Road to Hospital
Road rage is a common problem in Mumbai. In a city where the traffic jams are longer than its local trains, people are bound to be easily frustrated. This correspondent was recently witness to one such incident of road rage but what was different this time was the way a young lady handled the situation.
The taxi in which she was traveling got into a little mishap, it was no fault of the taxi driver though. The taxi driver was going along his path when a car came out of its parking spot and touched the cab while it was still moving. The impact caused the rearview mirror of the private car to come off.
An extremely enraged driver and co-passenger stopped the cab and pulled out the poor taxi driver. With all profanity in place they explained him how expensive their car was and how he was a just a stupid reckless taxi driver, so he should pay the damages.
The cabby kept his cool. He apologized and tried to reason with them that it was no fault of his. He also went on to tell them that he was a poor man and could not afford to pay for their broken rearview mirror.
The girl sat in the cab quietly all this while. People told her to take another taxi and go on with her work. She
did not budge. The fight between the taxi driver and the car owner almost got physical, that’s when she got off the taxi. She went up to the car owner and asked him how much his rearview mirror cost, he told her the price of his expensive rearview mirror. She then took out the money and gave it to him.
Before she left she turned around and told him, “Sir, so much anger is not right. Especially on a poor taxi driver. You should do something about it otherwise you will have to pay very high hospital bills very soon, even more than what I’m paying for your rearview mirror now.”
Govindas to the Rescue
Recently, this reporter saw an elderly woman trying in vain to retrieve clothes that had fallen on to a sun shade whilst they were hung for drying. Enter, three teenagers. They formed a human pyramid with the smaller one of the lot standing on the shoulders of the other two. The job was done. The old lady constantly reminded them to be careful but the teenagers reassured her saying that the sun-shade, which was one-storey high, was no challenge at all as they had been practicing for the larger part of the last two months to reach much greater heights for the recently celebrated Dahi Handi festivities.
The Quizzer
This reporter was chatting with the PRO of the Government Railway Police, Ritesh Ahir, when he asked her what she had for dinner the previous night and for breakfast that morning. He then asked this reporter where she would be going the next day.
Ahir then explained himself. He said that when this reporter was talking about past events, her eyes moved towards the left. And when she was talking about the future, her eyes moved to the right. He said that several such `observational tactics’ are used by the police to interrogate criminals to find out if they are being honest.
Wonder why they have to use third degree then.
Hindu Raaj in Thane
Recently, this correspondent called up the Thane Municipal Corporation for the commissioner. By mistake, she told the telephone operator to connect her to Aslam Gupta instead of Aseem Gupta. The operator turned out to be a strong saffronist and took serious offence to it. As a journalist, you should know that the Thane municipal corporation has never had a Muslim commissioner, he thundered.
Realising her mistake, this correspondent kept listening as the operator went on lecturing her about getting her facts right. Although not sure why it would be so disastrous for the operator to have a Muslim commissioner in the city, this diarist did not want to argue. Finally, she asked the man to connect her to the top boss, only to be told that the boss was away.
Quotable Quote
The Preity Zinta-Ness Wadia assault case has been going on for so long that even the Commissioner of Police, Rakesh Maria, is bored. When reporters asked him about it at a press briefing held at his office last week, the CP said, “Yes, they are having their very own ‘Qawwali’ programme. First, she comes up with a list of witnesses, then he comes up with his own list, and this pattern has been going on forever now. So yeah, the show is on until we find independent witness.”
Be the Change
This diarist’s hackles were raised when she read that a tip should be added to the taxi fare because cabbies are really hardpressed to make ends meet. There are really decent taxidrivers and then there are the others whom she has cursed inwardly — for flatly refusing to take her to her destination or throwing change challenges at the nth moment. But there is one particular one, who called himself Bharat from Ayodhya that she encountered on the night of Eid that she is not likely to forget. When she boarded his cab and requested he go to CST, he struck up this conversation with her and she answered as politely as she could, all the while hoping she wouldn’t miss her fast train despite taking a cab. As the cab neared the subway, she noticed that possibly a couple of streetlights were out and it was quite dark in the cab too. She handed him Rs 22 and searched for another tenner to make the exact fare, but she couldn’t find one at that moment. So she handed over what she thought was a Rs 100 note from her wallet and then found that she did have another tenner after all. As she was looking for a tenner, he muttered, ‘Note asli hain na?’ She absently replied now why would she give him a counterfeit one, but what she failed to understand was it was his devious way of hinting you have given me Rs 500. She was too preoccupied finding the tenner and fretting about her train. Finally, she gave him the third Rs 10 and said now give back the other money. Now the cabbie smelled success and he shrewdly asked how much because he sensed that the diarist was clueless she had inadvertently handed him a 500-rupee note. And yours truly said, Rs 100. So that’s exactly what he gave her back. The diarist found out only when she had breathlessly clambered on to her train and discovered that her monsoon emergency fund of Rs 500 was gone and she understood exactly what had happened, but it was too late. For days after, she had foolishly hoped that the guy’s conscience would be rankled sufficiently enough to find his way to the building outside where she had caught the cab and attempt to track her down and do the right thing? After all, didn’t she read all the time in the newspapers about honest cabbies and autorickshaw drivers who returned smartphones, bags full of cash or valuables to grateful customers the next day? Needless to say, that thought has remained exactly that — foolish hope.
Tailpiece
Irony of life: Priyanka Chopra earned more money acting as Mary Kom than Mary Kom earned in her entire career by actually being herself!
Contributed by Adele Macdonald, Arun Venkat, Sindhu Mansukhani, Tanvi Deshpande and Geeta Bhagat.
Compiled by Anil Singh
[alert type=”e.g. warning, danger, success, info” title=””]
Language of Money
‘Paisa bolta hai’ is a very famous Hindi line used in many serials, films, advertisements, etc. But in order to earn ‘paisa’, one has to learn the language of the customer.
Pandurang Aamle, a florist at Dadar flower market, is an example. It so happened that this reporter was speaking to him when two Tamil oldies came and enquired about the rates of the flowers. This reporter was shocked to see Aamle, who speaks Marathi in a particular dialect, speaking Tamil. When this reporter asked him as to how he learnt Tamil, he said, “I am into this business for the past 40 years. Most of my wholesale customers are Tamilians from Matunga. Slowly, I learnt their language and do not see any harm in speaking it.” Further, he said that language should not become a barrier in trade and no language is of lower status. Knowing an additional language is always an advantage, he added.
— Sujit Umadi, September 16, 2013
[/alert]
