On the road in India
charukesi January 2nd, 2006
The travel back to Vishakapatnam for my return flight to Bombay was exciting - not the drive itself, but for the many mild adventures it presented… The first one hour was through crowded villages struggling to be small towns, much like small children wanting to grow up quickly and immediately; people out in their Sunday best, the narrow roads where life and commerce were thriving despite the traffic, the glare of basic and bright colours… the heady smell of Sunday excitement and shopping everywhere, even in the narrow lanes…
The rest of the journey was on a excellent four lane high-way, except that people there seemed to hold extremely liberal views - to them, there appeared to be no right side and wrong side of the road… At any point on the road, there were tractors and trucks looming on to us from ahead… As for lanes, the very concept did not exist in the minds of the thousands who use the highway everyday; bicycle riders and scooterists - what were they doing on a highway in any case - merrily inched their way ahead on the extreme right lane, and glared at us when our driver honked them out of their wits and the lane…
We did not stop at Dolphin Dhaba, which had neither dolphins frolicking on show, nor a typically pungent dhaba atmosphere. Instead, our driver followed the norm there and crossed the road - on a state highway, mind you - to Krishna Bhavan Udipi Hotel on the other side. KBUH incidentally offered customers lodging and bodging facilities; we duly bodged there on coffee and vadas and continued on to Vizag.
At the intersection of Tuni and the Vizag highway is a sign in red that is as imperious as it is sudden; it says STOP in bold letters. Stop and what, please? And why STOP in the middle of a highway? Further ahead was an even more intriguing sign that said, GIVE WAY. If you have visions of drivers politely giving way to each other, banish them; the entire journey was one long cacophonic medley of horns. Sometimes sharp and staccao and at others, one long ceaseless hoot; hard to say which is more grating on the nerves…
Thinking about it, such a drive is not an unusual thing in India; national highways run through villages, children run in front of your car and bicycles meander and wobble dangerously. Bullock carts and tractors appear suddenly out of nowhere in front of your car and state buses try to run you off the road, as they breathe down your neck menacingly.
The entertainment for the entire journey is often an orchestra of blaring horns and colourful curses in local languages. There are numerous Krishna Bhavan type Udipi hotels dotted across the country, in the north these are substituted by dhabas; all of them offering customesr bodging and more…
Then the inscrutable and confusing road signs, cows and even bulls gazing placidly at you unaware of the chaos they are causing, decorated trucks bearing messages including the evergreen buri nazar waley tera muh kaala. And if happen to be unlucky enough to pass through small towns (where there is no “bypass” available), then market scenes and choc-a-bloc traffic assailing your senses; young girls selling plasticware, old women selling jasmine and kankambaram, young men selling glass bangles, old men selling coloured powder, and all this on both sides of an already narrow road…
Road journeys in India can be full of surprises, even shocks; never predictable, never boring… Who can say what the bend in the road holds… (picture taken on the way from Bangalore to Hogenanakkal flls - when we got lost, as a matter of fact - also my icon on flickr)…
Charu,
Running a four lane highway through villages is criminal;are they not aware of thay at the Public woks administration.BTW what is the speed limit are supposed not to exceed in such highways.I believe it is high time they start teaching kids the rules of the road if we want responsible drivers in the future
Hi Charu
I wondering what “bodging” would be?
We traveled a bit on the road in Kerala and in Karnataka and many of them were in very poor shape. I noticed that drivers in India are not comfortable driving fast. Motorcycles putt along at 30 kph when they could easily go faster. But, of course, driving fast is dangerous in India because of the way cars and motorcycles just weave in and out and between other cars.
Hi Charu
Even though the word doesn’t exist, I get the strange feeling that ‘bodging’ could stand for some immoral, illegal or fattening activity, but that’s just me. Great post, btw.
And I was surprised you couldn’t recognise numchuck (methinks it is a corruption of nin-chaku, which Bruce Lee used so effectively to fell his enemies). I’m sure more men would recognise the word than women because they watch martial arts movies. Men are from Mars, you know.
Pardeshi, there *are* no rules of the road in India. period. adults dont know it themselves to teach their kids…
as for national highways, I have been on enough of them that pass through villages, the Chenni Bangalore stretch for instance…
Michael, am surprised you are saying that in India drivers are not comfortable traveeling fast.. wonder why. never thought so myself…
as for bodging, I think it is just that the poor guy spelt boarding wrong - these hotel signs usually say “lodging and boarding” - I know this was just a mistake (or ignorance on the part of the owner) because I saw a smaller hand painted sign board just at the entrance of the hotel saying “lodging and boarding” - these are places where the ground floor is a resturant and there are rooms for rent at the top floors…
Ram, oops no, I just think bodging was boarding spelt wrong - way wrong but just that and not connoting anything illegal or exciting!
and numchuck? no way would I know a word like numchuck
Hi Charu,
I was surfing some blogs and came across your site.Just Saw your posting about the road journey in India.
Not trying to be rude, but I wonder why people like you always want to take pleasure by projecting the dark sides of India. Everyone knows that it is BAD.Remember you also used to drive the same way before coming to US.Suddenly those things are looking funny to you.I don’t know why.Before coming to US have you ever had a vision about the advantage of driving rules
and all.
How can you expect people to follow rules when there doesn’t exist any rules at all (supposed to be set up by the govt)
Unfortunately most of the Indians like you always think that it is not related to me and I am here only for taking the pictures,blog and increase my hits. No one can save India as long as there are people like you.
You better not visit India again.People are already poor there.Dont make them more poor by spreading things like this.If you are really concerned about them try to do something,atleast a letter to the local govt officer there or prepare a website or CDs for ‘traffic rules
awarness’.
-Kumar
Kumar, ouch! you have discovered my hidden identity - the lordess of the dark side - forever projecting the dark side of everything… I promise to try to not make people more poor than they are (except I didn’t quite understand how and when exactly I was doing this). Given that, mind you, I can only try - am not promising anything more.
I also promise that I will not take pictures in future, blog and increase my hits. However, if my blog hits get increased any other way, I am not responsible.
And finally I promise - this time sincerely - that I have never been to the US, I live in India and do not drive at all.
Thanks..you didn’t take me wrong.
.. I’ll continue reading ur blog..
I was reading some blogs written by some foreign tourists who were describing their visits by making fun of the indian road conditions.I thought you were also doing the same thing and u live in US.Other than that post,your blog looks interesting
take care..
-Kumar
[…] While on the road in India, Charu tries to understand the why’s of banned items for passengers in hand baggage, Amit has learnt an interesting way of punctuating his sentances, Uma has me drooling for dosai’s. […]
Hey, Kumar, I live in the US and I’ve been to India and when I describe my visit I talk about the negative as well as the positive http://chittahchattah.blogspot.com/2006/03/further-on-our-asia-trip.html
If you don’t like it, don’t read it.