Indian roads
Feb. 4th, 2006 01:49 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rhyllFirst off: Giagia and papou will you please reassure me that everything is going well. I haven't heard from you for a while and I'm fretting. (Don't you love me?)
Since I've spent most of the last couple of days reading and transcribing, most of this post is about
At first glance, you might think that Indian roads are crazy merely because everyone drives like they are completely insane, with no regard for lane discipline, speed limits, traffic lights, or human life. However, once you've had time to get used to the roads and can pay attention to something other than self-preservation, it becomes clear that Indian roads have whole new levels of excitement to offer.
For a start, there are the one way streets that make navigating Bangalore an incredibly convoluted businesses. A small distance from place A to place B on the map will frequently take in place C, D, E, and X in reality, even if you somehow manage not to get lost along the way. For additional excitement, one-way streets change frequently, with notice being given in the local paper. This does not seem like a particularly efficient way to do things. Then, if traffic going one way on a busy road builds up enough, it will quite frequently just take over both of lanes.
Mind you, this is not so much of an issue because the rule seems to be "stick to the left lane, unless you'd rather not". I've quite frequently seen motorcycles or cars optimistically pushing forward through seas of traffic going in the opposite direction because they've seen a parking spot, or because it would be inconvenient to travel with the flow of traffic until they can get past the road's traffic island.
My personal favourite are the digital countdowns they have displayed next to the traffic lights. As far as I can tell they are there so you know whether or not to turn off the engine while you wait for the light - quite eco-friendly in intention. However, in practice what they do is give a rather 'GTA' kind of feel to traffic...as the count gets lower, cars start reving their engines, auto-drivers start pulling up their hand-cranks, motorcycles who haven't already run the red started edging forward...
It also makes it easier for me to know when to start running like a scared little rabbit, which is more or less what I am in Indian traffic.
It reminds of something miss n said in a recent email: "there was a little song I used to sing when I saw something particularly indian. it said 'do what you feel like' in tune. cos thats what they do. what they feel like. i mean, who else gets to wear their pajamas AND a pretty dress every day?" (I think she is clever for thinking about it that way.)
In other news:
I had a pleasant talk with Dr. Supriya RoyChowdhury about the changing nature of urban activism, her current area, yesterday. She sounds a bit exasperated with the rather fragmentary nature of current activism, and argued that some problems - such as low wages for garment workers in India - are caused by international trends (like the demand for cheaply-produced clothes, and low wages in other parts of the world), and hence demand an international response. It makes sense in a way, but I guess I am still curious if perhaps there are other answers (beyond either demanding at a local level that people in this work get paid more, or trying to call for international standards for wages) we haven't looked at yet. It still seems like these kind of answers are sticking within the same production-consumption paradigm. She also said that part of the problem with movements within the anti-globalisation movement is that they're not tackling consumerism (which I'm not sure I agree with), and that consumer capitalism is the main problem (which I do agree with).
I think one of the things I hate about the system we (at least, the majority of people in the west) live in is the mindset it gets you into. If you ask people what they believe in and what they value, most people would say the sort of things you expect them to about helping others and being a good person and the environment and such. (At least, that's what I think most people would say. Perhaps I'm being optimistic.) But then there are so many ways that the setup that make it hard to actually live by these things, and so much of our attention is being nibbled away at by a thousand messages telling us that we'll be happier if, basically, we have more Stuff. Even our attempts to live by our values so frequently get channelled through consumerism...but I won't rant about that because I'm fairly sure I've done so before. (Just comment if you miss it and I shall oblige. hah.)
Anyway, I am not getting as irritated about it these days as I sound in this post. Because most of the time these days I like thinking about all the little things I can do that make me feel better about my place in the world. It gives me tremendous pleasure to think about:
* growing herbs and marigolds, and learning more about companion planting,
* having a worm farm,
* bicycling (and maybe finding time to go to critical mass now and then),
* volunteering at city farm or earthwise,
* getting back to capoeira and swing dancing,
* doing market shopping,
* cooking for people,
and a heap of other things, too.
Wow. I really am procrastinating. This is getting ridiculously long, even for me. I am not in a transcribing kind of mood today - I am in the mood for thinking about nesting and gardening, actually.
A final recommendation: why not cook with kale tonight?
