So, I drive these days to my
office. Driving alone is such a boring activity, at least for me. That too, on
the same route daily. But not the same traffic. Traffic in terms of number of
vehicles can be less or more but on the scale of how many ‘horrible’ drivers
are there on the road, it’s either the same or increases every day. Yesterday I
was thinking, probably it’s a problem just with me.
I might be the only one who wants
to switch and come in the ‘correct’ lane much before the crossing. I might be
the only one who uses the indicator to check, confirm, inform and kind of ask
for permission from the vehicle coming behind me to change the lane rather than
randomly putting it on while I am recklessly cutting across that vehicle. I
might be the only one who is not honking the horn and restlessly jumping from
one lane to another wherever I find an inch of extra space, even if that means
to jump to right most lane, blocking the way for the people who have to turn
right when I have to actually take the left turn. I might be the only one who
don’t want to squeeze the right most lane vehicle when I can comfortably drive
in my lane. I might be the only one who prefers to apply the brakes and slow
down when some slow driving vehicle suddenly come in my lane instead of blindly
jumping in my right lane thinking that the idiotic fellow of that lane can
apply the brakes. My brakes are supposed to be used only in case of emergency.
Out of the 4 scratches that my
car have got in one year, 2 were gifted while my poor rampyaari was silently standing in the parking lot of my office,
while I was obviously breaking my head inside the air conditioned office. 1 was
when an auto rickshaw zipped across my way coming from nowhere and poor fellow
loosened his grip on the break exactly at the time when I sneezed. His auto
came backwards and gently kissed my car leaving behind a scar. Wow. That
rhymed. The 4th one hurts the most. I don’t have any clue of why I
decided to take a U-turn on a busy junction to get into the narrow by-lanes for
reaching my office when I had been going straight for good 3-4 months. But I
did that since my colleague told me the previous day that those by-lanes are
very smooth these days with no traffic. And the by-lane welcomed me with a
traffic jam. Spoke to my sister-in-law, listened to 10-15 songs on FM, had one
or two biscuits which I normally keep in my car, whatsapped in almost all my
active groups and one on one conversations. Finally I was fed up. I mean,
hardly a kilometer of a distance and I had been crawling on that stretch from
past 40 minutes. When I arrived at the final turn for my office, I see a big
car on its lane and an IDIOT biker boy with a girl trying to outsmart everyone
jumped ahead and blocked my way head-on, blocking the complete traffic. Only
way out was if he could politely go back from where he jumped. But that’s too
much for a man and biker boy’s ego. So, he stays and signals me to go ahead
since he has given me few inches by ‘adjusting’ his bike position. I knew that
I can’t go but by that time I had lost all my patience and zoomed in. That
first moment when his bike touched my car, I knew that I have got a scratch but
I didn’t stop. I made that biker boy yell and fear and cry for the stupidity
that he had done. That meant, my car and his bike, both getting a long scratch.
The moment I reached my office I realized that I should not have lost my
patience but what to do? I think that auto rickshaws and the bikes are like
water. They will fill in every empty space on the road whether that spot is
easily reachable or not.
Lot of my colleagues in my office
make fun of the speed with which I drive and boast about the maximum speed that
they have hit. I don’t want to die in a car crash. You have too much confidence
on your vehicle, other vehicles on the road and on God. I don’t. Big deal. I haven’t
been in any such emergency situation as yet which makes me accelerate at 130
km/hour speed. For them drive fast gives them a high. For me, it doesn’t.
I don’t understand one thing. Out
of 100 vehicles on the road, none or probably except 1-2, have any kind of emergency.
Then why are people so restless on the road? Why are they not patient enough to
drive in their lanes instead of cutting across like zip-zap? What will they
lose or rather what will they gain? They might probably reach their destination
10 minutes earlier. What kind of competition do they want to win? I have seen
many times that the cars will keep on honking their horns till you move aside.
Why? Can’t you see that there are other vehicles coming from behind and I
cannot move to left lane? Can’t you wait? How do you know that I don’t have to
take a right turn because of which I am in the lane where I am?
And when it comes to giving way
to an ambulance, all of us think that the other lane will make the way. In
fact, lot of time you can see lot of vehicles suddenly behind an ambulance
because they know that somehow people will give way to the ambulance and we too
can tag along. I mean, instead of tagging along from behind, come in front of
the ambulance and now honk your horns to help ambulance make its way through
the traffic. At least, get aside in case you don’t want to volunteer for that.
Not only the vehicles. People on
foot. Why can’t you see the signal and time when you should cross the road? Why
do you block half the road for the vehicles/side which have Green signal? Yes,
some signals are really long but that’s because they usually have heavy rush.
So on such signals, why do you want to cross when it’s a Green light for a
side? I often gasp of how people can be so careless on the road. It’s
impossible to have zero human error on the road or no accidents. That’s too
good a situation to ever happen. But only few things people need to keep in
their minds:
- There is no race. You are not supposed to drive ahead of every vehicle. No need to honk the horns and squeeze or crush other vehicles to make way for yourself
- You are not an ambulance or a police jeep driver. There is no emergency situation for you. Even if there is, better to keep calm. Else, you yourself are going to land up in the hospital’s emergency ward
- Learn why your vehicle have been given the horn, brakes and indicator. Seriously. And also that why your country has marked ‘lanes’ on the roads. The government is not that fond of painting that they would make different type of white or yellow lines on the black roads. They are there for a purpose.
- Always promise yourself that you will drive such that neither you die nor anyone else should get hurt because of your stupidity. It can lead to someone bedridden for life or even losing it
- There is absolutely no need to honk your horn the moment the signal turns green. For the car or bike ahead of you, it will take at least 2 seconds to put on the gear and accelerate. 2 seconds to move after a green signal does not mean that the driver is stupid or his/her vehicle has broken down. It’s absolutely normal
- There are many people who love you and rely on you. They may not scream out their love towards you or how important you are for them but be careful on road for their sake.
By the way, my husband in a way
confirmed that I am probably the only one who thinks that way – refer to the second paragraph. Scroll up
again!! But I am not ashamed of that. Sorry.
