Truck Drivers, or Give People a Chance
I was, like most of us, brought up to believe that truck drivers are the most badass people in the world. They are crude, lack manners and mercy, drink and drive dangerously, have no families waiting back at home, would squash your car to pulp if you came in their way, blah blah. I had no reason to believe in the above, but it had been somehow passed from common knowledge into mine. Now one day, back in my college days, I had gone to Haldwani for some work and got late. My college, at Pantnagar, was some 30 KMs away, and the last train had left half an hour ago. There were no buses at night for Bareilly, which could drop me at the University gate, and the late night buses to Delhi took the Tanda bypass at night, which would drop me some 5 KMs from the college. So although instinctively I found hitching a ride from a truck at night dangerous, I had no option but to try for it. I gave my hand to a few but all were going to the local mandi a few KMs ahead. About half a