My cab rides

For some months now, I have been taking the company cab to commute to and from home. My rides,normally cover 25 to 30 kilometers going one way, and take up well over an hour and a half. To be precise, I live in in one of the southern most points in Bangalore and my workplace is situated in the northern part of the city. So it is not too much exaggeration to say that my cab rides are normally quite an experience.

I share the cab with three other individuals scattered in various different geographical positions around the city and due to the lack of cooperation from fate, my position turns out to be the farthest from our destination.Result being, I get picked up first and dropped last. :-(

There are a few distinct characteristics of our cab rides that I want to talk about..

THE SUN

This is a phenomenon noticable fortunately only in the morning as our drops in the evening are well after sun down. This phenomenon mainly consists of a set of entities(namely ourselves, the ones travelling) trying very hard to grab hold of the best seats to reduce the effect of THE SUN (bisilu) falling on us, and at the same time trying very hard to make the effort inconspicuous.. As I am the first one to get on the cab, I get to choose first :-) And I can see the very same set of careful calculations going on in the others' heads as went on in mine, as to which direction the sun is at this time,is it a cloudy day, which direction will we be travelling on an average, how many shady roads are we going to take etc. Its quite a hilarious situation :-), specially because no one talks about it.

THE MUSIC

This is quite a common phenomenon amongst any set of people trying to travel together. Interests in music vary and unfortunately we have only one radio :-( The situation is worsened by the fact that, that only radio has close to a dozen channels making the choices harder. So not only does everyone try their best to get their favourite channel on air, but they also make quite an effort to try and impress the others with their channel hoping that they might just succeed in influencing a few others into adopting their music. Thus hoping to reduce the competition they will have to face, the next day. This set of mind games being played is another interesting thing to watch out for.

THE ROUTE

This phenomenon occurs when we have two strong parties each favouring a different route to take to the destination. In our cab, one person feels that the sensible thing to do is to take a route with minimum number of traffic signals and thus try to keep away from the mainroads as much as possible.This unfortunately means that we take a route that comprises of the smallest 'gullies' possible.
The opposing party does not agree, and puts forth the argument that lugging an almost heavy vehicle like ours(which is an SUV), into those small congested 'gullies' is akin to inviting traffic jams.
Both parties make it a point to respond to jam situations while on the oppositions' route, by shaking their head and making appropriate sounds like 'che' and 'plch'...This heated argument is something else to look for.Highly amusing :-)

But apart from all these, our cab rides also come with exciting conversations and debates, gossips ;-), sleep sessions and general sight seeing, thus accounting for a wholesome experience...
If you ever get a chance to experience long cab rides...make your decision wisely ;-)