Actually it was more of a shart. And I was wearing my bathing suit, not pants. But you get the idea.

Sharting in my bathing suit was one of the initial indicators of just how ill I was from eating a “veg burger” at a disreputable restaurant on the beach in Palolem. The other indicators were massive amounts of watery diarrhea, nausea, constant pain in my abdomen, zero appetite, and extreme weakness. This went on for three days (basically rendering me useless for the second half of our stay in Palolem) before I decided to go on antibiotics.

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The antibiotics kicked in and by day four I was feeling pretty darn good. That was the same day that Maren and I left Palolem and headed two hours north to Panjim, the capital of Goa. By the time we arrived, my appetite had returned and we went for lunch at a restaurant called Viva Panjim that came highly recommended on Trip Advisor as well as Lonely Planet. I dove right in to the vegetarian caldinha and xacuti as soon as the waiter set it on the table. It was indeed delicious. Some of the best food we have eaten so far.

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After lunch, I felt tired but not sick so we did a little exploring of the neighborhood before retiring to our room for an afternoon siesta.

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For dinner, I did some more research online and found a restaurant called the Ritz Classic, which people reviewed as a “must do” on Trip Advisor. Maren and I shared an appetizer and two main dishes there.  The food was decent, but I starting feeling bad about 10 minutes after we left the restaurant.

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That night the sickness returned with a vengeance. (Although I’m still not certain if it was the same illness returning or an unfortunate case of food poisoning, even though Maren remained unaffected). The symptoms were the same except throw in a few sessions of vomiting into the trash can while also busy on the crapper. “Double-bucketing” is what that’s called. And that was my night. All night.

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The next day was my birthday and I spent the whole day in the bed/bathroom except for a quick trip to the pharmacy to purchase electrolyte packets and probiotics. I felt ROUGH. I wondered why India hated me and I questioned if maybe I also hated India, a country I’ve been trying hard to love.

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So, I doubled up on my antibiotics, drank tons of water, and rested, and by the following day I was feeling decent. Decent turned into pretty good, and pretty good turned into very good. That was yesterday. Today I’m feeling healthy and ready to tackle India again. Let’s do this thing.