The Yellow Envelope: One Gift, Three Rules, and A Life-Changing Journey Around the World by Kim Dinan

Author:Kim Dinan [Dinan, Kim]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Publisher: Sourcebooks
Published: 2017-04-04T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter 11

We took turns driving in one-hour shifts, the maximum length of time we deemed tolerable before the stress shot our nerves completely. Poor Sarah was stuck behind the wheel as we navigated the terrible traffic of Ahmedabad. She sat stark straight, trying not to stall in the stop-and-go chaos as cars and buses and motorbikes whizzed by us in all directions. From the back of the rickshaw I noticed tears running down her cheeks. Leaning forward, I squeezed her arm for comfort but knew there was nothing I could say. The stress of driving on crazy Indian roads had pushed all three of us to our limits. When I hit my breaking point I cussed. Lesley detached. Sarah cried.

We were driving through Gujarat, an industrial state that we’d been warned to avoid altogether. But we didn’t have the luxury of avoiding Gujarat because we were behind schedule, and we couldn’t afford to pay the hefty fee if we returned our rickshaw late.

The beauty and magic of the first few days of the Rickshaw Run felt like a distant dream. We’d been driving for more than a week, and the novelty of navigating India in a rickshaw had not retained its charm. In Gujarat we saw a different side of India. It was dirty and ugly, and the level of poverty was profound; everywhere people and animals suffered.

We drove past people living on the side of the highway in shanties made from tarps and branches. In a rural village I saw a girl, aged about twelve, skeleton-skinny and working naked in a field. There was garbage everywhere. Cows and goats, their ribs as bowed as cathedral arcs, stood on the roadside chewing plastic wrap and chip bags.

As we drove down a crowded highway, we saw a starving dog standing over the bloated corpse of another dog, eating it. Later, I saw a dog heaving and bleeding on the side of the road, heartbreakingly close to death. Actually, the dead dogs were everywhere. We passed too many to count.

Our collective mood darkened. Each time we ran out of gas, broke down, or got a flat tire, I had to suppress my urge to kick the ever-loving shit out of the rickshaw. I knew exactly where I wanted to kick her, too, right in that mockingly perky orange posterior door.

Many miles passed as I contemplated my years with Brian, and many more passed while I sat suspended in a kind of unthinking awareness, staring out of the rickshaw and dreading my next turn to drive.

India was taking her toll on me. In the mornings, when many Indians burned their garbage, the pollution became so thick and invasive that the caustic smell of scorched plastic burned my throat. I’d developed a hacking cough from our twelve-hour days in the rickshaw.

We’d been subsisting on pineapple and Parle-G biscuits, India’s ubiquitous best-selling cookie, and I hadn’t pooped in nine days. I felt like hell, but I also felt guilty for my minor and temporary suffering.

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