A lesson in humility

I approach another intersection and the signal turns red. The vehicles behind me continue to honk urging me to jump the signal. After a while, they give up. I look around and see an autorickshaw to my right, the driver is revving up the engine in anticipation of the green. Behind me is a bus that is packed with people who are jostling for space. A couple of two wheelers squeeze in between me and the auto. The Indian streets are always busy. Everyone seems to be in a hurry to go somewhere.

For me, driving through this mess called the traffic causes enough frustration and anguish but surprisingly in a strange way, it allows me to relax and at times even put things in perspective. Among other things, the Indian streets teach a lesson in humility.

Unlike many other countries where strict rules ensure that everybody complies with the discipline needed to maintain smooth traffic flow, Indian traffic is mostly a self adjusting organism that offers unparalleled flexibility at the cost of unbridled chaos and inefficiency (We don’t have traffic rules only suggestions).

In this motley mix of vehicles and drivers, it does not matter who the individual is because once a driver hits the streets, he becomes a part of the traffic organism merging into the whims and fancies of the entity. So irrespective of his social standing or his intellectual accomplishments, he is ‘normalized’ into the system.

A professor holding a PhD or a businessman driving a Mercedes or a movie star will still have to sway to the diktats of say an auto driver cutting across the streets or a dilapidated truck in the middle of the road that just does not seem to move uphill holding up everyone behind it.

How so important a person might be, the traffic organism ensures that he is brought down to the minimum workable levels on the streets. The traffic IQ is determined by the operational IQ of the least aware individuals comprising it and thus ensuring that the rest are browbeaten to those levels of operation.

Ironically this is a lesson in humility. In a strange way, the Indian traffic lets you know that on the streets you are but an ordinary person shorn of all individuality.

The signal turns green and honking begins from behind. I shift into gear and move ahead as I maneuver through the chaos ahead…