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Bhutta Walla and Jhini and me eating corn.

Road Tripping in India...

So you haven't really lived till you have taken a road trip some where, where rules just don't exist. Where everyone is in a hurray to get to their final destination. Where the highway is a road that is wide enough to hous two lanes, but it doesn't really matter which lane you are in - people, cars, animals are everywhere and the biggest trucks you have ever seen are on the road. Where every minute you feel like you are playing chicken with oncoming traffic...then you stop - the world flys by you, cars honking and you are sitting by the side of the road eating corn. haha! India has a beautiful country side, which makes you feel calm, I can't say the same about driving! haha! I have road tripped in Nepal, that was fun - scary and fun at the same time - India is much better than that. There are the occasionaly rest stops - dhabba - where people can get a nice hot meal that is sometimes laden with flyies, but yet it is the best food you have eaten, other people stop on the side of the road and create their own rest stop. This usually occurs when they get hungary and see someone selling corn on the side of the road. During our journey we stopped at such a place - the corn man's advertisement is simple, five pieces of cooked corn in a bucket filled with dirt, he cooks the corn on an open fired created with one piece of thick wood - essentially creating an oven by digging a small hole in the ground and keeping the wood hot enough to cook the corn - then he roast the corn, places a simple mixture of lemon and spices together and spreads it over the corn like butter...and boy does it taste good! Bhutta or corn is in season - so on every open shoulder you will find a bhutta walla (corn person). It is awesome.

This is my niece and I eating - enjoying the corn that was just freshly cooked no more than five minutes before - we chose the corn, he cooked it, we ate and then paid him...a perfectly fair transaction for which all the money goes to him and his family. On our way back, we saw our bhutta walla, all his corn was gone - within the day he was able to sell all his corn and went home with just some money in his pocket. The next day he will do the same - bring the same amount, maybe more, or as much as he can carry - he will then make corn and wait for hungary customer to drive by and stop by his stand. He knows he has competition from other bhutta walla's, but he also knows that the demand is high - so people will come...

from the corn man, we made the rest of the drive - it was fun and scary - a constant in and out, passing people, snaking our way through the roads of india to our final destination, my aunt and uncles house. To go the 85 KM it took us 2.5 hours - along the road to slow people down were speed bumps and tolls. Gas stations now exist on the roads, 7 years before you would not have seen that. The scenery is still the same - miles and miles of open fields, people, cows, dogs, donkey's , horses, and goats are wandering the street - all of which you have to look out for so you don't hit them. Cars narrowly each other and the other people on the road. it is amazing how things operate. it will never cease to amaze me.

time to go...

till later -

posted by ravi @ 9:52 PM