Traffic in Hyderabad

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Today, Priya and I went to meet her friend Sanaa and altogether we went to a large craft fair in the Jubilee hills section of Hyderabad. Last night, riding in from the airport at 5am was obviously not representative of the traffic here. Today, I got to see the real deal. From Priya's to Sanaa's,
we took an auto-rickshaw (simply called an "auto" here). Catching an auto involved walking down the street from the apartment and waking an auto driver sleeping in the back set of his auto. Note that he couldn't have been comfortable - an auto is basically a moped with a bench and enclosure bolted on. They're tiny and open to the air/smoke/dust/beggars that you encounter on the road. In the open air of the rickshaw, you get the full appreciation of the sound of the Hyderabad traffic. The most dominant sound is the constant honking. Drivers here honk to notify other drivers that they're arround, to notify other drivers that they're about to cut them off, run into them, etc. And, they also honk for no reason at all. The sound of constant honking is mixed with the rumble of the public buses (think of the sound of a poorly maintained 1965 bluebird school bus), and the drone of hundreds of mopeds and autos.
Traffic here is like nothing I've ever seen. It is madness. I think that there may be traffic rules, but they're all voluntary. There are traffic cops standing around, but I'm told that their main job is to spot naive-looking drivers from which to extort bribes. The road is a free-for-all mixture of private cars (small vw golf sized hatchbacks of various brands and the ubiquitous Indian made "Ambassador" cars - collectively known as "4-wheelers"), auto rickshaws, mopeds and motorcycles (collectively known as "2-wheelers"), bicycles, bicycle-rickshaws, pedestrians, random pockets of road construction/repair, and occasionally animals (cows, dogs, chickens). Traffic moves by each individual driver doing whatever it takes to move himself forward. This primarily involves squeezing into any available space, but can also involve driving on the wrong side of the road while honking. Amazingly, this self-optimization approach seems to work for the most part. Traffic doesn't move quickly, but it is rarely at a standstill.
After our auto ride to Sanaa's house, she drove us in her new car (4-wheeler) to the craft fair in Jubilee Hills. This fair is a very local event, not frequented by Indian tourists, not to mention white tourists with blond hair! Eyes were on me from the moment I stepped out of the car. The parking attendant, a young man, basically quit doing his job and just stared at me. I was also quickly spotted by a band of about 5 tiny beggar children, who swarmed me, tugging at my clothes and signaling that they were hungry. Of course I'm a compassionate person, but there was nothing I could do. I tried to shake them off, but was only finally rid of them after passing through the turnstyle into the fair.
More eyes were on me inside the fair, including most storekeepers who busied themselves when I came toward their stall. There were many pretty things, but I held off because I've only been here a day! (From what I understand, the trip to Rajastan will be the time to buy things.) I did purchase a couple of nice framed colored line drawings from a vendor. 500 Rp for two, thats about $12 for the two - not bad. I may have paid a premium for being white, but I didn't feel it was a bad deal. Priya and Sanaa shopped with some other vendors, and I stayed away so as to not jinx their bargaining.
After the fair, we headed back home with the plan of later going to a clothing store to buy some nice clothes for a large lunch tomorrow. The trip to the store, which should have taken about 20 minutes, turned into an ordeal as part of the road was closed for a minister's convoy. The ensuing traffic jam stubbornly stuck around for at least an hour. We finally parked the car and went through the harrowing experience of crossing the street. This is something I'm not in a rush to do again soon. Priya told me that often when she has to cross the street, she'll just have an auto driver take her to the other side rather than try to make it through the traffic. We wandered around in the store, but I found myself too tired to even think about shopping. We came back home, I typed up this entry, and now i'm going to bed.

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