I was in the town of Junagadh, a quirky little city that long ago was once a major center of Buddhism and later became the center of a small Muslim state. The city itself is crowded and smelly as one would expect but features some surprising Gothic architecture downtown as well as the tombs of the Nawabs of Junagadh and Buddhist caves carved into the rocks beneath what was later the Muslim fort. The Muslim tombs were beautiful, while the Buddhist caves (which were also reused as Jain and Hindu caves) were basically cubic boxes inside rocks with wildly overpriced admissions (two dollars for this??) My real reason to be here however was to climb Mt. Girnar, a story I will tell at a later date.
I was to go from Junagadh to Diu, an island just off the coast some 168km away, a relatively easy haul even for an Indian bus. I rose at 7:30am to catch the 9:00 bus, expecting to arrive in Diu around 2:00pm. Guess what didn't happen.
There were buses scheduled at 8, 9, and 12. When my alarm went off I figured "8? Screw that, catching the 9." What would have happened if I took the 8? We shall never know.
The day started well, or so it seemed. I was highly entertained by a teenage boy with the slogan "No Entry" (why?) and a Valentine's heart embroidered on his shirt waaayyyyy too low on his back to prevent me from chuckling. Then I saw his father, a splendid old Kathiawadi man dressed from head to toe in white, with a poofy-shouldered shirt, poofy pants tucked into his knee-socks, a huge turban, and a monocle. I expected to spend the rest of the day being amused.
I got on the bus I was directed to at 9:00am and we uneventfully drove away. For 5 kilometers. At that point I saw two French tourists desperately scrambling off the bus. At the last instant one of them turned and said to me "This bus is not going to Diu."
Well, balls.
I hustled to unwedge my luggage from the ceiling and also leaped off the bus. The French and I took a rickshaw back to the bus stand, where, surprise surprise, the bus we should have been on had already left. A silly error on our own parts perhaps? No. It was part of a vaster, far more sinister conspiracy.
There was still the 12 o'clock bus. A longish wait, but whatcha gonna do? I took to drafting my forthcoming post about Mt Girnar. At some point I looked up and saw a mob begin to form in a circle around me. No. Not again. I feigned ignorance of English and went to buy some snacks, rather than sitting still for a circus to form around me. At the snack stall I purchased what was to become my only sustenance for the entire day: a bag of strawberry-flavored peanuts. They exist. The taste and texture are essentially that of a pink Froot Loop with a peanut trapped inside. It is not the worst strawberry-Froot-Loop-based concoction I have ever tasted, but that is hardly a ringing endorsement considering I once consumed a two-year old can of a beverage called "Liquid Cereal." As for the strawberry-flavored peanuts, they taught me a valuable lesson: never purchase a food you know you're going to hate if there is also a reasonable chance you will find yourself compelled to eat the entire container.
Around 11:57 I began to grow concerned, and the French could be seen anxiously pacing the bus depot, Frenchishly chain-smoking their cheap Indian cigarettes (beedis). The bus should be here by now.
12:01. The bus is late, I hope. I dash to the inquiry desk to make sure I'm not about to miss a bus sitting before my eyes. The Inquiry Man said "12:00 bus is canceled. Please wait until 1:00 bus."
"But there is no 1:00 bus on the timetable."
"Bus is at 1:00 to Una."
[Una is a town 30min from Diu, and a common and convenient transfer point]
"Oh Una, OK. But I don't see it on the timetable?"
"Bus is at 1:00."
Another hour passed. I was rather annoyed. 4 hours in the bus station with a bunch of goggle-eyed Gujaratis waiting to close in as soon as I drop my guard was wearing on my patience. At 12:45 I hatched a plan. I approached the French. Between the three of us we could personally inspect every bus entering the Junagadh bus depot and interrogate the drivers. This way we could not get on the wrong bus again.
At 1:13 we were forced to concede there was probably not going to be a 1:00 bus. I went to the Inquiry Desk.
"Excuse me." *knocking on window in various ways* *more knocking* "Hey." "Inquiry Man." *knocking* *rolling pebble through ticket slot into Inquiry Man's newspaper*.
[Reluctantly] "Yes sir?"
"Where is bus to Diu?"
"At 12:00 bus was scheduled."
"Yes, but it was canceled, and you said there was a bus at 1:00"
"There is no 1:00 bus."
[body language becomes exaggeratedly impatient] "1:00 bus canceled?"
"No sir. No 1:00 bus. Diu bus is at 12:00."
I relayed this 'information' to the French. Their emotive gesticulations of silent dismay were such that I suspected they might be Parisian mimes whose costumes and makeup were lost in a luggage mishap. The Frenchman hustled off and returned with a double-pack of beedis. Francois and Francine didn't even move this time; they just shook where they were standing, tossing one beedi butt after another at their feet. A mustachioed Indian approached. He told us he also was going to Diu, and was taking the 2:15 bus and would help us. Jacques, Josephine, and I expressed our gratitude but I decided it would be prudent to seek confirmation. I paid another visit to Inquiry Man.
"No bus at 2:15 to Diu" he said.
Silence. Suggestive glances. Stroking of the chin. "And when, do you suppose, might there be a bus to Diu, if I may ask?"
"Please take bus to Una."
"Aaaahhhhhhhhhhh I see. And now, tell me, when is that?"
