Indian roads are scary. I thought city roads were bad with car, three wheelers, the occasional cow, children, trucks (large trucks) and bicycles. Then I saw the roads in the country side.
We saw two accidents on our way to and from Ranchi. One, some poor soul was hit by a truck. The second, a jeep carrying probably ten people hit a motorbike and rolled. This would be considered front page news in Australia. For India it is a way of life.
Most cars don't have rear seat belts, which scares me. Our driver drove extremely fast even though we told him to slow down. I think they see it as a car race. And of course there's all that dipping and weaving on bad roads that make it a tragedy in the making. No wonder people travel by train so much.
I have a theory that people operate on survival of the fastest in India. With chronically short infrastructure and services, there's a need to be first to get anything done. If you go to a government office or post office, there are no queues, the same as on a foot path or on the road. If there's a space, there's room to push in. Some guy pushed in front of me at the airport. I tapped his shoulder and told him that he should go to the back of the queue. He looked me up and down and then moved behind me, where the next guy did the same thing to him. I just smiled, but the fellow behind me had more angry words.
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