The law of averages is tough on you at times. Just when you're cruising, happy about the fact that it's been calm the last six months (touchwood), it dictates that you're in for a day of close misses. It also suggests that there are some creatures lurking around the corner.
A big wide road, first out of the signal. Happy and cruising like an eagle. I see a pedestrian walk across the road. Normally, it isn't anything to be worried about. Unfortunately, it turned out to be a lady dressed in pink. You see, men always have a sense of fright while crossing the roads; because most of the people driving are men, and a majority of them are straight. I've observed that there's a difference between men and women in how they cross the road.
Sometimes, the women are a godsend. They're the smart ones, who look the right way while crossing the road, and maintain eye contact with oncoming vehicles. Then, there are the ones who're too scared, they're okay most of the times. They think twice before crossing across an old scooter; which means that it's unlikely that they'll try their luck.
It is their lucky day though, because I'm in the saddle. Unfortunately, it wasn't one of them either. This one was dreaming, and almost doing the Paris fashion week walk, expecting everyone to stop on a 3 lane road, when the signal's just gone green. The worst part was when she realized it wasn't working and froze in front of me and then walked across with an air of pride. Yes, you can read that again. As unbelievable as that sounds, she did continue walking across. I braked a bit, and had to swerve to the right; narrowly missing another chap. Surprisingly, there were no Hyderabadi expletives being yelled at me. I guess he just felt sorry for me. And it wasn't an easy miss, trust me.
The next one involved a bond impersonator in a not-so-swift Swift. He wanted to overtake a slow moving truck on a flyover. I can imagine this happening after 12 midnight, when the traffic's thin; I think it's a high risk at all times, and use that overtaking maneuver sparingly. The flyover is one and a half laned on either side. I wonder how he wanted to get a car through a 3 foot gap (to the left of the truck); and it didn't look like he was casually snaking around. This was a serious, "will it go through?", try. Five repetitive, exponentially increasing horn lengths later, I went through. The last time I saw this happen was in a Bond movie, and they goofed up in that case too.
Observation and experience tells me that of all the things on the roads in my country, Buffaloes and BMWs are the easiest things to negotiate. Buffaloes are easy to go around. They seldom walk backwards, so you just have to swerve towards its rear. BMWs are mostly being driven around very carefully by chauffeurs, to an office or back home. I even saw a politician being driven around in a Jaguar XF.
And that is what pisses me off the most. No, not BMWs being chauffeur driven. Well, a little i guess; but not enough to get all worked up about. It's those politicians in green Jaguar XFs.
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03-15-2011, 05:24 AM
Of Buffaloes and BMWs
