Chockful ! Chockful of cars. Bumper-to-bumper traffic. That’s how I’d describe it, and I’m sitting in it. All 5 lanes are the same. If you need to travel by freeway you must travel like this. Not that the feeder road is any better. However there is a bright side to this story. Since it’s 2 of us in the car, we have the option of taking the HOV (high occupancy vehicle) lane. And ah ! the HOV lane lies empty. Well almost. There are a couple of cars ahead of us, as we swerve into it. As we speed along (because now we are speeding compared to the crawling traffic next-door), I’m thinking what nice people these other car-drivers are (you know the ones stuck in traffic) because this HOV lane is a “diamond” lane, that is it’s a part of the freeway, and there are no barriers around it, preventing other non-car-pooling vehicles from entering. But still no-one enters the lane that is not supposed to. In the cars ahead of me, I see atleast 2 heads bobbing.

My husband is more pragmatic. He doesn’t argue the “nice-people” theory. To him, the niceness is a side-effect of law-enforcement. I mean, it’s better to be law-abiding and reach a little late than to be handed a $200 traffic ticket, no ?

I tell this HOV lane story to a distant cousin while we are in India. At my obvious “admiration” for the law-abiding citizen, he looks at me like :

a. I’m demented, or
b. I’ve gone soft in the head

As he tells me, to him no road law applies. If a guy in khakhi objects, he can be stopped right then and there by a hand-ful of notes. See, so easy. So, that’s that. I don’t argue with the guy. I mean, is there a point ? Plus, I’ve got to be polite, even though the guy is an odious creep, else I’ll get the whole “you don’t live here, we do – maintain relationships etc.” schpiel from my Mom again.

A couple of months later, I hear of him again through my Mom, who is the ordained bearer of masala news in the family. Apparently the cousin and his brother had come to California to setup a business. He was driving around going about his business – so that was good. But is now unable to drive, because he was caught driving under the influence of alcohol, and had his license suspended for 6 months.

I’m guessing the offers of financial remuneration didn’t work this time.

Categories : _india , _culture_and_society