"Live and Let Live" Driving Rules - India

I know, I know...I'm in Tanzania now.  My blog posts should include photos of lions in the savanna, local festivals and descriptions about the culture and customs I'm experiencing in Africa.  But...I wasn't done with India!  And my blog, my rules.  So people, you're just gonna have to deal...

Before I could let India go, I had to write about transportation.  If you've ever been to India, you know why.  I've done my fair share of traveling globally, but I've never quite experienced chaos like this before.  This title of this blog post was not something I made up. There are literally signs posted up around cities and in the countryside that remind people to "live and let live" while driving in India...which is exactly what it feels like as a passenger and spectator.  Here's how I would interpret "live and let live": do whatever you flip you please! and...try not to injure yourself or someone else while doing it.

My friend Jess lent me her book "Holy Cow" before I left the states.  Holy Cow is the story of one woman's experiences in India, and if you want to know anything about this country, just read the first 20 pages.  You will then know much of what I experienced during my trip.  And...Sarah MacDonald is a genius writer.  Her hilarity has me laughing out loud on a regular basis.  I strongly encourage you to read this book.

Sarah really paints the perfect picture of the transportation scene in India, so half out of laziness and half out of pure desire to share her words with you, here's the scene:

"we move to the deck to watch the roaring rough sea of traffic wildlife.  All around us a furious knot of men and metal constantly unravels and re-forms, ebbing and flowing and going nowhere fast.  Blokes - and a friend or two - perch atop tall, rusty bicycles.  Entire families share motorcycles; toddlers stand between dads' knees or clutch his back, and wives sit sidesaddle while snuggling babies.  Auto-rickshaws zip around like tin toys.  Ambassador cars - half Rolls-Royce and half Soviet tank - cruise with class.  Huge tinsel-decorated trucks rumble and groan, filthy lime-green buses fly around like kamikaze cans squeezing out a chunky sauce of arms and legs. Shoes dangle from back bumpers and black demonic faces poke out red tongues from windshields; these are for good luck.  But it's probably the holy mantra written on the backs of vehicles that keeps things moving.  It's not BABY ON BOARD, or JESUS SAVES, or TRIPLE M DOES DELHI.  Instead, hand-painted in swirling childish capital letters is: HORN PLEASE.

Everyone seems to drive with one finger on the horn and another shoved high up the nostril.  The highway soundtrack is a chaotic symphony of deep blasts, staccato honks, high-pitched beeps, musical notes and a weird duck drone.  It's as if Delhi is blind and driving by sound - except it seems many are deaf.  Women are curled up on the pavement sound asleep, and a man is stretched out on the median strip, dead to the danger. On the backs of bikes, on the laps of the motorcycle mums, babies are floppy with dreams.

(There is a) strict species pecking order:  pedestrians are on the bottom and run out of the way of everything, bicycles make way for cycle-rickshaws, which give way to auto-rickshaws, which stop for cars, which are subservient to trucks.  Buses stop for one thing and one thing only.  Not customers - they jump on while the buses are still moving.  The only thing that can stop a bus is the king of the road, the lord of the jungle and the  top dog.

The holy cow."

One thing Sarah fails to mention are the crazy hand signals.  While people are swerving in and out of lanes and around obstacles, they are motioning and directing traffic via hand signals out the window.  The "wave"...making a ripple with your hand, means slow down.  A "come here" motion with your hand means you're free to pass, and a palm to your face means the same thing it means everywhere in the world: STOP!

The ironic thing about the traffic scene in India?  I actually felt MORE safe as a passenger there than in the states.   Drivers are in high stress situations every minute they're on the road, and are constantly on guard.  I felt like we could have an accident at any moment, and the driver would be prepared to react correctly at all times.  I may, however, have felt differently if I had actually experienced a collision....