No joyride this - Part I

You are about to read what you could have read a year ago! I didn't mean to confuse. Well, the day I created my blogger account, I was typing this post (that's about to come) and didn't get around to finishing it. It is probably one of the most personal posts I have written and will ever write (all in good humour) This time around too, I couldn't finish it in one sitting, but I am getting smarter. I divided it into 2 parts :-)

Every female driver will empathize with me. All men will mutter the cliched dialogues - " females cannot/should not drive ". Four-wheelers at that!!  Normal people enroll themselves in driving schools, learn in twenty days , procure their licence without a teeny-weeny hassle and zip zap zoom all over town.

I " learnt " driving from my father and brother (younger). If you are smiling imagining two gentle and kind teachers then you are totally off the track. My brother learnt driving around the same time as me from a neighbourhood driver. He learnt to drive in 7 days flat!!! All this didn't help my cause one bit. I had no interest in learning as I find Bangalore traffic a nightmare and have no road-sense whatsoever. Even a cow would meander its way through traffic better. My dad insisted that I learn and took it upon himself to teach me. He thought he could teach me the basics and then I could go to a school if required (the catch). How nice you might think. I also did. Only for the first class. Father must never teach their daughters how to drive solely because as a rule, they always love the cars more than the daughters! Such a rude shock for poor me.The first lesson I learnt - HONK! Make that the only lesson. If there ever was an International Community for Honking Enthusiasts, my dad would be the  President. It doesn't matter whether you drive at a speed of 50 kmph in 1st gear, but Honk you must. Big deal if you don't accelerate enough, but don't forget to Honk! Sometimes both my dad & bro would come along and I'd be jelly. Quivering and shivering!

Brother : Change the gear ya!

Father  :  You must ALWAYS be alert. Don't dream.

Brother : Accelerate, not brake !!!!

Father  : Horn please! Honk! H-O-N-K!!!!

Brother : Brake , you are going to ram into the auto. $%&t

Father  : Tchah! You will never learn !!

Brother : Tchah! You will never learn !!

I reluctantly persisted with the lessons { " If you are going through Hell, keep going " - That sort of attitude } . If I managed to change gears smartly in one class, I could never turn. If I got the hang of turning in the right direction, reversing was always aimed at trees and innocent people. If reversing happened by fluke, clutch was the bane of my existence. Notice I didn't mention honking. I gave up on that totally. I just honked at regular intervals to please my dad. It didn't help. My dad wanted me to honk on empty roads also!! I refrained from demanding why. I consoled myself with the only plausible explanation --  heavenly bodies fell from the sky by chance directly in front of my car ONLY when I was driving.

Anyhoo, I managed to manoever the car a bit and use all clutch, brake, accelerator correctly atleast once in the course of my driving lessons. But I lacked confidence to drive in the busy roads of Bangalore. I went for my driving test 2 months later. My brother also took it a week before me and it was a breeze for him. I took an appointment (BDA Complex, RTO Indiranagar) and was asked to come by at 1 p.m. noon. I was taking the test in our car so my dad came along. Of course, how could he trust his beloved car with reckless daughter :-D

The Inspector taking my test sat with another student and told me to follow. Even here I wasn't spared with running commentary from dad (Eleventh hour tips !!). In the main road, the Inspector asked me to parallel park. I could've told them then and there that I would be able to park properly only in an empty football ground. I tried and failed miserably.  He was determined to make my life hell. He had my dad for company. The buzzword was parallel park. Next to impossible for me. After half a dozen attempts (each worse than the other), he appointed a Sub-ordinate Inspector to teach me and left !! Inspector # 2 had immense patience and taught me slowly. I managed to park decently and practised a couple of times to be sure. By then, Inspector # 1 returned, gave me a cursory glance and asked " I have 5 minutes. Can you? " (in Kannada). I was a bundle of nerves and my dad was getting more and more irritated by the minute! First attempt - No need to mention. All lessons forgotten. I was back to square one :-( All hell broke loose. I don't know who was more angry - dad or Inspector. Two more trials and I got it right. But Inspector was not convinced and told me to come at 5 p.m. (I guessed he would ponder over the state of my licence for the next two hours - To give or not to give ). I drove home (much better than I did during the test mind you) with an agitated, hot-tempered dad breathing fire.






The moment we reached home, I had had enough and cared two hoots about the licence. Dad vowed he would never let me drive and I swore never to sit in his precious car ever again. Many a driving episode with dad ended like this usually! Dad stormed inside the house and lamented about how he had wasted one entire working day and narrated his version of my hopeless performance. I turned a deaf ear. My mom did what moms do best. Packed my dad off to office assuring him that she would accompany me to RTO for the licence. The only bright spot of the entire day - The Inspector gave me the licence with warnings and a stern lecture for 10 minutes to practise PARALLEL PARKING!!! How I hated that word. I suspected he gave me the licence eventually because like all RTO Officials, he extracted extra 'cash' from us - The Indian way!! I don't know why he made my life hell inspite of all that.





For the next 2 days, the words 'car' , 'test' , 'licence' , 'park' etc were all taboo in my home. I normally don't stay angry with anyone for more than a few hours and never silently , but was livid with my dad for taking sides with anyone and anything but me. So Cold War prevailed in my home. Finally the second evening, dad let it slip cautiously about how parking isn't all that easy even for experienced drivers. Of course that was enough for me and I melted instantly. In this fashion , the peace treaty was then virtually forged between dad and daughter again :-) :-)





More to come ...


Edited To Update on 12/01/10 - This is one of the posts chosen as part of BlogAdda's Tangy Tuesday picks. Click here to read. Thank you BlogAdda, it IS an honour!! :-)