Life in a traffic Jam.

Anarchy, Chaos, Siege. Not words usually used when you come out on the streets in the benign country of India, but today I discovered that they should be.

According to the exalted intelligence of my great city's town planners, one of the arterial roads in my area needs to be closed for about a couple of months. So, they shut it down.

With little information to the hapless motorists used to their routes for the last so many years, suddenly the route to work was infinitely more interesting (to me) and annoying. Lefts that were routinely free disappeared like a pimple on Ash's face in the glossies.

Now nobody knew what the roads held for them next. In like fashion all the chauffeurs decided to take a turn right in the middle of the road to find an alternate route that they thought existed. But little did they know. Suddenly the men in white armed with whistles and an ugly countenance, pounced upon these motorists to re direct them to the lock jam. All pleas about the all important meeting, the pregnant dog and dying great aunt were summarily dismissed without so much as an hear.

Soon, a great river of cars had formed. With little islands of calm in between where a paan chewing man would proudly survey the line formed behind his one puny little palm. This was the man, the lines of whose palm controlled the destiny of the rich and the poor alike. The man in the Mercedes to the man in the bus, both brought together in a manner our ministers only aspire to.

With strings of invective flowing all around, suddenly people realised the whole futility of all this. With forbearance only Indians and especially the ever suffering Mumbaikars can achieve, they got out their cell phones, rescheduled the meetings and got to discussing the match the Indian team had miraculously saved. While I got off the bus to trudge to the station.

All hail the Mumbaikar!

V