Winners and Losers

Morning of June 25th 2008, driving to work and about less than a km away. Stuck in a traffic jam in CV Raman Nagar...

I am at least a couple of signal full-cycles away, before I can turn right. The opposite side traffic is just as bad. As the signal turns green there is a growing urgency for each vehicle to pass through without having to wait for another cycle of the signal.

This is a 2 lane traffic on both directions of the road with concrete blocks for barricade, a few dis-oriented to let some one to cut across or just an example of an ill-supervised municipal work.

To my right I see few school kids trying to cross the road, boys with red shorts and ivory colored shirts and girls with red skirts. All wearing short ties and of course the heavy vintage backpacks - couple of 5 year olds, one 8 year old girl, couple of 5 year old and one more 8 year old boy, all joined hands in that order from left to right. These kids are standing on the other side of the road from my car. When the signal turns green the cars and bikes zip across as if there is on a dedicated run-way. This group had to stay on course, actually stay put in the narrow side-walk and not make the wrong step on the road. After this the traffic thins with just a few miscreants zipping after the red light.

Throughout, the 8 year old girl in the middle of the group is in-charge, fully in control of the situation and confident - she looks carefully on either side, monitors the traffic, stops the other 8 year old boy when he took a wrong step right after signal turned red and pulled the chain back. After some quick analysis, springs into take the decision, pulls the two sides of her control to get past one half of the road. They are mid-way but still have challenges. The kids are now balancing one on each block barely able to balance as the width of the block can just about house the little feat. This side of the traffic is fairly ok as we are still crawling. Makes a quick decision on the fly and pulls across the group to the other side of the road...Wallah mission accomplished. It was quite an excitement to watch this flawless execution.

This girl personified many things - courage, in control (took charge despite there being another kid of the same age group), cool as a cucumber, timely decision making and perfect execution. My hero and winner...

During times when children take school bus or get chauffered to school, a sight like this makes one wonder how much is too much or too little a real world exposure.

Visibly awe-struck observing the 3 minute road-crossing drill and wondering how the kid pulled this one off, I notice something else. The other side of the road has stopped and my side of traffic is moving to grab the opportunity to get past the intersection on green. Couple of bikers in front of me, in their infinite wisdom decide to squeeze through the few dis-oriented barricades, drive on the wrong side of the road and get back in to the lane just to get a few vehicles ahead and not wait for another signal change. Interesting that there are such educated idiots and such inspiring kids all within eye's reach - one exhibiting exemplary leadership qualities with high moral responsibility and the other shamelessly flaunting their indecency and lack of responsibility.

These losers cannot take anything away from the inspiration I drew this morning from a group of kids.