As I mentioned quite awhile ago, I no longer walk along the main road to get to my language class. There is a back way that someone showed me which is much more pleasant. Less traffic, less dusty, less dirty, less smelly. Usually...
Well, yesterday and today there was so much traffic that I got stuck, even though I was walking. I have no idea why it happened today, but I do know that yesterday there was a transportation bandh along the main road, which meant that no vehicles could travel on it, and so they all took the smaller back roads. I have never seen anything other than a few motorbikes and the occasional car on those back roads, but yesterday and today there were also buses, taxis, and autorickshaws. The bandh yesterday was called by a bunch of college students to protest the increasing fuel costs. I think I have already mentioned the fuel shortage here. That continues, and the other day the government announced that they would be hiking fuel costs. Which they really need to do. Apparently, they have been selling the fuel for LESS than what they have paid to buy it from India. And then they wonder why they can't pay India for the fuel. And THEN they wonder why India stops sending them fuel and we have a shortage here!
So in protest for the (necessary, in my opinion) increase in fuel prices, the students have called a strike. Which means that the anything or anyone who relies on transportation to get to work is stuck, and thus, the economy is injured again. Pretty typical of the way things run around here...lots of very short-term solutions that only make things worse in the long run!
Anyways, as I was saying, all the vehicles decided to take the back road. The road is very narrow...not wide enough in most places for 2 vehicles to be side-by-side. But they still tried! And of course, in the midst of that, the motorbikes were still trying to squeeze through the little space they had. Everyone was honking at everyone else, thinking that it would help (or maybe just to vent their frustration). In places where there was more space but things were at a standstill, some people had actually gotten out of their cars and were just standing outside, since they couldn't move anywhere. It was quite a sight! Yesterday I was already running late for class. And at a certain point, I came upon a crowd of pedestrians, all stuck behind this traffic jam. There wasn't even enough space to walk past it! (Did I mention there are no sidewalks?) So we stood there for awhile, wondering what to do. Then I looked and thought that maybe, just maybe, if I took my backpack off and sucked in my stomach, I could squeeze between the car and the stone wall...and just hope that the car didn't move and roll over my toes in the process. So off I went, and I did succeed. A few steps later there was another car to squeeze past. I continued in this way for awhile, and eventually there was more space for me to walk. I made it to class only 10 minutes late.
I took this photo after I had arrived at my language class, from the balcony. This is not the road I got stuck on, but it looks very similar...narrow, with walls on either side. Picture this photo, but with the row of cars closer to the wall, and with an extra "lane" of cars trying to go in the other direction (and keep the motorbikes in the picture, and add a bunch of pedestrians and some bikes...and hey, while you're at it, a few cows here and there), and maybe you'll understand why it doesn't work very well!
