India On Three Wheels

It had just topped 45 °C, the sun was blazing high above us in a clear blue sky and a hot wind was blowing across the cracked dry plain drying out my eyeballs so I could barely see the potholes in the road as I drove. My kidneys felt bruised from the constant pounding of the rickshaw and my back, as well as the rest of my body were aching nearly as much. We were somewhere out in the middle of the desolate Uttar Pradesh countryside nearly out of gas, with only a liter of water between us. We had not seen a village, mud hut or another individual for miles. It was times like these that I wondered how I had gotten myself involved in such an adventure.

Leaving India after our first visit, my two brothers and I had promised each other that one day we would return to the country and do something special. As time wore on however, we began to go our separate ways we collectively felt our promise slipping away. Then came the inspiration we were waiting for. It was sudden and was provoked by nothing more than daydreaming about the trip, but it was just what we had been waiting for: we would travel the breadth of India, border to border, in a rickshaw.

We chose the auto rickshaw because it’s the workhorse of the nation, the vehicle that every man, woman, and child in India can relate to. We knew its wheels were closer to the ground than the wheels of a bus or the rims of a railcar, and it would allow us to easily stop anywhere at anytime. Without doors, shocks, trunk, or great engine power, the rickshaw provided the most basic horrendously uncomfortable form of transportation possible.