Years of experience on the streets of Rome, a good amount of Southern Italian blood and one more than 70 hours spent on the rickshaw in the last 7 days all came up together yesterday when team Trukke Trukke cut Kolkata (15 mln people) from west to east in less than 30 minutes! We have finally left the Orissa and the NH5 highway behind and we are now in West Bengal driving up north on the NH 34 toward Siliguri.
If possible this road is even more dangerous than the highway. There are only two lanes going in opposite directions which by itself shouldn't be a problem if it wasn't for the unwritten Indian traffic rules. As the rickshaw is basically at the very bottom of the road food chain, bigger vehicles such as trucks don't really consider us as a factor in their overtaking decision making process. So, when they do overtake the only option left is to throw the rickshaw offroad on the narrow strip of land between the road and the trees (or the rice fields).
Just to make things even more complicated the horn of the Trukke Trukke does not work anymore. Not a big deal if you are in London or in Rome (unless it is June 2001 and you want to celebrate the Trukke Trukke...) but here in India the correct and shameless use of the horn really makes the difference between life and death! Fortunately we got the two bicycle air horns attached on the rickshaw and whoever is not driving is now in charge of using them, carefully coordinating with the driver. What a relaxing way of driving around...
We do now blend so well with the local rickshaws that today an old guy jumped on our rickshaw thinking it was a "cab" only to then jump out immediately very confused, when he realised who was driving it.
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You ought to pretend to be a taxi service. Shout "taxi taxi" at people and see what happens.
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