by Cleo Odzer Blue Moon Books
If so, this is the book. It is a must-read for the student of
sociology, the Goan from the coastal belt, and about anyone curious to
understand the changes this society underwent in the last three decades.
Cleo Odzer is herself a former hippie, reincarnated as a respectable
academic in the US. She tells the full story, with brutal and uncensored
honesty. Even at the risk of portraying herself as a narcissistic,
self-centered and a law-breaking guest of Goa.
This book's significance is that it is the first to decode the lives and
times of the hippies of Goa, which was one of the hippie-capitals
worldwide (besides Ibiza in Spain and Kathmandu).
Odzer grew up in the lap of Jewish affluence in New York, as a
disaffected youth in the post-Vietnam War generation. She opted to
restlessly comb Europe and the Middle East before taking the overland bus
from Europe to Goa. Four years -- of drugs, depravity and a
meaningless existence -- was, however, more than she could take of it.
Returning to the US, she valiantly worked her way to a doctorate
in Anthropology. She now works with a drug rehabilitation group called
Daytop.
Her story zooms in on that community of aliens which relocated to a tiny
stretch of Goa. Though based in Anjuna, the Goa Freaks, as they
called themselves, kept links across the globe. There were some in San
Francisco. Many temporarily shifted to Bali (Indonesia). Bangkok was a
oft-visited destination. They congregated around a few down-market hotels
in Mumbai too.
But in the monsoon, the Goa Freaks fled the torrential rains and
undertook 'scams' -- couriering drugs to distant locations. On this
money, they lavishly lived it up in the ensuing season. Returns were
high. Drugs bought for $2000 in Asia could retail for $21,843 in Canada.
Just to carry somebody else's drugs to Canada, they were paid $8000 to
$10,000.
On their drug earnings, they lived life to the hilt. En route, they
stayed in the Sheratons, the Holiday Inns and the Hiltons, and met
contacts at the Taj.
Cleo Odzer, returning to Anjuna from Canada one time, meets a friend
coming in from Thailand. Take her word for it: "We exchanged knowing
smiles. Now I knew how the Goa Freaks made the money to splurge on
so much coke (cocaine). Now I knew, because I'd been initiated. I was
really one of them."
Odzer narrates how she opened her "dope den," called the Anjuna Drugoona
Saloona, after boldly tacking handwritten adverts throughout the beach!
Her description of the outdoor and indoor parties clearly suggest these
are fueled by persons linked to the drug trade which is far more
organized than most of us could dream of.
Odzer suggests the Goa police failed to be vigilant in curbing the drug
trade. Despite reading her letters and raiding her home, they simply let
her off. In comparison, even Thailand was very strict on drugs, and Bali
was firm even against nudism.
This is not a story of Goa. It is a story of the hippies' escapades,
which has Anjuna as the backdrop only incidentally. Nonetheless, it is
fascinating reading.
In brief references, we get a hint of the dramatic interface between West
and East. Once, a "French junkie" fell into a well and died, resulting in
a "major disaster" for the villagers dependent on its water.
Goans are shown as a people willing to put up with the "crazy foreigners"
for what they get out of them. By 1979, nothing they do surprises the
locals anymore, says Odzer.
Goans were also little more than a source of cheap labour. "A Westerner
doing housework! What an unheard-of thing in that land of cheap labor,"
writes Odzer. "Living in Goa could be stupendously inexpensive. Food and
rent cost little and I paid the Goan maid $22 a month for coming in seven
days a week and doing everything. Drugs were the main rupee eaters... the
low cost of Goan labor allowed me to hire an army of painters for pennies
an hour," commented Odzer.
Based on first-hand experience, Cleo Odzer is able to smartly analyze the
mechanics of drug smuggling. Maybe Customs officers could consider
adopting this book as a text.
For instance, on the Bangkok-Mumbai run, drug-couriers realize that the
Customs officials are obsessed with locating electronic goods, not drugs.
Duplicate passports were used to hide traces of traveling in drug-prone
Far East Asia.
The Goa Freaks took out drugs to destinations in the West. To
avoid detection, they visited posh hairdressers and transited through
drug-free destinations -- like Portugal, Switzerland, Bermuda, Canada,
and even the former Soviet Union!
