Narrow escape

They must have been drunk! Otherwise, why would they be kissing on a moving motorcycle? Thanks to the ever growing number of Sekuwa stalls along the sides of Itahari-Tarahara highway.

It happened a few days ago. My wife and I were going to Dharan with two heavy bags on my motorcycle. As we reached a few metres beyond Halgada Chowk, a motorcycle coming from the opposite direction (from Tarahara) seemed out of control. It visibly headed towards us, and was sure to collide with ours. I had only two or three seconds before I could decide what to do to avoid the collision.

Frantically, I blew the horn but the couple did not care. The motorcycle was sure to hit us if our motorcycle kept moving ahead along the same lane (the left) of the road. Therefore, I swerved the handle to the right and took the wrong lane. The kissing couple's bike swiftly passed away slightly kissing my bike's left leg-guard. I was so shocked that I could not think immediately what to do. I could not speak a word for a few minutes. My wife was furiously cursing them while they whisked away not knowing the world around them.

I should have been able to stop them and slap the motorcyclist. Crazy rascals!

On this time’s visit to Letang, to my parents-in-law’s, we (my wife and I) didn’t see some familiar faces at the house. They were the lodgers at my parents-in-law’s house when we last visited. Instead, we saw some new faces in the tenement rooms. Some of them were bright and some others were gloomy.

On the second day, my mother-in-law shared a gloomy story about one of the gloomy faces we had seen the previous day on the floor below. In a room, there were a skinny pale-faced lady, a fat brown complexioned burly man and a couple of elderly man and woman. The skinny lady was not more than 30, but she had many wrinkles in her face. She remained in her bed almost all the time, and we didn’t see her come out of the room. She spoke softly. Actually, she looked very weak.

My in-laws were well-informed about their plight that the woman was suffering from her both kidneys’ failure. Unfortunately, their former house lady had evacuated them from her house thinking that the patient was going to die. Moreover, my mother-in-law was informed about them by the same house lady. But they had been lying to her saying that the lady was suffering from chronic gastritis.

It’s a superstitious belief rampantly found in the Nepalese society that if a person dies, the house becomes impure. Therefore, a house lady often treats the seriously ill renters inhumanely, and expels them out of her house fearing that they might die any moment. But my mother-in-law seemed not moved by the fear psychosis of the possible death at her house. Rather she sounded firm in belief that everyone has the right to die peacefully if one has to. I read her mind and found to be sure that she was not, not at any cost, going to ask the sufferers to leave her house just because the cruel death was lurking above the skinny lady’s head. I felt proud of my mom-in-law for her kind heart and great conviction. :) 

The recklessness of the bus driver

The bus was running almost at the speed of 50 kms/hr. On my bike it’s a great speed, but on the bus I felt very comfortable. Moreover, there was no crowd inside the bus as usual.

When the bus reached beyond Tarahara chowk, the driver seemed relaxed. He took out a mineral water bottle from a box and washed his both hands. He looked as if he had forgotten he was driving because he had released both his hands from the steering wheel. He was doing it as the bus was running and taking turns in the Panipiya locality, the most dangerous place notoriously known for accidents and killings.

The escalating heat of the summer day could be felt inside. Pabitra was hanging her head down in her drowsiness. She was unaware of all these things happening around, but I was in a great discomfort. I was watching the driver’s mischief.

After he had wiped off his hands with a rag, the driver took out a tobacco packet and started preparing it for putting inside his mouth. He took almost five minutes to finish this act. Meanwhile, he was supporting the steering wheel time to time to take the turns and to avoid the collision with other vehicles. Otherwise his hands would be off the steering wheel.

At the taps in front of the water reservoirs at Panipiya, there were some bus workers washing buses and their hardly covered bodies. Our driver bade them hilariously as they replied in the same spirit with gestures.

I was very much worried about the safety of the bus passengers until we reached Bargachhi chowk, Dharan, where we got off the bus.