A little word about buses. An angry little word about the horrible buses here.

7/19/07
Buses cut down on the congestion in Mumbai in two main ways. One, they move people around the city, reducing the need for cars, and, hence, cutting down on traffic. Two, they intentionally and maliciously try to cut down members of the human race in their prime by trying to pick them off in small groups as they walk down the road.
As I was walking home yesterday a bus almost hit me straight on. Now, this would be fair if I had been staggering around the street or dodging unpredictably, in and out traffic, but what I was doing was walking along the side of the street, where most pedestrians walk. Then, as I went along in my pedestrian way, I looked up and suddenly I saw a bus veering in my direction. I couldn’t believe how baldly dangerous the driving was. I had to leap sideways to avoid the bus. As I moved, the wind and vibrations from the bus swept over me. The side of the bus slid by inches away, leaving me with visions of my mortality. Then it stopped and let some people on and off, so I guess it had been aiming at a bus stop, not at me. I was just between it and the bus stop, as one might be between a mother grizzly and her cub, or between an ice cliff and an avalanche of snow. So maybe the ineptitude of the bus driving is just another force of nature.
Then, later the same evening, I walked down the alley near my house to try a new restaurant. At the end of the alley is the intersection of my alley, another alley, and a larger road. I had to cross the other alley, but there was a lot of traffic, so I waited for a break in the flow so I could cross. As I waited, a bus came roaring down the alley towards me, and turned onto the road I was waiting beside and would have killed me and a few other people waiting there if we hadn’t jumped backwards into a ditch. It literally drove over the ground where my feet had been seconds earlier. I was staggered- it cannot be that they are actually trying to kill me, can it?
Then, this evening, I saw an elderly woman, who well out of the way of most other traffic, have to jump back to avoid being hit by a bus. (Good thing she was quicker than she looked. Fooled that driver!) So at least I can be pretty sure that it isn’t just me the bus drivers are trying to get. It is just everyone in Mumbai who walks anywhere. Hmmmm. So I guess if they discourage walking, then more people will have to ride the buses, and that is a little more job security for the drivers. Nice.
If I ever meet a bus driver I am going to kick the shit out of him.

Since I am expanding along this theme, the taxi driver who drove me from the airport to my apartment deserves a mention. I should probably state, in the interest of full disclosure, that I have not yet made my peace with the universe. I am not ready to die. There are things, many things, that I would like to do before I pass on (for one, I want to shake a Mumbai bus driver so hard his nose bleeds).
The taxi driver who drove me from the airport has, on the other hand, made his peace with the world. A more benign presence I have not met, at least not recently. This is a man who should be in charge of a religious movement, not driving around in some crummy old taxi, because faith like this deserves an audience.
When I arrived, I came out of the airport to solid humidity and my boss, who was kind enough to meet me at the airport. He got a prepaid cab (costs a little more than the meter, but at least you go the most direct route.). We stowed my stuff in the ancient trunk of the ancient vehicle, which, being ancient, wouldn’t latch shut. So, we pulled the door of the trunk over my bags and hoped we wouldn’t go over any bumps, and got in.
We left the airport, and I was a little shell shocked, but feeling, overall, ok. We drove down a divided road for a while, passing encampments, stores, traffic jams. Eventually we got onto the highway. We went along uneventfully for a while, but then the driver missed the exit that my boss had wanted him to take. Some small discussion ensued, resulting in this taxi driver obligingly stopping the car on the highway, smiling and nodding pleasantly at everyone in the cab, and then calmly and smilingly shifting into reverse, and, clearly serene in the knowledge that he was doing the right and proper thing, backing several car lengths up the highway, towards oncoming traffic, so that he could take the exit he wanted. This man, who is not afraid of death, backed up on the highway. With absolutely no fear or anxiety evident anywhere.
I mean, really, we could have just taken the long way, because once we started talking about it, we had already missed the exit. Missed it. Means we went to far, have to go some other way. Not going to be able to go that way.
Oh, . . . no? Turns out not. We’ll just drive backwards on the highway for a while, no problem. The man had on the biggest, happiest smile, like it was painted on. The kind of smile you might see on the happy face of the happy/sad drama masks. Big, absolute, and weirdly vacant.
At least I was safe in my seatbelt, while we were zooming backwards along the highway. My seatbelt, which I have read is mandatory in Mumbai, safe around my corporeal being. Oh, no, wait. Seat what? But I do have a solid headrest behind me to protect my neck in case of an accident. Ha ha. At least all the drivers in Mumbai are really safe and considerate. They really don’t speed up and brake centimeters from the car in front of them, like they are all playing some huge, psychotic game of almost-bumper car.
While I am on the subject, lanes, too, are more of a guideline than a rule. The driving is very organic, the cars are like cells through a bloodstream, rather than like, well, cars in lanes.
The honking also takes some getting used to. I am from Polite Seattle, where it is almost gauche to honk at someone in traffic. I once sat at a light, distracted by some construction or something going on, through its entire cycle: red green, yellow, red. It wasn’t until the second green that anyone honked. Granted, that is an extreme case, but here they honk while sitting at red lights. Just cause they want to go now. Or don’t like that there is a big truck in front of their car. Or maybe cause they don’t like the flow of traffic and want to go faster. Or because you are walking along the side of the lane. Or because they are going over a pothole. The honking is constant. It makes me feel like humans and dogs have a lot in common. Here’s what I mean: Gary Larson drew a great comic in which he pictured a guy who had invented this device for translating dog language. Turns out they are all saying “Hey!” “Hey, hey!!!” “Heeey!” “Hey, heyhey, hey!” “Hey!” I think that people might have a need to do that too. I guess I am too close to American culture to see what we do, but around here it is “Honk honk/ Hey hey!” “Honk, honk HONK/ Hey, hey HEY!” “Honk/ Hey!!”

Um, later in the evening- I forgot how scary I think cockroaches are. Especially when they are longer than 3 inches. Oh god. I was all alone, and I had to kill it, because no way was I sleeping in this room with that thing crawling around. At least it didn’t start flying. The only evasive action it took was skittering quickly. Ugh, that was so awful.

Soon I will talk about stuff I like.