The Travel Gods are Laughing

“It’s our last leg” I texted to G on our 3 hour pre-paid taxi ride to Pondicherry. Silly me. It was late at night and K & I were drowsy from a day of transit. So was our driver. Suddenly I am brought into wakefulness as he jams on the brakes and tries to swerve, but we are too close to the motorcycle and there is an sickening crunch and the forward fling of impact. Unusually, this cab actually has seatbelts and we are all buckled in so we don’t go too far. 

Ah, fuck!

People rush out of the dark surroundings like cockroaches. Everyone approaches the men on the bike and, amazingly, they are unhurt. But they are angry. So is our driver. And there are many opinions on who is at fault. Some people leave, probably because it’s less interesting with no injuries. Everyone remaining looks at the bike, then comes over and looks at the taxi. K & I keep low and stay in the taxi so as not to attract attention. There is a lot of loud bickering, mostly in English but also in Tamil. 

The men on the bike are visiting for the first time. They say our driver was speeding. He says they cut him off coming from the side street. People seem to be siding with our driver for whatever reason. Honestly, I was too out of it to know what is true. The big problem is that we now have 2 undriveable vehicles. Who will pay for them? 

It went on and on in circles flaring up into dramatic yelling and arm waving and then moments of calm, until they came to some resolution and our driver asked us to leave the taxi. The front driver’s side tire was flat, the side was all dented and the bumper was torn apart. He said also damage inside, indicating under the hood. He was going to change the tire and had to stay all night and wait for a mechanic. We decided to pay him the remainder of our pre-pay amount with a nice tip and find a way to our hotel. He flagged down a rare rickshaw and we were off to the hotel. Our actual final leg to Puducherry.