My first auto rickshaw
A couple of days ago, I had a few new experiences in India. It started when Gopal had to go to the bank. The rear seat of the motorcycle is not usable as it is currently being modified to be comfortable for more than 20 minutes at a time, so he went alone. Plus, we have our niece staying with us at the moment, and there is no way all three of us can go. He left around 2:30 and the bank shuts at 4. It’s about half an hour away.
At 3:30, he calls and asks if I can come there sign something straight away. He says I should do this:
- Go out to the end of the road and flag down an auto-rickshaw (even if shared)
- Ask him to take me to Yapral (the nearest village, about 2km away)
- Get another auto with a meter and ask them to take me to the bank, but via a specific route. (He gave me details of the route – part of it I knew and part I didn’t)
We went outside and started walking to the end of the road. It was hot. Not just hot, but HOT. How hot? This hot:
No clouds like the little picture shows either – we were just out in the sun. When we got to the end of the road, we started walking towards Yapral. If we didn’t find an auto on this road, there was a bigger chance at the next intersection. Only a couple of autos passed us, and they looked like this (not my picture, but gives you an idea):
Fortunately, once we got to the intersection about 1km away, we got an auto pretty quickly. He didn’t know the route we had to take, so we had to tell him where to go. Thankfully I had my niece with me to help with the language, but left, right and straight are pretty universally understood.
We did miss the landmark we were looking for to signal the turn and went further than we were supposed to and had to circle around a bit, but we did get there in the end (about 6km). The meter had somehow “stopped” during the journey. The guy said 70 rupees (reasonable) and then told us he wanted 100. We said he could have 80 but he took 90 by only giving me 10 change from my hundred note.
I think we arrived about half an hour after the the bank closed, but they happily let us in and helped us. They brought us some water, but really, just being able to sit in air conditioning for a few minutes was blissful. I may have had a few hurdles to overcome with HDFC, but their branch staff have been nothing but helpful.
The way back was less eventful – the first couple of autos we flagged down didn’t know where we wanted to go and said no. Gopal eventually found one who knew, and it was made even easier because the auto driver followed Gopal for most of the way. But Gopal stopped in Yapral village, and just after that, at the intersection where we had got the first auto, our driver started turning off, and we had to tell him to go straight ahead instead and direct him to the apartment.
He’d agreed 80 rupees with Gopal but when we got there he wanted more because he’d thought it was another apartment building that was closer. My niece argued him into giving us 20 change like he was supposed to, and he did, but then I felt a bit bad and so I gave him a 10 rupee tip.
Just for reference, 100 rupees is about $2.20 and 10 rupees is about 22c. Also for reference is that 100 rupees buys you a decent meal and a few cups of tea or coffee, and 10 rupees buys you half a kilogram of most vegetables.