Delhi's an easy ride, thanks to autowalas

College has been successful at doing what my parents couldn't get me to do for 17 years: getting out of the house. This obviously entails a fair bit of independent travelling. And that, in turn, entails behaving like a mature adult; something that I can't be expected to be completely proficient at since actual adults on the road have problems with it (I'm looking at you, all the paan-spitters painting the town orange).

All one needs to do is establish a simple rule: stay out of everyone's way. Two-wheelers riding on pavements, flustered in their attempts to somehow skip the red-light? Occasional police cars giving them competition by jumping red lights? No worries. Keep your head down and eventually use your experiences to sustain the weak title of a writer that you occasionally hold (look who's an expert at shooting herself in the foot). 

As much as I attempt to keep with my rule, the otherwise carefully hidden dork likes to take over to amuse herself. Once hurrying to make it to the first class on time, I gave up on boarding a bus and desperately rushed to get an auto instead, which was followed by the everyday battle of an average Indian: bargaining. I actually think the creators of the phrase "Aate-daal ka bhaav maalum hona" had it wrong. It's not about learning the price. It's about learning to participate in the exasperating verbal back-and-forth that finally fixes the price at a reasonable rate.

"Kitna deingei", asked the auto-guy.

"Metre se bhaiya", I replied.

But he asked me the same question like he hadn't heard me, so I answered it the same way again. And that went on for a while, probably before the guy thought I was plain dumb and rephrased his question to "college tak ka kya lete hain?"

I'm still not sure why this happened till date, but my brain understood this as him asking me about the course I had chosen in college. While it seemed like an absurd question in my head in the middle of our haggling, I nonchalantly answered, "English Honours".

The guy chuckled and rephrased his question in English, "How much money?" To say that I was embarrassed would be an understatement. To say that I wanted my existence to never have been an earthly occurrence would be putting it precisely. There was nothing left to say after that of course. I quietly agreed to his price, something I would have done even if he had overstated it by two times.

As odd as it may sound, I'm glad my travels in autos have become more frequent since that day. I recently experienced an auto ride that was equivalent to meeting my spiritual guide. This time the auto-driver, an old, wise looking Sikh gentleman, asked me what course I was pursuing (actually happened this time folks, not just my brain making it up). I replied, while simultaneously bracing myself to be chided about how it didn't have any scope as a subject and how I'd be better off with more practical options, something that random relatives always make a point to state.

But to my surprise, he approvingly nodded and asked about what I wanted to do next. I told him that I honestly had no idea and he replied with such maturity that put all the prior mentioned relatives to shame, "That's alright child. We all make plans for life, but who actually knows where one is headed?"

Even if one makes it far enough to travel in personal air-conditioned cars, there is something that connects you to the earthy figures that are our autowalas.

(Subtle propaganda for the Odd-Even rule? You'll never know.)