Of course our scheduled departure for the village interviews at 9am turned into a 10am departure. The village was about 7km away and right off the main highway. It was arranged that four of us would go to the village on 2 motorbikes. I would ride on the back of my translator’s motorbike and the other two coworkers would ride together. Well my translator is a girl who is, maybe, 21 years old. My boss has known her family for many years and thought having her as my translator was a great idea b/c she can speak English (although not very well) and she is a licensed motor bike drive with her own two wheeler. Well as you are speeding down the four lane highway on the back of a scooter with no helmet, going 30mph as huge cargo trucks wiz by you, knowing that the 20 year old who has your life in her hands has a ‘license’, is not that much of a comfort. It was even less of a comfort on the way back, when we rode on the shoulder of the highway going against traffic for 5km to get to the next opening in the highway divide. This experience was topped off when it started pouring rain and the rain drops were like needles hitting my face. I happened to notice that my trusty driver must have felt the same way b/c she was trying to cover her eyes with one hand while driving the scooter with the other, and turning her head to the side so it would not hurt her face. I definitely had white knuckles from holding on to the back luggage rack for dear life. We then had to stop two times along the way to wait out the heavy rain in shelters along the highway. Needless to say, by the time I made it to the reception hall, it was 245 and I had missed the lunch. Since I was sopping wet and a little beaten down, I didn’t mind coming home, getting dry, and having a cup of hot tea. But I was determined to make it to the evening celebration!
Because of the timing, the only option was to walk the 5km to the wedding hall. At about 5:30 I was leaving the office to meet my roommates at the compound gate and they called to say they didn’t want to walk in the rain. I was a little disappointed, but couldn’t blame them. Just then a rickshaw passed me coming into the compound. This is rare and only happens when someone is taking one back from town. I managed to wave it down and then explain to the driver I wanted to go into town, but first he needed to take me back home so I could pick up my roommates (not a small task when you don’t speak the same language). But I was a woman on a mission. So we swung back to pick up my roommates and after we all piled into the back, the driver couldn’t start the rickshaw back up. Keep in mind we are sitting about 20 yards from our house, but we sat in the rickshaw for about 25 minutes while the driver tried to fix it. He tried hot wiring it, he tried pushing it down the hill to get it started, but nothing. Finally, and very surprisingly, another rickshaw arrived and the three of us piled into the back of that one. We waited for another 10min while both drivers attempted, and failed, to fix the first rickshaw. Finally, it was decided it wasn’t going to start. So I thought clearly solution would be to abandon the broken rickshaw and bring back the needed parts. But apparently I was wrong. Instead our driver drove the whole way into town with his left foot out the side pushing the broken rickshaw from behind (while the first driver steered it). Of course anytime an oncoming car or motor bike approached us, he had to give the broken rickshaw a good shove and fall behind it b/c we were taking up both sides of the road. It was quite a show for all the people along the road. But we made it to the wedding, although half way through.
When we got to the hall we were pulled around the side and directed to sit in the front row. Which I guess was convenient for the photographers and video recorders who then took our picture several times. After the ceremony was over everyone stood up and my roommate and I were taking a few pictures. Seeing this it was insisted we come on stage to get a better picture of the bride and groom as they posed for us. It was all a little surreal and we left shortly after.
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When my mom was pregnant with me, my grandmother took her aside to have a serious hushed conversation. She dragged her to an empty room, looked around to make sure no one was listening, took her gently by the hand, and said, "Marge. I have something very important to talk about with you. I want you to know that it would not be a good idea to name your son Richard. You wouldn't want people making fun of him and calling him RickShaw." My mother heeded this advice, but personally I would be much more worried by "DickShaw" then "RickShaw".
I just watched the Namesake. Did they wear those funny hats?
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