Traffic

Moving through Delhi requires navigating a writhing swarm of cars, cycle rickshaws, buses, pedestrians, trucks, motorbikes, strange automobiles of various kinds, cows, stray dogs, bicycles, and auto rickshaws. Vehicles drive on the left side of the road, but it's not uncommon to see people defying law and good sense driving on the right side of the road against traffic (this is particularly scary when you're a passenger in a cycle rickshaw facing four lanes of fast moving traffic). Lanes may as well not exist, and every car had dents and scratches from minor run-ins on the road. People don't use turn signals and instead maneuver wherever they can find the smallest bit of space. Vehicles (and people) are routinely only inches apart. Every day I'm convinced that this will be the day we will get in some kind of horrific traffic accident (this is mostly me being melodramatic, but honestly it is terrifying sometimes. The roads are often filled with potholes, and I've been slightly afraid that my rickshaw is about to tip over on several occasions. Today I tried to take a video of our commute home from our friends' neighborhood, called Nehru Place, but traffic was remarkably light and it's not that interesting. I'll take another one on a more standard heavy-traffic day, but this will at least answer some people's questions (hi Rach!) about what a rickshaw is and such.