Mysore (concluded)

Part 4. The Journey Home

I dare not sleep, as I intend to meet Death with eyes wide open. . .

---

Travelling along the roads outside Bangalore is quite an experience. The scenery can be serene and scenic, with intriguing rock formations and sugar cane fields that seem to stretch forever. The scenery can also be fairly depressing, as roadsides are often used as garbage dumps in the more populated areas. But no matter what one finds off the roads, driving these roads is always exciting. . .the adrenaline-pumping, white-knuckle kind of exciting.

---

If there exist any type of driving laws here I dare say that I have no idea what they might be. Travelling these roads seems to be Darwinian in the extreme. In the absence of formal driving laws, one might at least expect a set of informal ones: slower vehicles stay to the left (they drive on the left/British hand side of the roads over here), pass on the right, try to stay within one's own lane lines (they were put there for a reason, right?), etc. My expectations seem to be too high.

In the absence of formal and informal driving laws, one might at the very very least expect common sense to rear it's head at some point. It does not (or maybe it's a common sense that is indigenous to only this part of the world and thus one with which I am not familiar).

---

It was after 8pm before we started back to Bangalore: already dark. Driving on the roads here at night is quite an experience. There is all manner of vehicular traffic that attempts to share the road: bicycles, scooters, motorcycles, tractors, cars, vans, large trucks. Then there's the pedestrian traffic. They generally stay on the left shoulder. Generally. Tail lights are not common place, nor are brake lights or flashlights. There are no street lights. The painted lane line would lead one to believe this is a two lane road, but this road divider lane seems to be largely, if not entirely, ignored. Every vehicle is travelling at a different rate of speed, on a different part of the road. The driving pattern seems to consist of a somewhat random ordering of brake, horn, swerve left, step on the gas, swerve right.

There are no posted speed limits, fortunately most of the cars seem to be a little underpowered so speeds tend to top out at about 100 kph (60 mph). There are, however, a couple of speed regulation devices employed: the speed bump and the chicane. Speed bumps appear out of the night about every couple of kilometers. These reduce most vehicles to basically a full stop while the vehicles' shocks try to negotiate the single or sometimes triple bumps in the road. Most are marked; however, our driver is surprised a couple of times and by association we are too. Our seat belts save the roof from a head-sized dent or two. Chicanes appear along the more populated portions of the road, and appear as metal barriers staggered between the two lanes so one is forced to slow and navigate a figure s-shape. Problems arise when what was three-abreast traffic needs to be reduced to single file traffic to safely negotiate these chicanes. A working horn and the repeated application of said horn is most clearly the one indispensable piece of automobile safety equipment.

And then the piece de resistance arrives in the form of the monsoon rains, during which visibility is reduced to at most a few feet. The whole experience is intensified many fold. The real has become the surreal. Mere words are not adequate here. I can only refer you back to the top of this blog entry and the (seemingly over-dramatic) thought that popped into my mind around this point of the drive.

Luckily the rains this evening are relatively short in duration, if not in volume. We clip a scooter at a red light intersection on the outskirts of Bangalore, but no real damage is done. Our driver and it's driver exchange a few select words in Hindi; a translator is unnecessary. Yet for all the drama, we do survive and arrive back in Bangalore unscathed (at least physically).

But this must be said: for all the potential for absolute disaster out on the roads, there would seem to be very few serious accidents; a credit to the Indian drivers, the relatively subdued speeds, and to whichever Hindu god or goddess watches over travellers. I wonder what driving school is like over here, or if such a thing exists at all. Maybe the roads are the result of just throwing people into the proverbial deep end of the pool.

And with this the Mysore trip comes to an end. Although it's after midnight the adrenaline still pumping through my body makes sleep impossible for a couple more hours.

A chance to finally close my eyes, however.

I try hard not to think about the hornets' nest out on the balcony which has been steadily gaining in size the past couple of days. . .