CRASH!

a.k.a. Oh my God- these Americans are lunatics!

So, to continue with the theme of the week – rickshaws – we had an exciting incident today. Jon and Sam were riding home from our bangla class with Taborok (we haven’t gotten a rickshaw for him yet- we are going on Friday when we have more time to haggle) and we were just about to turn onto our street when CRASH! A car smashes right into us. Jon and Sam go flying, the rickshaw goes down and within seconds Jon is up and banging on the back of the car to stop. He then proceeds to get in front of the car and stop them from leaving. The rickshaw is damaged beyond drivability (both wheels are bent up) and, of course, the car is just fine. So Jon and Taborok are over yelling at the car while Sam stays by the broken rickshaw and rallies the crowd on behalf of Taborok. In all honesty though it was the car’s fault – Taborok had clearly made a gesture that he was turning and the car just thought he could bully through. So after a sizable crowd had amassed and Jon and Sam had made quite a scene (Taborok was yelling too…not just us!) Sam went over to where Jon and Taborok were still arguing with the driver of the car and the owner/passenger. (In the back of the car were two ladies that we’re so scared out of their minds that in retrospect we kind of feel bad for them.) Regardless, when Sam walked over and saw that they had only given Taborok 150 taka for the damage (about 2 dollars!), she kind of lost it. (Not that Jon hadn’t already kind of lost it by blocking the car and yelling (in english) that this was the car’s fault. So Sam proceeded to yell at the ladies in half bangla/half English, Jon was yelling in English, and Taborok was yelling in bangla and the scene was probably pretty scary for the car. Even more chaotic was that we were all kind of mad about separate things: Jon was mad that the rickshaw was broken, Taborok was mad that Jon had gotten hurt with a (minor) scrape on his foot, and Sam was outraged that they had tried to get away with giving Taborok only 150 taka. There was also a good sized crowd around that, as mentioned earlier, Sam was adamantly keeping on our side. So then Sam suggested we might need to get the police, which probably scared the pants off the car owner/driver and they gave us address and number information and Taborok seemed satisfied that this would get resolved. We conceded to let them go. It turns out they live around the corner from us!

What’s funny about this is a few things. First, Jon and Sam basically went crazy on these people - mostly because in that moment they represented all the greedy rich assholes that drive around in big cars and harass rickshaw-wallahs (and we all know that Jon and Sam are the friend-of –the-rickshaw-wallah and downtrodden in general). This feeling was further established when they offered a ridiculously low amount to Taborok for the damage. Second, Jon and Sam only knew about 40-50% of what was going on most of the time. There was a lot of confusion and it is highly likely that our aggressive involvement added even more confusion – it definitely added to the spectacle. Third, it was raining, so were soaking wet during all this. Fourth, while we were content to stand around even after the car drove off to make sure everyone there knew we were right, Taborok was the one who was like ‘Well, I’ve got to get this rickshaw back to the company so I can get back in time to get you to the school to get Atticus.” (Good thing he was looking out for him!) He has probably also dealt with a wreck before, but this was new and exciting for Jon and Sam! We also thought that Taborok was probably like ‘Geez, these guys are nuts’ (although he didn’t seem that way all, he was pissed too, but it would be funny if it were the case). Fifth, Jon and Sam did the EXACT opposite of what the embassy "security advice" tells you do in case of an accident- they say if an accident occurs try to get away as soon as possible and definitely avoid crowds that form. Um...well, that's not our style.

Well, later Taborok came back on a new rickshaw and he said everything was fine and taken care of. So the drama was over. We actually saw the car with our neighbors/the perpetrators in it on our way to Atticus’ school, and we told Taborok but he was like “It’s all ok, it’s finished” and despite the joy of dwelling on our exciting encounter, we had to move on.

I think this incident is just one of many things that confuse people in our neighborhood about us. We just don’t really act like most bideshis and we don’t act like most rich people (usually those two are one and the same). Ah well, after a year of observing the freaky Christiansen family I’m sure everyone will have a thoroughly confused notion of what Americans are like, but at least they will have gotten to see something besides drunk Marines harassing ladies outside of the American Club and a bunch development aid workers telling them the cure to all poverty is free market capitalism and speaking English.

So, fortunately we didn’t buy a rickshaw yesterday. I can’t even imagine how pissed we would have been if it had been the rickshaw we just bought! Perhaps we’ll see in the future…