Waylaid on Empty Streets? Try a Different Vernacular!
WAYLAID ON EMPTY STREETS? TRY A DIFFERENT VERNACULAR!
Of late, a new kind of menace is wreaking havoc in Bangalore – of extortionists in motorbikes. In an era of mail/twitter/facebook/blogosphere-driven mass paranoia, it's amazing that the EXACT SAME method has been adopted by gang after thuggish gang (possibly from the same coaching camps) with stunning success. They seem to be following all the mantras of running a business – standard operating procedures, repeatability of processes and good returns on minimal investment.
The modus operandi of these gents (ladies haven't entered the game yet) is quite standard. You are traveling in your car in a fairly isolated or deserted stretch of road thinking about your mounting to-do list or unpaid bills or that wholly unnecessary morning argument with your kids/wife/ boss/boss's wife etc when suddenly you see one or two bikes ahead of you. Now, this by itself is nothing to cause major alarm since in our free country, public roads are constructed for the use and abuse of all and sundry starting with folks who set up football field sized stalls in full regalia (tents, loudspeakers, industrial fans etc) to sell their wares, approximately in the middle of major traffic junctions.
But this time around, you sense something different. After allowing the tolerance for lousy driving, you feel that the guys are coming a little too close for comfort, considering that the road is practically empty, barring the omnipresent stray cows. Before you realize it, you are surrounded by bikers in front and on the sides, all frantically gesturing at you to stop or better still, cut you off by literally blocking the road ahead. You have no option but to pull over. Is this police in mufti (plain-clothes) you wonder and have they found out by sixth sense that you're not carrying your registration certificate, insurance papers AND driving license since you forgot to put them back into the glove compartment after picking it from the last servicing which in fact happened six months back and that can only mean the car has been running minus most of the essential oils including engine, brake, door, steering, ceiling, cooling, heating etc?
Thus distracted, you get out of your car to reason with the police when the bikers reveal their true colors - unbathed, unshaven, wearing chains, random pieces of chunky jewelry augmenting garish shirts with top 2-3 buttons off or just vests, sporting drunk and bloodshot eyes. Guitars in hand, they launch into their first bass riffs and you recognize to your utter horror that you're being subjected to YET ANOTHER rendition of "Smoke on the water", which you've heard in every school/college festival and is so sick off that you violently lunge at them grabbing the nearest rock, fueled by years of suffering all those versions that sounded like a bunch of tomcats getting strangulated and then being thrown in boiling water.
Oh wait, that's the desi rock star stereotype, cut that bit about the guitar and let's proceed with the rest.
The bikers start shouting at you accusing you of a parade of heinous crimes. You'll be informed that their sometime brother/cousin/lover/friend/city councilor/local politician/cook/gardener/significant other AND full-time thug/goonda has been brutally knocked down by you just a few hundred meters back and has to be taken to the hospital right then and there or he/she will bleed to death and you will end up with first-degree, pre-meditated culpable homicide charge in your hands. No bail, no parole, your kids dying shameful deaths being called murderer's progeny and the REVENGE…. You're jolted back into reality.
You're now racking your brain wondering where in heavens you knocked down anyone, let alone fatally, but your conviction level starts flagging thanks to the absolutely certainty on the other side. As you start protesting, you slowly realize that (a) there's no one else in the road (b) these 4-5 guys with the bikes don't look like your average office going white-collar types and importantly (c) they're now slowly beginning to display their collection of implements all of which, singly or collectively can cause unpleasant outcomes on your body parts. To further prove that they're virile men who play by a different set of rules, you may find your bonnet dented with a handy crowbar or your rear view mirror contorting into some as-yet-undefined yogic pose.
If you continue your foolhardy protests, new and interesting charges will be hurled at you like (a) the fact that you rode over the toe/s of one of the folks while trying to dodge them (read: additional compensation) (b) you have hit their bike also and caused arbitrary damage (read: further compensation). Well preserved dents custom created once and used many times for this purpose, would stand mute testimony.
Before you know it, you're ushered back into your car with multiple folks for company, who in normal circumstances would be among the last people on earth you'd invite for a joyride. You're then "driven" to the nearest ATM machines (the downside of carrying four debit cards in the first place), divested of your daily withdrawal limits (or better still the ATM card itself with the PINs) after which the heroes drive off into the sunset (or daylight). As the movie comes to its finish and "The End" sign gets flashed on the screen, you realize that during the entire transaction, there was no further mention of the dying don you're supposed to have cruelly mowed down.
