Motorbiking Part 2

When Sunil, one of our guards, got married last year, he received a new motorbike as part of the dowry from his wife's family. His happiness with the bike rivaled his happiness with the marriage, and I could see how proud of it he was when he showed it to me. When he invited me for a ride I couldn't resist.

We set off from the house one night — him in front with motorbike helmet, me holding on in back. After wizzing around the area, we reached some quieter backstreets. At this point we swapped places and he let me take control of the bike. It was good fun to ride, but after cruising for a bit I made a critical mistake. As I came up to a main road I braked to check for traffic before crossing. I forgot that an intersection is not the place to slow down — it is the place to lean on your horn as you blaze across and continue on your merry way.

My pause had given the man in uniform on the corner an opportunity and he waved at us to stop. He sauntered up, looked at me driving in a borrowed bicycle helmet and undershirt, and said, "driver's license." My instinct told me it was a good time to keep my mouth shut. Sunil started arguing in Hindi with the supposed policeman. At fairly regular intervals, when the policeman had heard enough of Sunil's excuses, he turned to me anew to demand with a sour expression, "driver's license." But I wasn't foold by his charms and kept my mouth shut.

After several minutes of the same, he finally turned away and waved us on. A block down the road Sunil said to me, "In India, anything is possible," and we burst out laughing. It turned out the man wasn't a traffic policeman after all but part of the "home guard" and had no legal authority to fine motorists. I then understood the disgusted look on his face as we pulled off — he had failed to convince us to pay him a bribe, a skill all government employees in Delhi should excel at.