My experiences at the driving school

                When I turned 18 years old on 29^th November, 2007, I took a firm decision to be a legal citizen of India by having a valid photo identity card issued by Government of India. Till then I had no photo identity and was recognized by the Government of India on the grounds of ration card, a domicile certificate and a birth certificate.

            The options in front of me was to obtain a PAN card which I didn’t needed desperately as of now, a passport but a thought cropped up in my mind- what’s the need of a passport when I will be using it only after I get a job, the last option one was to get a driving license which would be of great use to me as well as to my family. The main reason for dad approving the idea of me obtaining a driving license is that his dream will come true of enjoying in the backseat of a car   while I sweat it out on the Indian roads and the standstill traffic with a dumb cow ruminating quietly on the middle of a six lane road unaware of the threat she faces from the monstrous Indian traffic. (One point I would like to mention is that Indian roads have greatly improved and the fact that the National Geographic society had a mention of it in their magazine.) Also my mother equally dreamed me helping her doing daily chores on the bike. Well my intention was that I should be able to drive a car in emergency situations.

            Finally the day dawned when my vacations started in June and I was free to do whatever I wanted after a harrowing one year of engineering. After enquiring a few driving schools in my locality, I enrolled for the one which was nearest to my home. (After all vacations were going on and I couldn’t take the risk of getting up early and destroying my peaceful sleep)

            Day 1: Reporting time 7:00 a.m. I reached at 7:15 a.m. The consequences- their whole schedule got disturbed. Then I came to know that students like me  who were lined up at an interval of 30 minutes, and as I was late by 15 minutes they too got late by 15 minutes and I was the first trainee student of the day. Many students were office goers who went late to the office because of a lazy oaf like me. I got a warning from the receptionist of the diving school to be on time the next day.

            I forgot to tell you what I learnt on the first day. The driving master came with the key and i followed with him to the Maruti 800 car. He told me to remain calm, adjust my seat and seat belt and slowly introduced me to all the aspects of a car. The ABC’s, that is the pedals, accelerator, brake and the clutch, how do they work, how to start the car, the various functions on the signs on the dash board of the car, and even how to adjust the side mirror of car. Then I started the car. Frankly speaking on that day I was just pushing the accelerator and the steering wheel while the controls of the gear clutch and the breaks were in his hand. I was observing him how he changes the gear and applies the break. I quickly grasped it as I had seen my father doing this for many years. Then he gave the controls of the car to me and I drove it in the best manner I can. In all it was a good day.

            Day 2: The instructor changed and he directly told me to drive. I told him that it was my second day and kindly requested him to explain again how to start a car. I think the guy was having a bad morning and he hurriedly explained me and off we went. On that day I had problems changing the gear from 2^nd to 3^rd and vice versa. After getting a hearing from him I was still uneasy in changing the gears and was not satisfied with the 2^nd day at the school.

The remaining 18 days went smoothly with me learning the various skills of driving a car.

In the next post I would be sharing my experiences of how to drive a car and the problems I had encountered in driving the car.

  

Earth

Just two days before, the Kepler was launched by the NASA. The main mission of Kepler was to find whether there are any planets in galaxy which can support the human life.

But the question is that can’t we keep Earth, our planet a little more habitable and peaceful instead of exploiting our beloved Mother.

We all in some or the other way are exploiting Earth for our benefit. We have become so selfish and cruel that we no longer care about Mother. We are indirectly decreasing the lifespan of Earth. We are acting as if we no longer consider the benefit of future generation. Are the present generations of people trying to be in the history books to be called as destroyers of earth by the future generation?

Look at the present scenario, everywhere there are some kind of disasters happening at every nook and corner of earth. Be it the natural calamities like earthquakes, floods, melting of glaciers, extinction of species everyday or tsunamis. They are slowly taking the toll on us and making the earth a dangerous place to live. But don’t forget that we are also creating manmade calamites like constantly exploiting the belly of earth for more minerals, wars, nuclear bomb testing, building dams on rivers and changing their course and polluting the environment to name a few. They are just a small portion of things we are doing to degrade earth. There are many things we are doing that made NASA to send Kepler on this mission.

Can’t we stop it?

Can’t all the world leaders come together and find a solution to problem before it gets out of our hand?

We can do it. We can start from our part to stop this degradation of earth by doing simple steps such as recycling plastic, using public transport to name a few. We can try our best to stop it and maintain the Earth’s ecological balance. After all we are humans; we should have the will power to prevent this type of calamity.

I hope the day doesn’t come that we are celebrating that the Kepler has found a planet like earth and we are leaving in batches to go to that planet. After all I feel that no other planet is as beautiful and hospitable like Earth.

But my good wishes are with Kepler to find another planet just in case………………….