading to the beachrdquo