fighting....

waiting, auto rickshaw, somewhere in delhi, 6th april 2012

bargaining is an issue. Always. Costs at least 5 minutes including some brain cells and nervstrings. Win. Maybe 20 ruppees if you are ok, 50 if you are amazing. The winner is always the other.

In india it is common to have tourist and indian prizes. foreigner are tourists. Tourist can be anything and nothing.

The rickshaw drivers are good in looking and reading. Mostly. Depends on the experience, background etc. they know when your are for a short time here, long time, maybe interested, maybe not. pretending to be. not discussable.

I guess I am getting good in reading them. Takes a while till you actually start to look at their faces. Actually a long time. At the beginning you are interested, but too early to understand anything else then indian, dark, dirty, clean. No time for details and distinguishments. Then you do not look anymore, because if you look they try to get you into their car, bicycle. Whatever. And then, hopefully you get over both and look again with a clear looking, ignoring the words, talking at the same time, polite, interested, ignoring the 5 minutes, 5 seconds. Being egoistic.

Than you can read, differences in style, face, in character. I think.

And that is important. Cause than it is about the person. And then the rickshaw driver is not anymore a rickshadriver. And then respect starts. Respect is about honoring the individuality. Say this hundrets of time. So I stop.

My rickshaw driver and me had a huge fight. Way tarin station to old delhi. People in the train said 100, he said 200. I got him down to 150, but somebody else drove with us. For 100. I said he is disrespectful and bastard. He ignored me. Said I do not understand. I shouted. He loved. Then silence. At the end I got out gave him 200, he 50 back. We smiled.

p.s. one thing i always get hugely annoyed. rickshaw driver shout sometimes  Tuck tuck. means ricksahw. in nepal. here they use it because of tourists. they do not mean it in a bad way. to artciulate, distinguish, but also to dertermine.

picture, auto rickshaw, somewhere in delhi, 6th april 2012