How can you ride on deserted roads to get to your destination faster? Can you avoid loss of cash, body parts, manly pride etc? Pondering over these questions, I came up with some options to pick from:
1. The non-violent way (brief version) – Don't protest, give in, listen to their stories, pander to their whims and testosterones and end up with a body (not just the car's) without too many dents and scratches though you may be poorer by ten to a few hundred thousand.
2. The tear-jerker way - Start protesting, negotiating, talk about your poor finances, massive debts, children dying of starvation, wife suffering from violent mental illness (true or not, this has really good dramatic quality) and generally behave as if you're the screenplay writer for the 2nd half of a Karan Johar movie. You may just be able to negotiate a better deal!
3. The macho-man way (hallucination version) – if you're carrying a weapon of some sort and sincerely believe that you have more male hormones per square inch that rest of the population in the planet put together, you can try this out. I can't guarantee the final results though.
4. The macho-man way (real version) - If the gang is just one or two people and you are a six-footer with a chest size of 46" who spends three hours in the gym daily lifting up a series of extremely heavy, complicated weights meant for various muscle groups, then this is for you. But then, I'm comforted by the fact that you will get married, have kids, lose those muscles and suffer reading the same Sesame Street story for the 17,000th time about how Zoe didn't feel like going to school and you'll happily let her be illiterate if only you can
5. The non-violent way (extended version): here you refuse to get out of the car, period. They can rave and rant, smash your bonnets or twist your rear-view mirror so that it reflects eagles soaring above, but you stay put. If you have the police emergency number and/or friends in the vicinity, you can pass time by calling them all before the inevitable step of getting your side windows smashed followed by step-1, 2 or 3 (read above)
As for me, if I ever end up with these good Samaritans, I've decided to speak in chaste Malayalam and nothing else - no English or Hindi for me and as for my Kannada, the less said the better. I can only think of two outcomes, repeating the story of their poor brother bleeding to death in Kannada, Hindi, broken English and finally in mime format so many times to no avail can potentially make grown men cry. Alternately, they may quickly cut to the chase and get straight to the wallet-snatching/car smashing part. So I may still end up shoving good money at them, but at least after some fun and free entertainment in return, so Malayalam it's going to be. Read more!
Of late, a new kind of menace is wreaking havoc in Bangalore – of extortionists in motorbikes. In an era of mail/twitter/facebook/blogosphere-driven mass paranoia, it's amazing that the EXACT SAME method has been adopted by gang after thuggish gang (possibly from the same coaching camps) with stunning success. They seem to be following all the mantras of running a business – standard operating procedures, repeatability of processes and good returns on minimal investment.
The modus operandi of these gents (ladies haven't entered the game yet) is quite standard. You are traveling in your car in a fairly isolated or deserted stretch of road thinking about your mounting to-do list or unpaid bills or that wholly unnecessary morning argument with your kids/wife/ boss/boss's wife etc when suddenly you see one or two bikes ahead of you. Now, this by itself is nothing to cause major alarm since in our free country, public roads are constructed for the use and abuse of all and sundry starting with folks who set up football field sized stalls in full regalia (tents, loudspeakers, industrial fans etc) to sell their wares, approximately in the middle of major traffic junctions.
But this time around, you sense something different. After allowing the tolerance for lousy driving, you feel that the guys are coming a little too close for comfort, considering that the road is practically empty, barring the omnipresent stray cows. Before you realize it, you are surrounded by bikers in front and on the sides, all frantically gesturing at you to stop or better still, cut you off by literally blocking the road ahead. You have no option but to pull over. Is this police in mufti (plain-clothes) you wonder and have they found out by sixth sense that you're not carrying your registration certificate, insurance papers AND driving license since you forgot to put them back into the glove compartment after picking it from the last servicing which in fact happened six months back and that can only mean the car has been running minus most of the essential oils including engine, brake, door, steering, ceiling, cooling, heating etc?
Thus distracted, you get out of your car to reason with the police when the bikers reveal their true colors - unbathed, unshaven, wearing chains, random pieces of chunky jewelry augmenting garish shirts with top 2-3 buttons off or just vests, sporting drunk and bloodshot eyes. Guitars in hand, they launch into their first bass riffs and you recognize to your utter horror that you're being subjected to YET ANOTHER rendition of "Smoke on the water", which you've heard in every school/college festival and is so sick off that you violently lunge at them grabbing the nearest rock, fueled by years of suffering all those versions that sounded like a bunch of tomcats getting strangulated and then being thrown in boiling water.
