Madam - one and a half please !

They leave you with a bitter taste; their money is hard earn (Khoon-paise-ki-kamayee), ours is all lottery business; they harass; they are unsafe; and they are broad day light robbers!! Yes, it’s the very famous auto driver nuisance.

Since office moved, I don’t travel by car, and any extra traveling will be at the mercy of a stupid enough auto-driver. I caught up with my friend at The Forum Mall last evening, at around 8 ‘o’ clock, and we had to head to Shantinagar. I knew it wasn’t a good time for one (paranoid one) to be taking an auto. Having decided to go prepaid, we walked towards the Christ college entrance; the cop at the Prepaid counter recommended the other entrance. We walked there to find it shut! Got back to the front entrance, with an irritated expression well defined on our faces, and finally got a receipt – thirty bucks to Shantinagar. Isn’t prepaid just as pointless if they don’t let you pay up right there? We could foresee the excess fare menace now. By the time we approached Shantinagar, this dude starts off – “Madam this is not Shantinagar, this is Double Road”. And mind you, he was arrogant, very arrogant! This guy was totally bigheaded and argued till we showed him a big yellow board that read – ‘Shantinagar’. He couldn’t argue about it not being shantinagar anymore, but hell he could still argue, over just some random, arbit thing! We asked him to stop and when he did, we were in a lonely by lane. He said fifty bucks. We didn’t intend to pay any more than thirty.

It’s not about ten bucks but about the attitude and the unreceptive environment that these auto drivers create. They invariably have to ask for excess fare, all they care about is to over speed and dump you at your destination to catch the next fool. They harass the ones inside the auto and the ones driving outside. They are a big nuisance on the roads, and more often that not, an auto travel leaves me sick of the city!

I opened my wallet to find five hundred bucks and no change in it. No Choice! He was fuming, and could have ripped of our clothes any minute! I was well aware of where we were and frankly, I know a lot of people think its cowardly, but I knew that beyond a point, I wouldn’t argue. Of course, I wasn’t close to giving up yet. I asked for change, he gave four hundreds, then a fifty, and then of course – a ten. That’s it! We screamed and said he would have to pay us back, else we would complain. The moment I began to take notice of the number, he tried to run his auto over me while my friend still tried getting our money back! K A 0 2 A 4 7 5 1 sped off, leaving us with his damned registration number.

After all this, getting an auto from Shantinagar to Vijayanagar was a nightmare. We boarded at least three autos, with drivers being their nasty selves, demanding excess fares! Finally one decent auto driver came along and we got home that evening.

A year I won't forget...

The past year has forced me to stop, look back and reflect on what I’ve done right, what I’ve done wrong, and what I haven’t done at all! A year that started very well, took a really ugly turn and ended – I don’t know how. Most of last year, I was overwhelmed, with every little thing, and looking back makes me feel like in the grand scheme of things, this is after all a year that will just fade.

The New Year is probably the most well known celebration in the world. For people like me however, it’s just another day! No resolutions, no celebrations to mark the beginning of a New Year. But as the year ended, and I took a moment to reflect, I knew - If there is any year I would never forget in my life – then its 2007. The last year has transformed me, taught me lessons; sometimes I struggle to live with them, I fight to disprove them, but at the end of the day I hope to carry them with me wherever I go. I know I haven’t done anything like I did last year in all my life. It’s the first time that I didn’t keep in touch with anyone over months, the first time that people around me influenced my life to such an extent, The first time I accepted a whole lot of non-idealistic things, and of course the first time that I ended up talking to anyone and everyone who came my way, as a result of which first time there were shocking revelations of people. I had small achievements to help me sail through a rather tough year, and I had myself. All in all GREAT! No, I’m not being sarcastic. I was always lucky beyond belief, and its good if once in a while, your good luck stabs you in the back, and shakes out the cobwebs.

Looking forward to an ambitious year myself, here’s wishing everyone else a very happy year ahead!