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Friday, October 09, 2009

Twisted Lines, Disappearing Acts on the Highway



This photo is for making a statement, sent to me by a friend, whom I trust. So, it’s for a fair use, I guess. The highway functionary in charge of painting this road erred, err, sorry, the tree erred in that it fell on the road and, the functionary just went around it, instead of through it. It is said that in Russia – the pre-glasnost Russia, I mean – a train left a station and never reached its destination. Every apparatchik available was put on the job of tracing the train and they scanned all paper documents, signalling records, eye-witness accounts, every possible way of recording a train’s movement. But nobody thought of walking down the tracks and finding where the train disappeared!

Another friend recently said that in certain stretches of highways in India you are supposed to drive at a constant speed of 80 kmps and should not stop come what may. If you are stopped, you are robbed and no trace will remain of you next morning, and your vehicle is stripped to its bare parts and sold in the auto parts market before sunrise. I think this friend exaggerates. I don’t know, still highways all over the world are dangerous places, in habited by the dregs of humanity. Remember the movie Mad Max, a cult movie of the eighties, also this blogger’s favourite, which shot Mel Gibson to fame.

2 comments:

Unknown said...

great pic! and i love the quirkiness of the person who did this. he knows his countrymen better - lines may come and lines may go, but the tree stays there forever!

Unknown said...

MS, I can see the quirkiness, the humour of this photographer. (Not me!).