The Great Bath History with a side of sabzi
The name kind of gives it away. The Great Bath is designed after one of the most recognisable sites from the Harappan Civilisation, which lasted from 3300 BCE to 1300 BCE. The décor includes replicas of the Dancing Girl figurine and the bust of the Priest King. No need to disrobe, for this is not a communal bath. The 200-capacity restaurant is al fresco and sits right in the middle of the courtyard of the 3102BCE resort in Vagator.
Ishaan Bhutoria, 26, who launched the place in April, studied hotel management at Les Roches, Switzerland, and was keen on the ancient-India theme. “We want guests to savour delicacies from the far corners of our age-old civilisation,” he says. The menu covers Bihari, Bengali and Rajasthani favourites for now. He’s hoping to develop and present rare preparations from these regions soon.
And where else would he do this but Goa, which hosts tourists from across India. “The appreciation from the sheer variety of people you get to receive is the best part of the state,” he says.
Goa Jazz Academy Riffing on an old tune
{{/usCountry}}And where else would he do this but Goa, which hosts tourists from across India. “The appreciation from the sheer variety of people you get to receive is the best part of the state,” he says.
Goa Jazz Academy Riffing on an old tune
{{/usCountry}}Who says you can’t pick up a musical instrument in your 30s? Or 40s, or 50s? Goa Jazz Academy in Guirim pulls every trick in the book to make it happen. Students enrol for online classes from any part of the world. and attend live classes at the school when they can make it.
Founder Karan Khosla, 40, picked up the guitar later than usual too: He was 32. But all through his career in private investment and as a management consultant in Delhi, his love for music stayed put. He was fascinated by jazz guitarists and their jams. “But it always seemed unattainable,” he recalls. He honed his skills via online classes with legendary jazz guitarists and educators, Matt Warnock and Jonathan Kreisberg. “It was thanks to both the jobs that I was able to afford getting a music education,” he says. “At one point, more than half my paycheque went into lesson fees.”
Kholsa and his wife Divya, moved to Goa in 2017 and knew there was an opportunity for adults to learn music without making compromises or huge sacrifices. The academy opened in 2018 with Khosla giving private lessons in a small room, as their baby cried next door. They now have 200 students from across India and 10 faculty members.
Goa is just the place for this experiment to work. There’s respect for music and “Goa is a great place to be entrepreneurial; no idea is too small,” Khosla says. He plans to release his own music this year, and is launching a one-year distance-learning programme for musicians looking to upgrade their skills.
Aal’s Kitchen North-east by the coast
Aal, aka Alistair Lethorn, was cooking homestyle food from his hometown, Dimapur, for his friends in Mumbai one weekend in 2017, when the idea struck. The IT professional had set up a kitchen in Delhi the previous decade, but had given it up. Watching friends polish off his smoked chicken and pork anishi made him realise he was happiest while he was cooking.
A series of pop-ups followed. “I wanted to popularise the food, because there aren’t too many places serving the cuisine and few people outside of North East even know what it is like,” says Lethorn, 39. At the music festivals, suburban restaurants and smaller hotels where he’d set up, the food would routinely run out. Might something permanent work down the coast?
Goa, it turned out, was even more appreciative. “It is more accepting than other places, and more people are open to trying new things,” he says of his restaurant in Vagator, which opened in May. Sourcing axone, bamboo shoot, michinga, tenga powder, king chillies, local chillis, fermented fish, and anishi is still a task, though. The state has only one store selling North-Eastern ingredients and it’s in Calangute; he gets his ingredients couriered in from Nagaland.
Meanwhile, he’s keen for even more people to sample his cuisine. There have been pop-ups in Bangalore, Kolkata and Meghalaya. But Goa is the centre of the action. “We have regular customers already,” Lethorn says. “Goa has been kind to me.”