I told you before that my daily journey to and from office is an adventure. Today I had a new one worth mentioning. The buses get very crowded during my journey back home. So it's a tough job boarding one and then keeping to one's feet for the entire journey. If you are lucky and powerful enough you might get a sit, though. Mostly I'm a lucky guy in this matter :D.
As usual I boarded a CTC (Calcutta Transport Corp) bus today. They are my choice because even they don't look nice and sound even terrible, they are faster and cheaper. But the evening had a surprise in store for me. After a couple miles there is a vast empty space where no vehicle stops. And our bus suddenly got stuck there. When people started shouting at the conductor, it was revealed that the accelerator of the bus was disconnected. So some people started getting down and trying stop something or anything that moves. Some, specially those who had cut the tickets already, were siting/standing with a confused look on their faces.
Meanwhile, there were quite a few IT engineers in the bus (I think almost 50% of the crowd). They started cooperating with the driver to fix the engine. And a very raw fix came up with a piece of rope, a cardboard and a few newspaper scraps. The accelerator pedal was attached to the engine. And to everyone's surprise the bus started moving! Of-course there was a price to pay. The engine was lying open and heating up the already hot environment. We traveled a bit slow but reached the destination safe.
Well, this happens only in India!
As usual I boarded a CTC (Calcutta Transport Corp) bus today. They are my choice because even they don't look nice and sound even terrible, they are faster and cheaper. But the evening had a surprise in store for me. After a couple miles there is a vast empty space where no vehicle stops. And our bus suddenly got stuck there. When people started shouting at the conductor, it was revealed that the accelerator of the bus was disconnected. So some people started getting down and trying stop something or anything that moves. Some, specially those who had cut the tickets already, were siting/standing with a confused look on their faces.
Meanwhile, there were quite a few IT engineers in the bus (I think almost 50% of the crowd). They started cooperating with the driver to fix the engine. And a very raw fix came up with a piece of rope, a cardboard and a few newspaper scraps. The accelerator pedal was attached to the engine. And to everyone's surprise the bus started moving! Of-course there was a price to pay. The engine was lying open and heating up the already hot environment. We traveled a bit slow but reached the destination safe.
Well, this happens only in India!
This is a wonderful post. Basically engineers can do anything. Right?
ReplyDelete@Web: Yes, provided they are truly engineers :P
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