"2:15"
Reader, there are such things as miracles. At 2:15 there was a bus to Una! But first to get on the bus we had to fight for it. Gujaratis mob buses. Knowing that there aren't enough seats for everyone to be comfortable, they behave like cheeky, aggressive children, using all sorts of contrivances from tossing a sweater through windows to 'claim' a seat, to ramming old ladies who are trying to get off the bus and tossing their luggage overhead to gain an advantage on the rest of the crowd. The Marcel, Margarite and I formed a small, elite colonial army. We assumed the V formation, with me at the head. I did not trust the snail-eaters to take the lead, as the modern French species has too far degenerated from their noble Frankish forbears and are all too inclined to turn and run in the face of martial adversity, trampling any companions in the path of their fromage-spilling rout. I found the Gujaratis to be more vicious in their assault but less tenacious in their defense than their Rajasthani bus-scrambling brethren. Perhaps by being generally better-nourished they are less acquainted with the tactical deployment of bony elbows. I added several notches to my bone-hammers. The French did an adequate job of following. They make excellent rear-echelon troops when there are no vineyards and prostitutes to divert them.
Having secured places on the bus (in my case, standing astride my luggage) we settled in for the five-hour haul. It may have been uncomfortable but we were on our way.
For 36 kilometers.
After 36 kilometers
the bus broke down.
We didn't know how serious the mechanical difficulties were and we were trapped in the back rows anyway, so there was little we could do as those Indians at the front of the bus fled like a herd of terrified gazelle to flag down and get on a passing bus before the rest of us even knew what was going on. The other bus became full to the brim and drove off, leaving some fifty people remaining stranded by the side of the road. "Joke's on them," I figured optimistically "It's gonna be an easy fix and the rest of us are going to Una with a half-empty bus to ourselves."
The bus driver emerged covered in grime from under the engine. He dropped a single wrench onto the ground and shook his head. The conductor solemnly said "Bus broken." Another bus was dispatched to retrieve us, but we did not know when it would get there. "Well, certainly not right now" I figured, this time correctly, and sauntered off the highway to urinate amidst a flock of sheep.
We waited and waited. Trucks drove past, honking to warn us that TRUCK COMING. Camels strolled by with giant piles of hay. Great. Camel-carts move more efficiently than we do. I started doing some arithmetic in my notebook. It was now a little after 3:00. That we should have been in Diu already if we had gotten the first bus was a given. Now, let's see, after six hours from our scheduled departure we had advanced 36 kilometers, easy math, 6 kilometers per hour. But being very generous and assuming we were on the 12:00 service to Diu instead, it works out to about 12 kilometers per hour.
It's official: The Gujarat state bus service traverses short-to-medium distances less rapidly than a well-nourished Kenyan.
Finally a bus came for us, destined for Veraval, a port some ways up the coast from Una. The mob swarmed over the asphalt. The conductor of our bus, taking charge of his self-appointed duty of escorting the foreign sahibs did his utmost to get us on the bus, but it was no use. The Indian blitzkrieg was too furious, the other bus too crammed with its own passengers and the new arrivals who fought their way into the last millimeters of aisle space like a battalion of drowning soldiers onto the only lifeboat.
About twelve of us remained at the roadside. Besides myself were the driver, conductor, some eight Indians of a more peaceable persuasion, and the two middle-aged frog-nibblers. A third bus chugged up the road, continued chugging, and blew its melodious horn "BOOP DE BOOP LATER SUCKERS".
A fourth bus rambled up, and to our joy pulled over to the side of the road fifty yards ahead. The first to the door was a Indian family who had abandoned their pacifism out of desperation and were all set to board, luggage poised like boulders in a catapult to be slung through the doorway. Then the bus closed its door and drove away - PSYCHE!
The Gallic Contingent was reduced to despair.
At 4:45pm a fifth bus pulled alongside. PSYCHE. The Gujarat State Road Transport Corporation is a snot-nosed brat that bullies the smaller kids into trying the same trick over and over again as the children weep because they know that only more of the same humiliation is held in store.
Bus number six....
SALVATION
Salvation is going to Veraval. Who cares. We all get on.
The only good thing about my experiences with Gujarati buses is that I can impart to you knowledge accumulated about various lesser-visited Gujarati cities I've been forced to experience, so that you might avoid the same.
The city of Rajkot is a large, smog-choked transit and business hub where Ghandi used to live. It smells like an exhaust pipe. Don't go there.
The city of Porbandar is a medium-sized, smog-choked industrial hub where Ghandi also used to live. It smells like a chimney. Don't go there.
The city of Veraval warrants special mention. It is a medium-sized, smogless port with one of India's largest fishing fleets. Ghandi never lived there but he passed through several times. The entire city reeks of fish and even kilometers from the coast it smells like having one's face forced through a barracuda's sphincter. Don't go there.
It was thus with some displeasure that we had to disembark in Veraval and wait for a bus from there to Una. The bus pulled into the station. It was a local bus, and I mean a local, local bus. Of all the filthy, slapshod rattletraps I have ridden in this vast, underdeveloped country, this was the most poorly constructed of all. This bus was a glorified soda can with wheels. Flaps of steel hung off here and there; windowpanes bounced on x, y, and z axises of motion, smashing against the window frames in all three. This bus looked like the product of a troop of 14-year-old Boy Scouts who had been told by their drunken scoutmaster that they could all try "just a little" whiskey if they promised to work on their Riveting merit badges afterward.
At long last, with a rusty scrap of metal dragging off the rear bumper, the bus pulled into Una bus station. It was 8:00pm, 11 hours after I had meant to depart, and some six hours after I meant to be down the road in Diu. In fact the French and I would finally get to Diu on a delayed bus a little before 10, but I didn't know this yet, so there was on more thing to do. I walked to Una's Inquiry Desk...
"When is the next bus to Diu?"
"We don't know."
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