I JUST DROVE THROUGH KTM!!!!!!
Check it, ya’ll, manche haru (peoples), I just drove for the first time in the crazy streets of Kathmandu!!!
I am so proud of myself because in all my years of coming to Nepal, I didn’t think I’d ever want to, or have the ability to navigate through the chaotic, lawlesss streets in Nepal.
But today, after going to the Immigration office of Nepal, I asked my Uncle if I could drive, because I’m going to have to learn sometime.
I’m so excited, I can feel the rush going through, though it’s not like watching a supsense/horror Japanese flick, more like a slight nervousness…
For those of you who do not know what I’m talking about, the streets here, like everything else, is unorganized. Very, very few traffic lights, (seems like a couple more since I was here last), people coming at you from all sides, in cars, motorcycles, pedestrians, animals, trucks, electric 3 wheeled tuks….and whatever else you can possibly think of that could cross your path in the streets of Kathmandu.
I drove from the gas station from the middle of the city, which I guess would be where Singh Durbar is (in front of that, is a temple and the gas station is next to it), all the way home, through the narrow gulleys of Thamel, to Chhatrapati!
There are huge traffic circles, and I was trying use the turn signal, which is on on my left hand side usually and the windshield wipers started flying. I tried to fix it, but I still needed to get to the right hand side of the road before the next traffic circle divider thingie, and again, out of habit, I hit the wrong side.
First of all I’m driving on the wrong side of the car, or actually, the right side of the car. And then, the cars are mostly, if not all, manual transmissions. Well, I got the manual transmissions down, but driving on the opposite side, was a bit daunting for me in the past.
I tried to drive once, in our old Fiat car, which had no powersteering and I think was a bit rough to shift, and my Uncle (we were coming from the Immigration office incedently) told me to pull over after about 300 feet from the office grounds. I thought maybe something was wrong with the car, but no, it was his stress level that he couldn’t take.
So, this time, he told me to go slow, (I was only in 2nd gear) and when I hit what I thought was the turn signal, and trying to watch for traffic coming out of everywhere, I kept hitting the windshield wiper, thinking it was the turn signal, and almost hit this guy who was walking across the road.
So, I only went up to 3rd gear most of the time, he kept telling me to go slower and stop honking so much. That’s the other thing about traffic, the incessant horns, that are high pitched and are constantly blaring. Quite annoying and can make even the Dalai Lama become aggro.
“You don’t have to keep honking, just because you don’t honk in the states, you are making up for that here!?” he said as he chuckled.
I said, “Get out the way, man, cause I’m hell on wheels! GET OUT MY WAY!”
But I was honking so that the bus in front and to the slight right of me, would know that I was there, so that in case he (and I can say he, because only men drive buses) wanted to meander in front.
Then I had to drive through the unpaved, pot holed, stony, rickshaw laden and foot traffic streets of the small gulleys or alleys.
That was fun! I never knew it could be so fun, except for that taxi driver behind me who wouldn’t lay off his damn horn the whole drive through Thamel.
I told my Uncle that the clutch must wear out easily since you are constantly have to be in first just to get out of the gulleys from the neighborhoods.
So, he said we have to look into getting an international driver’s license for me. Man, I’m so happy that I can drive now, because taking taxi’s are getting to be quite expensive now. Even while driving as were stuck in the usual sections of Thamel, I kept thinking of the meter, and thought, hey wait I’m driving, there’s no meter.
Watch out Kathmandu, cause hell on wheels is coming!
MUAAAHAUAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHA
HA.
Tags: cars, driving, Kathmandu
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