Ingo's Night Market in Arpora, Goa
In 1999 the first night market started up in Arpora and was initially quite a low-key affair, the kind of event where the Western stall holders could drink a few beers and catch up with the latest gossip. It was only for artisans and with a bit of live music, it made for a pleasant Saturday night.
The European management argued though and one of them, a German called Ingo, split to form his own market further back in Arpora and allowed anyone who could pay his prices to come and set up shop. Now the night market is massive. There are hundreds and hundreds of stalls and thousands and thousands of people passing through, eating and drinking, enjoying the live shows and spending lots of money.
There’s something quite surreal about seeing something so well organised in India, a country where chaos and inefficiency are the order of the day. Everyone puts it down to German management and Ingo has in truth pulled off something of a miracle. People have a great time, the merchants make a load of money and it’s a cool social scene, loud and garish though it can get at times.
Merchants are now required to pay a hefty amount of cash up front to reserve their places for the season and it’s firmly established on the tourist agenda that Saturday night means Ingo’s. Whether it will continue to flourish is another question – nothing winds the Goans up more than foreigners coming and making a go of things. They soon wonder if they couldn’t be making all the money themselves.
Of course the first thing that would happen under the average Goan management is that they would try to pay the performers in lemon sodas, overcharge for stalls and forget who had been allotted which pitch. In short, the whole thing would probably generate into the kind of nightmare that is the Wednesday flea market.
Let’s hope Ingo continues to be able to pay off the cops to allow the night market to keep going.