The Lone Bike Rider

Long, long ago,in the land of latex and lakes, with hilly terrain, with gender difference to the maximum it was only the sterner sex who perched on the drivers seat.The long winding narrow roads going up and coming down had a serpentine look. The vehicles flashed by at breakneck speed whether it was the Fast passenger of KSRTC with limited stops or the local Lovely, Daisy, Unnikrishnan and others or, the bikes with mundu or lungi riders or, the few high end cars or jeeps driven by good looking, well- groomed, young or old men from respectable khandans or others, with starch stiff clothes which made looking sideways or backwards an effort without a total sideways body movement .

The few houses in large tracts of red colored soil dotted with rubber trees, cocoa, mango, jack-fruit, coconut trees with black pepper vines winding round them was a visual treat. The density of houses by roadside increased only as you neared the town. 

The narrow road was always the monopoly of the gentlemen, as the fairer sex only belonged to  Mills and Boons tales and were not conditioned to drive on these roads. Now this was a myth soon to be rewritten by the young ladies of 2YK who went out to study and came back with good driving skills to traverse on roads of any kind and on different types of vehicles to save on time and to get rid of the dependency to be chaperoned.

It must have been early eighties when a city bred girl made inroads into a rural household bordering on the limits of town and village thought it was time saving to continue her riding skills of the metropolitan city. The walk up and down on the hilly terrain to reach the bus stop left her huffed and puffed only to miss the bus which left a minute ago. No short cut or any other way.Maybe holding bag and sari knee length to cross the fields which would land you in water with any false move which was any day ruled out.

Now, riding a Bajaj Chetak and zipping through was neither a welcome sight nor welcomed at all. It meant tearing through male bastions. As she went by, some hooted and whistled which gradually stopped. The buses deliberately pushed her to the side of the road with no riding space, but she continued never afraid .She never violated rules at all.She serviced her vehicle regularly and always ensured breaks were in good condition. Gradually she became a face on the road riding as any other.

She remembered one day when the road was empty, as she was riding she heard the sound of a Bullet behind with its typical noise with high rear view mirrors and an elderly Kottayam Kunjachan  in nice silk jubba and white mundu with the trade mark sun glasses, a thick chain, honking endlessly behind.He appeared old enough to be her father.

There was no traffic front or behind with space as wide as a bus width to overtake. But he chose not to and took endless pleasure honking behind, the regular MCP that he was. The entire 4 km stretch ,he rode behind, honking till  the city limits when he overtook and went his way.Some real pleasure he experienced because the girl continued without any hurry maintaining the same speed, unperturbed without looking behind.

The day was not far off, when there was an encounter face to face. Both were familiar faces as in those days wearing helmets was a rarity.There was no place to hide and the glasses did not help to mask the shameful face as he squirmed to extend a cheque for encashment . It was fun to see  him

wanting the earth to cave in and hide as he made a hasty exit.