Ride for us, race for them !!

Whenever I get down from a bus, I always pray to find a city bus. The reason being my childhood aversion from public transport, like city vans and tempos. Why I hate them, it’s not hard to guess. They are always overloaded and the situation inside these vans are like a third degree torture to war slaves. Often there are 5 people sitting on the seat where at most 3 can park and both the conductor and driver, if by some mean they can, are willing to place more people.

Many a times in emergency people had to stand between the spaces, some of them are drunk so the condition became further worse. Suffocation almost kills you and you just wish to jump from the moving van so that you can grasp some fresh air. Guess, its better to die from wounds than lack of air. Long before when I avoided public transport I often used to think that they must have some phenomenon of extra dimensions in these vans as almost triple the amount of people are sitting at a time on a van and sometimes the figure rise exponentially. 2 people escape and 10 more get in. I had once traveled when the gear rod was between my both legs and I had to concentrate more than the driver to protect myself from a life threatening accident.

So this time too I didn’t get a city bus and I had to travel in a city van. I was daunted by the fact that I was the first one to get in. It means I may have to wait for more than half an hours if it didn’t get full completely. By full I mean 3 people along with the driver, 4 people on both seats and a conductor hanging on the gate and crying for money. I began to panic when only 3 people come after 5 minutes.

Just then I had started to analyze the driver and for the first time I started viewing things from his point of view. He was panicked and unstable. He was wandering around his van, calling loudly for the passengers. His eyes were in horror. Horror of other drivers, horror of impatient passengers, horror of city buses and horror of remaining behind in this everlasting race for survival. A race, which uses your blood as a fuel and it is converted into lots of sweatand little money.

He started the van with only 5 passengers in it and I was baffled. Baffled by his decision and baffled by my own inner paradox of thoughts. I always imagined this situation and rated it as impossible, sitting comfortably in a city van. But now here I was, sitting with as much space as 3 people use usually but I wasn’t happy. I was sympathetic towards the fellow whose eyes were still rolling 360 at the road to find another passenger. But he didn’t get any more. I just got down, finished my work and coming back to stand again sat in an overloaded van, suffocating, perspiring and abusing the van driver and thinking “ kash agle stop par sab utar jaye “ !!