We Should Blame Ourselves First

Yesterday, I was standing at a road crossing waiting for the signal to turn green to cross the road. There was a “No U Turn” sign at the crossing and couple of traffic police. Then a taxi comes and wants to take a right turn, from the look of it because the passanger couple wanted him to. The traffic police stops them of course. Then the male passanger, who was dressed really well with formal shirts (If you met him any random day he’d introduce himself as a gentleman I’m sure), starts arguing with the traffic police. His point being he’s taken right on that crossing before so he can take right again.

The traffic police shows him the sign ans ask them to go ahead and take the next right. But the passanger keeps arguing, and slowly gets angry. His wife/gf/co-passanger slowly joins him and supports him. The traffic police starts insisting that they don’t argue and take the next turn. The passanger starts getting really angry this time and starts talking is loud voice.

The taxi driver then realizes that he can’t take a right, so he starts picking up the speed. But the passanger is really furious by then. And just as the taxi starts picking up speed, he says something really offensive to the traffic police. The police, hearing that, shouts at the taxi driver and asks him to stop the taxi so that he can do something about it. The driver doesn’t stop and they speed away.

Now think a little, I’m sure you’ve seen something similar happen around you before. It’s clearly written that you can’t take a U turn. Or in your case it might have been a “No Parking” sign or something similar. What did the traffic police do to deserve bad-mouthing? Just because you’ve taken U turn on that crossing before, does that give you right to violate a traffic sign? And say offensice things to someone who stands at the crossing of a road trying to keep your journey smoother all day long?

What really bothers me is that these people who wears nice cloths and speaks nice language behaves like this while on road. These people cannot follow a simple traffic rule and don’t even know how to talk to another person. Any given day that traffic police works harder than you and me. They deserve more respect from us than you can think of. Let’s just try to give them that. Look around you, you’ll find such people around you all the time. You neighbours, relatives, acquaintances. If you see something like that and have a chance to speak some sense, please do.