Rural traffic

This picture was quite accidental and I love it. We were bumping along on some rural road in our rickshaw in Vellore when we ran into a herd of cows. I scrambled for my camera while the auto honked and weaved its way through the mess. By the time I got my camera out and turned it on I just enough time to pop it out the side of the auto, aim it backwards and hope for the best. I managed to get the end of the herd, the cow-herder, and--quite amusingly--the side of our rickshaw. This is mostly hilarious because the auto (like all good autos) has the ubiquitous and ever-confounding image of the Swiss cottage on the side. For anyone who has been to India the strange national obsession with images of Switzerland is something you would recognize, if not understand. And the contrast of the picture of the Swiss villa and the look of the rural cow-herd is too perfect.