It turns out that this happened to be a 2-day weekend for me and because they are so rare I was compelled to take advantage of it. The only other 2-day weekend we’ve had was the first weekend I was here. That weekend I tried to make it to Pondicherry, but alas was thwarted. I had made lodging arrangements, so all I needed was transportation. Since our base is on the outskirts of Chennai, that can be hard to come by. It also happened to be a big festival weekend because Friday was Eid (the end of Ramazan) and Saturday was a Hindu holiday celebrating Ganesh. That made it nearly impossible to arrange a taxi. No taxi, no problem… at least that’s what I was told by some seemingly reliable sources on base. They arranged an auto (rickshaw) ride to the bus station and convinced me that taking a bus would be no problem. It would be significantly cheaper than a taxi and pretty comfortable. I’m not sure what buses they were thinking of because nearly all the buses I’ve seen look anything but comfortable. At any rate, they told me the buses run every 20-30 minutes to Pondicherry. That seemed like a great way to go, so I hopped in the auto and was whisked away to the bus station. After stopped a couple times to ask directions, my driver told me the next bus wouldn’t leave for another 3 hours. At least that was what I understood him to be saying. Frustrated, I got out of the rickshaw with hopes that someone might be able to help me out. I spoke to a few police officers, but they were not able to give any good advice. After some time, I thought maybe I’d try to catch a train because the bus station is conveniently located right near the train station. There was a train going to Pondicherry, but you had to buy your ticket in advance and there was a long cue (line) and the train would be departing in 5 minutes or so. With that plan foiled, I decided to call a classmate of mine who was my babysitter that night. He offered to pick me up, but I politely declined, still hoping that there might be a chance I could get to Pondi. I spent another hour or so wandering around the chaos that defines public transportation centers here and happened to stumble upon a taxi. It also happened to be a reliable company that I had used before, so I approached the driver and offered him 2,000 rupees to take me to Pondicherry. He had just dropped off a couple and after some bartering agreed to my price. I got into the car and we drove off. The problem was that he pulled a u-turn and started heading the wrong way! I called him on it and he said he needed gas. I asked him why we turned around for gas when there were gas stations aplenty on the way out of town. He communicated that he needed to go to the airport to fill-up with premium gas. This displeased me greatly as driving to the airport was a detour of at least 40 minutes. With a 2+ hour drive to Pondi, I was not okay with that. After continuing to express my frustration and finding that it was falling on deaf ears, I decided I was going to get out of the cab as soon as possible. I considered hopping out while we were stopped at a light, but with all the traffic thought that would not be wise. Instead, I waited until we got to the gas station. After we pulled up to the pump, he turned around and asked for 200 rupees (which apparently is typical if a taxi or auto driver is getting gas). At that point, I said “I’m not paying you and I’m leaving” and got out of the taxi. Somewhere between his shock and the fact that he was in the wrong, he did not chase me down. Fortunately, I found a very nice nearby hotel and was able to arrange a taxi back to the base. It wasn’t a cheap taxi ride, but I was just glad to get back to the base safely. So that brings me to this weekend, which you can read about under the title, “Pondi… take 2”.
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