The Rickshaw Run

There were many ways to participate in the Rickshaw Run. Some teams chose to form convoys and spread out their experience of India over two weeks. Others chose to race competitively from Kochi to Darjeeling in a balls out race to the finish. The three podium finishers were the Rajasthan Raiders, the Calamity Crew, and the Dosa Boys. They completed the run in little over a week.

The Calamity Crew (great group of guys with the best bassline in India) from South London, not realizing that the Rajasthan Raiders had finished some 17 hrs before them, texted their friends back home that they had won the Rickshaw Run. To their dismay, they found out later that they came in second. Making matters worse, the Calamity Crew came in second to Americans!!! The Rajasthan Raiders also labelled by the Calamity Crew as the Yankers are a team from the Midwest. Well done fellas!!! Wait till the Crew have to make the announcement in their pub back home.

Posted at 10:00AM Jan 10, 2007 by D Bums Comments[1]

Finally!!! Darjeeling!!!!

  

The final nighttime approach. It is with bittersweet enthusiasm that the Bums tackle the curves leading up to Darjeeling. We travel most the road in first gear, the rickshaw growling towards the finish. At certain points, the chariot shows her meddle and I am able to push it to nearly 40 km/hr on the dark slippery road. I know Bennett is in terror. I push the rickshaw harder, playing chicken with the jeep ahead of me.

Nearly at the top, Bennett requests I pull over so that he may urinate. I stop the rickshaw and wait. Suddenly, a van pulls up beside us. It is pitch dark. People get out of the van and surround the rickshaw. The Driver flashes an ID and tells me we are going the wrong way on a one way street. It’s a 5000 rupee fine. So close to the finish, this couldn’t be happening. I tell them I don’t have that kind of money. Bennett approaches the driver and insists on seeing the ID. The driver pulls away. Suddenly, Bennett notices that the people surrounding the van are too tall to be Indians and there is a smell of alcohol in the air.

It is Jordan, the Wangdi Inn proprietor, Ivan of the Dosa Boys, and the Bodensee Rickshaw Team, more affectionately known as ze Germans, playing a mean trick on us. They got us. Real good!

We get the location of the Wangdi Inn where they are staying and check in ourselves. We go to Joey’s Pub in town and get blasted, drinking till the wee hours of the morning with the Dosa Boys and the Calamity Crew.

Posted at 08:00PM Jan 09, 2007 by D Bums Comments[0]

West Bengal Haiku

Posted at 01:00PM Jan 09, 2007 by D Bums Comments[0]

Road from Purnia

  

Another early morning start. We set off hoping that the roads are better out of Purnia than the roads into it. Surprisingly, it is. There are fewer potholes and actual continuous lengths of pavement. Our improvised weld is holding, but the tank is flapping around. We mobilize the “Bisleri Air Dampening System”. We shove a five gallon plastic water container between the gas tank and the rickshaw frame.

We are on the outskirts of Bagdogra when the tank springs a leak. We pull into a mechanics shop and wait for the epoxy to dry. We have a three hour lay over. We meet Chacko Sebastian who runs an English school in town and have tea with the men from the shop and other curious passers by who want to meet the kooks who have driven a rickshaw from Kerala.

It is a warm and very peaceful day. We watch the traffic go by relaxing in the shadows of swaying trees. I ask Chacko about dating rituals in India, English middle schools, and various other topics under the sun. Soon the epoxy has dried and we are off to tackle the hill to Darjeeling.

It has been nearly 60 years since a rickshaw has entered Darjeeling. Apparently, the road to Darjeeling to too steep for rickshaws. Or they thought. Over 15 rickshaws have already conquered the hill and we begin to make our way.

Posted at 10:00AM Jan 09, 2007 by D Bums Comments[1]

Mistreat Her and You Will Suffer

Driven by a determination to reach Siliguri by nightfall, we push the chariot to its limits. We bonzai the craters and push along at 20 km/hr. Several times, we are lifted from our seats by the force of the collision of wheel with hole. We begin to sing soprano.

Somewhere outside Kursela, our exhaust falls off and the chariot’s engine is bursting at a deafening volume. We limp into town and have the exhaust re-welded and attached to the chariot.

Continuing forward, the chariot comes to a halt. There is a strong smell of petrol and we discover that our tank is leaking. It is nightfall now and the Bums are stuck on the side of the road on a highway running through the most lawless region in India. A passing motorcyclist stops and informs us that there is a mechanic some 7 km down the road. Another man on a bicycle stops and slants our tank so that we can start the chariot and drive it towards the mechanic.

The mechanic shop is actually a tire puncture fixing station run by an old man and his sons. The “shop” is a three walled enclosure of bamboo and straw and it appears to double as home for the family. They pull the tank from the chariot and find a gash in the plastic. They are ill equipped to fix the tank, but they improvise a solution. They melt a plastic bag into the gash and cover the area with soap. The improvised weld holds and we are able to fill our tank.

Bennett, meanwhile, has gone to fetch tea for himself and the old man. At first, the old man refuses the tea, but Bennett’s persistence persuades him to take it. His son is livid. He runs back to the tea hut, fetches a new glass of tea and presents it to me. He is upset at the old man for accepting someone else’s tea even though I had refused it earlier.

We ask what we should pay for the service. They insist on taking nothing and smile pointing toward the road. We force the issue and give them two hundred rupees. Again, one of the sons is upset. He seems to believe that we shouldn’t be charged anything for their hour of work. Once again, we encounter grace; this time in the most lawless region in India.

We continue on our way to Siliguri, but we decide not to push our luck and spend the evening in Purnia.

Posted at 02:00PM Jan 08, 2007 by D Bums Comments[0]

Leaving Patna

Woke early at dawn hoping to make it to Siliguri by the evening so that we could drive up to Darjeeling in the daytime of the 9th. Trying to load our luggage into our rickshaw, we find that the security guard, holding his rifle, is sleeping in the back seat of the rickshaw. He is out.

In a lawless town like Patna, what use is a sleeping security guard whose gun could obviously be seized from him with ease? I still have trouble comprehending a lawless Indian. I would think that common Indian courtesy would prevent a thief from waking the guard to steal the rickshaw.

The road NH 31 from Patna is good and continuous all the way to Bergusarai. There is a factory there and road maintenance seems to be a high priority. Traveling along the road, the human traffic is continuous. There is no break in buildings along this road to Bergusarai. Making it to Siliguri by night fall seems realistic as the chariot is gliding along.

Suddenly, the road disappears. It turns into a river wash with craters covering the expanse of the remaining roadway. At no point are all wheels of the chariot on a level surface. It is slow going and we are reduced to nearly 5 km/hr.

Posted at 05:00AM Jan 08, 2007 by D Bums Comments[0]