Ambulances - please make way!!!

One of the most painful sights for me is when Ambulances with those flashing blue lights are stuck in a traffic jam with no where to go, helpless relatives looking as helpless as ever frustrated to the core and looking for some consideration by the people in the traffic.

Once on Residency Road, there was a huge traffic jam in front of Mayo Hall. I and a few others in front of the Ambulance made conscious efforts to get out of the way and finally made some progress by actually getting down from the bike and pushing it aside and not moving into the readily available space in front of us. A jerk in a Silver Santro had the audacity to cut right across the Ambulance and drive into the space created as though all of us had put in the effort just to make way for him. He probably was trying to show off to his Girl Friend sitting in the passenger seat telling her that this was his kingdom and the people making way were his subjects. But our prince got exactly what he deserved. A thousand curses / gaalis by onlookers and especially by the relatives of the patient in the ambulance. Some of us were even tempted to pull him out and give him a sound thrashing - but we avoided it so that we don't cause further delays for the patient in the Ambulance. Hope our man/woman made it that day.

Contrast this with the way it works in the US. If you don't stop whatever or wherever you are and make way for the Ambulance, you'll probably be booked and maybe jailed as well. And the best part is people don't make way for fear of getting booked. Most of them do it out of the sheer compassion. And seriously this is one case of treat others as you expect yourself to be treated. Hope the jerk that cut across the Ambulance gets his due. :p

There was this Ambulance driving in the wrong direction on the same Residency Road but slightly further up that Road, closer to St. Josephs School. A Traffic Cop (MAMA) stops the driver of the Ambulance and asks him why he's driving on the wrong side when there was no patient inside. :-) It took a lot of convincing for this dull-headed Policeman to realize that it was an emergency because the Ambulance was going to pick-up a patient and this was probably more of an emergency since the Patient hadn't probably even received any first aid of any sort. He finally relented. Hope the delay didn't take another life.

So please make way for any and all Ambulances even if it means missing a stupid meeting at work by 10 minutes. It might be you or your loved ones in it on another day.