Oh wait, that's the desi rock star stereotype, cut that bit about the guitar and let's proceed with the rest.
The bikers start shouting at you accusing you of a parade of heinous crimes. You'll be informed that their sometime brother/cousin/lover/friend/city councilor/local politician/cook/gardener/significant other AND full-time thug/goonda has been brutally knocked down by you just a few hundred meters back and has to be taken to the hospital right then and there or he/she will bleed to death and you will end up with first-degree, pre-meditated culpable homicide charge in your hands. No bail, no parole, your kids dying shameful deaths being called murderer's progeny and the REVENGE…. You're jolted back into reality.
You're now racking your brain wondering where in heavens you knocked down anyone, let alone fatally, but your conviction level starts flagging thanks to the absolutely certainty on the other side. As you start protesting, you slowly realize that (a) there's no one else in the road (b) these 4-5 guys with the bikes don't look like your average office going white-collar types and importantly (c) they're now slowly beginning to display their collection of implements all of which, singly or collectively can cause unpleasant outcomes on your body parts. To further prove that they're virile men who play by a different set of rules, you may find your bonnet dented with a handy crowbar or your rear view mirror contorting into some as-yet-undefined yogic pose.
If you continue your foolhardy protests, new and interesting charges will be hurled at you like (a) the fact that you rode over the toe/s of one of the folks while trying to dodge them (read: additional compensation) (b) you have hit their bike also and caused arbitrary damage (read: further compensation). Well preserved dents custom created once and used many times for this purpose, would stand mute testimony.
Before you know it, you're ushered back into your car with multiple folks for company, who in normal circumstances would be among the last people on earth you'd invite for a joyride. You're then "driven" to the nearest ATM machines (the downside of carrying four debit cards in the first place), divested of your daily withdrawal limits (or better still the ATM card itself with the PINs) after which the heroes drive off into the sunset (or daylight). As the movie comes to its finish and "The End" sign gets flashed on the screen, you realize that during the entire transaction, there was no further mention of the dying don you're supposed to have cruelly mowed down.
How can you ride on deserted roads to get to your destination faster? Can you avoid loss of cash, body parts, manly pride etc? Pondering over these questions, I came up with some options to pick from:
1. The non-violent way (brief version) – Don't protest, give in, listen to their stories, pander to their whims and testosterones and end up with a body (not just the car's) without too many dents and scratches though you may be poorer by ten to a few hundred thousand.
2. The tear-jerker way - Start protesting, negotiating, talk about your poor finances, massive debts, children dying of starvation, wife suffering from violent mental illness (true or not, this has really good dramatic quality) and generally behave as if you're the screenplay writer for the 2nd half of a Karan Johar movie. You may just be able to negotiate a better deal!
3. The macho-man way (hallucination version) – if you're carrying a weapon of some sort and sincerely believe that you have more male hormones per square inch that rest of the population in the planet put together, you can try this out. I can't guarantee the final results though.
4. The macho-man way (real version) - If the gang is just one or two people and you are a six-footer with a chest size of 46" who spends three hours in the gym daily lifting up a series of extremely heavy, complicated weights meant for various muscle groups, then this is for you. But then, I'm comforted by the fact that you will get married, have kids, lose those muscles and suffer reading the same Sesame Street story for the 17,000th time about how Zoe didn't feel like going to school and you'll happily let her be illiterate if only you can
5. The non-violent way (extended version): here you refuse to get out of the car, period. They can rave and rant, smash your bonnets or twist your rear-view mirror so that it reflects eagles soaring above, but you stay put. If you have the police emergency number and/or friends in the vicinity, you can pass time by calling them all before the inevitable step of getting your side windows smashed followed by step-1, 2 or 3 (read above)
As for me, if I ever end up with these good Samaritans, I've decided to speak in chaste Malayalam and nothing else - no English or Hindi for me and as for my Kannada, the less said the better. I can only think of two outcomes, repeating the story of their poor brother bleeding to death in Kannada, Hindi, broken English and finally in mime format so many times to no avail can potentially make grown men cry. Alternately, they may quickly cut to the chase and get straight to the wallet-snatching/car smashing part. So I may still end up shoving good money at them, but at least after some fun and free entertainment in return, so Malayalam it's going to be. Read more!