Since I've spent most of the last couple of days reading and transcribing, most of this post is about
At first glance, you might think that Indian roads are crazy merely because everyone drives like they are completely insane, with no regard for lane discipline, speed limits, traffic lights, or human life. However, once you've had time to get used to the roads and can pay attention to something other than self-preservation, it becomes clear that Indian roads have whole new levels of excitement to offer.
For a start, there are the one way streets that make navigating Bangalore an incredibly convoluted businesses. A small distance from place A to place B on the map will frequently take in place C, D, E, and X in reality, even if you somehow manage not to get lost along the way. For additional excitement, one-way streets change frequently, with notice being given in the local paper. This does not seem like a particularly efficient way to do things. Then, if traffic going one way on a busy road builds up enough, it will quite frequently just take over both of lanes.
Mind you, this is not so much of an issue because the rule seems to be "stick to the left lane, unless you'd rather not". I've quite frequently seen motorcycles or cars optimistically pushing forward through seas of traffic going in the opposite direction because they've seen a parking spot, or because it would be inconvenient to travel with the flow of traffic until they can get past the road's traffic island.
My personal favourite are the digital countdowns they have displayed next to the traffic lights. As far as I can tell they are there so you know whether or not to turn off the engine while you wait for the light - quite eco-friendly in intention. However, in practice what they do is give a rather 'GTA' kind of feel to traffic...as the count gets lower, cars start reving their engines, auto-drivers start pulling up their hand-cranks, motorcycles who haven't already run the red started edging forward...
It also makes it easier for me to know when to start running like a scared little rabbit, which is more or less what I am in Indian traffic.
It reminds of something miss n said in a recent email: "there was a little song I used to sing when I saw something particularly indian. it said 'do what you feel like' in tune. cos thats what they do. what they feel like. i mean, who else gets to wear their pajamas AND a pretty dress every day?" (I think she is clever for thinking about it that way.)
In other news:
I had a pleasant talk with Dr. Supriya RoyChowdhury about the changing nature of urban activism, her current area, yesterday. She sounds a bit exasperated with the rather fragmentary nature of current activism, and argued that some problems - such as low wages for garment workers in India - are caused by international trends (like the demand for cheaply-produced clothes, and low wages in other parts of the world), and hence demand an international response. It makes sense in a way, but I guess I am still curious if perhaps there are other answers (beyond either demanding at a local level that people in this work get paid more, or trying to call for international standards for wages) we haven't looked at yet. It still seems like these kind of answers are sticking within the same production-consumption paradigm. She also said that part of the problem with movements within the anti-globalisation movement is that they're not tackling consumerism (which I'm not sure I agree with), and that consumer capitalism is the main problem (which I do agree with).
I think one of the things I hate about the system we (at least, the majority of people in the west) live in is the mindset it gets you into. If you ask people what they believe in and what they value, most people would say the sort of things you expect them to about helping others and being a good person and the environment and such. (At least, that's what I think most people would say. Perhaps I'm being optimistic.) But then there are so many ways that the setup that make it hard to actually live by these things, and so much of our attention is being nibbled away at by a thousand messages telling us that we'll be happier if, basically, we have more Stuff. Even our attempts to live by our values so frequently get channelled through consumerism...but I won't rant about that because I'm fairly sure I've done so before. (Just comment if you miss it and I shall oblige. hah.)
Anyway, I am not getting as irritated about it these days as I sound in this post. Because most of the time these days I like thinking about all the little things I can do that make me feel better about my place in the world. It gives me tremendous pleasure to think about:
* growing herbs and marigolds, and learning more about companion planting,
* having a worm farm,
* bicycling (and maybe finding time to go to critical mass now and then),
* volunteering at city farm or earthwise,
* getting back to capoeira and swing dancing,
* doing market shopping,
* cooking for people,
and a heap of other things, too.
Wow. I really am procrastinating. This is getting ridiculously long, even for me. I am not in a transcribing kind of mood today - I am in the mood for thinking about nesting and gardening, actually.
A final recommendation: why not cook with kale tonight?
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ghiaghia and papou
on 2006-02-06 02:59 am (UTC)Re: ghiaghia and papou
on 2006-02-06 10:00 am (UTC)no subject
on 2006-02-06 08:12 am (UTC)no subject
on 2006-02-06 09:56 am (UTC)