We have commented
before about how India is a land of contradictions in nearly any way you can
imagine: rich and poor; beauty or the Taj and other magnificent structures and
hovels that are in complete disorder; spectacular natural beauty and
desolation; love of rules and order and chaos. Well, today I am going to start
out by talking about another of those contradictions.
The US has
anti-smoking commercials, but they are nothing compared to the frequency and in
some cases their graphic depiction of physical consequences of smoking. Any
time someone smokes on TV there is a banner that runs stating neither the
actors nor the channel endorse smoking. At the movies, before the movie starts
and during intermission (every movie has intermission) anti-smoking ads are
run. The government has raised taxes to an amazingly high level and raises them
with each budget cycle. They walk that fine line of officially discouraging
smoking and taxing it as much as possible without really decreasing the number
of smokers (wouldn’t want to lose that tax revenue). I don’t know if smokers
face the public stigma smokers in the US face. Like in the US, smoking is
banned in all public spaces but there are some private buildings where
companies still allow smoking in individual offices.
It’s not just cigarettes
either, paan masala or paan (traditionally betel leaves and areca nut; now
betel leaves mixed with or without areca nut and chewing tobacco, coconut and
fruit wrapped in leaves) has been used for years as a stimulant. Its use is
generally considered vulgar and unclean because the juice of the mix with
tobacco is spat out periodically as it is chewed. Tobacco and paan stands are
most often found where laborers live and work. However, some fine restaurants serve paan
(without the tobacco) as an after dinner treat to assist with digestion and
increase energy. I guess without the tobacco, you can at least swallow the
juice without getting nauseated, so the spitting of the juices isn’t an issue. I
have seen no one smoking cigars or pipes, although there must be some who do.
In certain parts of society, hookahs or water pipes are popular, but there is
no public smoking in those cases as hookah smoking occurs in private residences
or speciality “bars”.
Clearly tobacco plays
a mixed place in society. Officially sanctioned but privately supported.
Nothing typifies this more than an article I read in Times of India this past
week. As noted tobacco is officially vilified. However, ITC, Imperial Tobacco
Company, was named as the most admired company in India. To be totally fair,
ITC has now expanded far beyond its tobacco roots (see what I did there?). It
is now a vast conglomerate that has companies in tea, hotels, greeting cards,
chemicals, and who knows what all. There is not much really simple in India: a
land of contradictions.
There is one more slight
contradiction I want to talk about. We have written before about traffic and
the craziness that can arise. Friday we were on our way to dinner with our
friends the Slocombes when we came upon and passed the horse and cart in the
pictures below. You do see animal drawn carts fairly frequently but in this
case, as you can see, the horse was running at a full gallop, which is not
usual. An $80,000 Mercedes Benz in one lane; a horse drawn cart in the other.
Yup, contradictions.
Now here is Rae. No
contradictions there, she is just simply wonderful!
In past blontries we’ve
talked about Phil’s adventure at the hospital and my resulting aversion to ever
going there. I frequently say “if
something happens, just let me die, don’t take me to the hospital”. Well related to that, I’ll be adding my two cents
worth about getting to the hospital. Most
ambulances are about the size of a Toyota van, a few are larger and more like
the ones we see in the US. All
ambulances are usually marked and have a siren, but not all have flashing
lights. With no flashing lights it is
hard to figure out where they are sometimes.
Here’s the thing that I find so interesting, and usually sad. There are no laws in place, or if there is a
law it’s never respected or enforced, requiring cars to move over and let them
through.
Cars can be broken
down on the road and somehow cars part, make their way around them and move
on. But when there’s a siren behind them
they do not budge. There is simply no
respect for the fact that there might be someone dying inside that ambulance,
and time is critical. There was a video
that came out that showed the problem of trying to get to the hospital via
ambulance. There have been cases of
ambulances not even being able to get out of there parking place to go on a
call. Drivers think nothing of parking
in front of an ambulance, thus blocking them in. Ambulance drivers can do nothing but wait until
the owner returns and moves their car. Sometimes they’ve sat there for up to ½ hour
waiting to begin their call. As a result
of all this disregard many people die just trying to get to the hospital.
Many times I’ve heard
a siren behind us for quite a long time before it ever makes its way to us. I’ve
commented multiple times to our driver about how terrible it is that people don’t
make way for ambulances. I’ve noticed
that he tries to get us moved so we are not the ones blocking an ambulance. Don’t know if he does this if I’m not in the
car, but I’m glad he does it when I’m in the car. I know that if he were to pull over prior to
the ambulance reaching us the space he created would simply be filled in by
multiple other cars. So, we have to wait
for the ambulance to reach us before we attempt to move for it. Sometimes that still doesn’t help as other
cars just pull into the space we’ve created.
Sad and frustrating. Poor
ambulance drivers and poor passengers.
I’ve learned that it is
slow, if not impossible to change generations of behaviour and attitude. So, my parting words are, “don’t take, or try
to take, me to the hospital, just let me die”.
I’d rather die at home than in an Indian ambulance stuck on the
road.
With that cheery
note, I wish you all…
Namaste.
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