We decided to have a late lunch as our main meal for the day, and then catch the bus back to Colva. Our India guidebook recommended Longuinhos; a virtual institution in Margao, and the kind of place where the locals drop in once a day, sitting at their favorite tables and always ordering their favorite dishes – you can just tell they’ve been doing it for years. I fell in love with the place from the minute we walked in the door. Something about it makes you instantly feel that you’re in old Havana, or maybe Coral Gables, or Miami, the way it used to be in the ‘60s. Maybe it’s the fact that the waiters still wear those slightly-seedy-looking, faintly crumpled, European white waiters’ jackets that they used to wear in restaurants that were considered a cut above in the old days. The clientele ranges from the young and with-it, cell phones in hand, to business executives, to old men nursing their third whisky and soda, to tourists, to students with notebooks, to groups of chic women having luncheon, to above-average-income families enjoying each other’s company.
The place suggests a sense of history and antiqueness without even trying – an aura of having seen better days that will never come again, but still bearing a certain worn nobility. The menus have also seen better days, and look as if they’ve been around at least a decade.
The first thing to catch your eye when you walk in are the three huge, old-fashioned mirrors. They’re framed in beautiful, dark teakwood, and look exactly like the heavy, dark furniture found in old homes in Portugal. What makes these mirrors unique (and even a bit creepy-looking) are the carved, wooden hands that mysteriously hold them up (see picture). They are truly unique, and I’d just love to own one! There are also some sort of old, black, cast-iron implements hanging on one wall, which looked to me to possibly be molds, perhaps for Portuguese egg puddings.
To your immediate left as you walk in the door, sits the cashier’s desk with an old cash register. Behind it on the wall hangs a very faded, blown-up photograph of one of the previous owners, framed and garlanded. Seated behind the desk and under the photo sits a heavy-set gentleman who looks remarkably like the man in the picture – probably his son, grandson or great-grandson. Next to the cashier was a glass case which was fairly empty, except for some slices of bebinca, a couple egg custards, and some gelatinous coconut puddings. On the left wall of the restaurant is a wooden bar with a little roof over it, dispensing the obviously popular whisky and soda, along with other cold drinks. The bartender, however, did not mix the drinks – that was the job of the waiters, interestingly. The bartender merely removed bottles from the shelf, or from the fridge, set them on the bar, and the waiters mixed them and took them to the tables.
After walking around Margao all afternoon, I decided to check out the Ladies’ Room. Unfortunately, there had been a city-wide water shortage for the past 10 days, so the toilets were “out of order” (which the odor quickly confirmed). However, I was glad I checked it out, because it was amusingly quaint. There was a swinging, stained-glass door leading into the Ladies’ area, like the “saloon” swinging doors in old Western movies. Above the door of both the Ladies’ and the Gents’ were heads that were gender specific, that reminded me of the figureheads that used to be fashioned onto the bows of old sailing vessels. Just the heads. They were painted, but very chipped and peeling.
The waiters in Longuinhos were not at all similar to the sweet, chatty boys who work in the restaurants on the beaches. Rather, they were older men, almost to the man, and a little bit aloof and impatient. They also looked very Portugese; one or two of them, in fact, were so white that they looked as if they had just stepped off the boat. The extensive menu, too, contained more Portuguese selections than most, or, I should say, many typical Goan specialties. It was heavy on the fish curries, and there was also a fish vindaloo.
The ceiling was very high, with old-fashioned moldings; the walls painted white, and a few columns standing between the scattered tables. At the far end of the room was a very odd-looking, very ancient-looking set of wooden stairs that wound up out of sight and looked for all the world like the kind of stairs one would see in an old sailing ship. They led to an even stranger-looking room above, that projected out above the dining area at a quirky angle; almost crooked. A stained-glass window would have looked down into the main restaurant, had it been opened, but it looked as if it hadn’t been opened in years. Right in the middle of the stairs, someone had placed a tray with dishes piled on it; obviously as an indication that the stairs were not to be climbed (they were so old, they may have been unsafe?).
Being of a romantic nature, my curiosity was piqued, to say the least. I just HAD to find out what was in the strange little room up there – it looked so enticing. Rooms that are closed off have always intrigued me enormously. So, after our lunch, I sauntered over to the bottom of the steps, and looked up to see whether I could get a peek. A waiter saw me poking around, and asked me where I was going, and I told him I was curious about what was up there. His English wasn’t very good, but he asked me if I’d like to take a look. Would I!! He removed the tray, and we wound our way up the extremely narrow stairs, emerging in one of the oddest rooms I had ever seen. It was quite small, and the ceiling was several heights: low, lower and lowest. At the lowest section, even I, who only stand 5 ft. 3 & a half in., had to hunch down quiet a ways. The walls were a mixture of wood, and plaster painted a muted orange, and a mildew-y smell pervaded. The room only held a few tables, and an eerie light shone in through the large panes of stained glass window from the restaurant below. I really felt as if I were standing in the small captain’s quarters of an ancient clipper ship or, more likely, one of those old, creaking little corks that sailed to the New World in 1492. Actually, I asked the waiter when this room had been built, and unfortunately, I’ve forgotten the exact date he quoted me, but it was around 1853. He also told me that it’s now just used for special parties. It probably belongs in a museum.
Well, as you can imagine, that experience made my day. It was my little trip back into history that will remain with me all my life. But there is one thing more that will remain with me about Goa, and it has nothing to do with the Portuguese heritage.