Drugs were smuggled in a variety of places: leather suitcases specially
stitched in Mumbai. Condom-packed narcotics were stuffed in the
intestines and vagina. "Smack" was brought in from Laos hidden in a
toothpaste tube. To retain it in their intestines, "a bottle of diarrhea
medicine" had to be consumed. To get it out called for "a box of Ex-Lax,"
a laxative!
Dr. Odzer makes it clear from the start: "This is a nonfiction story, but
some names and characters and exact dates have been changed to protect
identities." Still, many are clearly identifiable. One only has to refer
to Goa Today's past issues to know who are the drug pushers being
referred to. Some still make their appearances. Others, like "Biriyani"
had purchased properties here not too long ago. Sadly, a few who featured
in the book died in "mysterious ways."
Many Goan characters and institutions also figure in this book -- Joe
Banana, landlord Lino, Paradise Pharmacy, Hanuman Ice Cream, the
Birmingham Boys gang, and Inspector Navelcar. There's also "the private
Catholic hospital in Mapusa" where the freaks go to recuperate. Not all
that is revealed may be flattering information.
Strange names and unusual characters also people this book: Neal,
Alehandro, an American named Narayan and another named Sadhu George,
Norwegian Monica, Mental, Serge, Barbara, Junky Robert and Tish, David
and Ashley, Canadian Jacques, Hollywood Peter, Marco and wife Gigi,
Guiliano, Amsterdam Dean, Trumpet Steve, Paul, Jerry Schmaltz and
Eight-Finger Eddie. Some still live in Goa. One of the hippies even named
their son Anjuna. But he grew up into a "conservative young man with
short hair who refused to be called Anjuna, and who just enlisted in the
US police academy." One of the pharmacies she names allegedly even bought
narcotic drugs from Odzer!
To maintain her drug habit she has to undergo amazing levels of
depravity: join a gang stealing traveler's cheques in Mumbai and agree to
sexual abuse by a police official in a Delhi jail.
Finally, Odzer takes a hard decision. Drugs slowly decimated the Anjuna
freak community, and she is shocked to find the number of friends dead or
in jail. Death stares at her too in the face and drugs make her lose
touch with reality. She either has to lose India or her life.
This story is best narrated in her own words: "Oh, I hated the notion.
This place was my dream. I would never find one I loved as much, or that
I could belong to as wholeheartedly. Goa was home."
Odzer's story can move you to tears. Even if you're an irate Goan who
believes the hippies ruined the place and brought in drugs. It can also
make you feel terribly angry. Scenes where she has to leave behind her
dog are touching. But, then, to learn that she fed her pet
prawns-in-wine-sauce, or bought saris merely to hang from the ceiling, is
nothing short of scandalous.
Despite her impeccable academic credentials, Dr. Cleo Odzer liberally
sprinkles her book with the Bs, Ds, and quite a few F-words too. But this
recreates a feeling of re-living the hippie years of Goa.
Goa Freaks has a fascinating style. A young Odzer herself poses
seductively on the cover, tells you of her own sexual escapades, and uses
a style that keeps the narrative gripping throughout. But do we find it
interesting because, in Goa, we have long been puzzled and unable to
understand the hippie reality?
Some may find the portrayal too superficial. It makes the flower-power
generation seem simply obsessed with sex and drugs. But perhaps the
hippies of the late '70s were a different cup of tea from those who
preceded them. Incidentally, despite their distaste for the Western
"capitalist" lifestyle, the late-70s hippies "loved gadgets, and at the
start of each season they fussed over the latest inventions brought from
the West."
Odzer, incidentally, was kind enough to send across complimentary copies
of her costly book to public libraries in Goa -- including the Central
Library's Rare Books Section and the Xavier Centre at Porvorim. Maybe she
can further repay her host society by passing on some drug-rehab skills
from Daytop.
DID you wonder how the hippies of the '70s managed to live seemingly
luxurious lives in Goa without doing a day's work? Want to know how they
spent months on a tiny stretch of Anjuna beach? Or what really attracted
them to Goa?