Thirteen autos arrived yesterday evening to our school to park their autos and were to leave this morning at a flag-off from the school.
Bangalore isn’t the small town it used to be and the traffic, traffic rules and road-conditions make it an extremely ardous affair to navigate through! Therickshawspromptly lost their way in trying to reach the school from the map provided with two of them breaking down enroute!
Anyways, they all made it to the school, parked and made their way to the hotel for the night. Came back (hopefully refreshed) this morning to our school, after an introduction of our school, some speeches, a flag-off from the local MLA Mr. Ramalinga Reddy – they were off toMysore.
They were directed to find their way to the NICE road and take a smooth exit out to Mysore road. Problem: on reaching there – found the NICE road is too upmarket for them and doesn’t permit autos on its carriageway.
So… all of them now were on their own – having to figure out how to get out of the city. Not easy, if you ask me.
The great thing about this challenge besides the fun for the participants is that theydonatepart of the money raised to projects like ours.
An auto rickshaw rally titled ‘Mumbai Express’, driven by the motto, ‘freedom through education’, was organized by the city unit of Round Table – 115 organization under the aegis of Mangalore Ladies Circle in the city on Thursday August 6.
‘Round Table’ is an apolitical youth organization, members of which are aged between 18 and 40 years. The organization aims at imbibing among the youth, the noble qualities like service, honour and dignity, at both national and international level.
The organization, under its motto, ‘freedom through education’, strives to provide infrastructural facilities like buildings, basic amenities, educational facilities, health services and other programmes that benefit the children of the primary schools, the organizers said.
Aravind Bremanandam, 32, an autorickshaw enthusiast, wants his passion for the “national vehicle” to go global. In 2006, this proud owner of 40 autos began a rally called the Rickshaw Challenge where he provided autos to teams.
The participants— most of them foreigners— included a 70-yearold woman from Canada, a male porn star from the UK, a former Miss Hungary, an actor from Japan and a competitor with a prosthetic leg. About 20-30 teams signed up for the nine-day race from Chennai to Kanyakumari.
The Rickshaw Challenge continued, and there are other races too now: the Mumbai Express (Chennai to Mumbai, 12 days), the Malabar Rampage (17 days), which traverses the Western Ghats to reach Kerala and the Tech Raid (five days), which is a technological and cultural exploration through Bangalore, Chennai and Hyderabad. He hopes to start a Delhi race—the Rajdhani Express—in 2010. “It’s more of a way for people to see India,” says Bremanandam… Full article here
They warn you well in advance: this is an amazing race for the clinically insane. This coming August, 40 teams won’t mind being called that, as they compete in the Mumbai Xpress, an autorickshaw rally from Chennai to Mumbai. For the past three years, The Autorickshaw Challenge has drawn loyal fans to its annual rickshaw rallies, which includes the Tech Raid (Chennai-Hyderabad-Bangalore-Chennai) and the Malabar Rampage (to Kerala and back). Software techie Aravind Bremanandam has even set up an event management firm to handle the show. The victorious world champions get, apart from ‘major bragging rights’ and ‘an outrageous trophy’, free entry into the Caucasian Challenge, a drive-anything motor rally that kicks off from Budapest every year. Says Bremanandam: “Our mission is to provide an unparalleled experience to the rallyists by combining adventure, sight seeing, fun and charity. And what better way to do it than in our own homegrown autorickshaw?” Racers who fall in love with their zany, multi-coloured rickshaws have the option of buying it. For a fee of e900 (Rs 60,000), an autorickshaw, paper maps, traffic reports, road conditions, GPS co-ordinates and even internet access at pit stops, are provided. Enroute, teams adopt-a-village and provide it with school supplies, medicines and the like. Participants are urged to think of the rickshaw as “a covered bicycle with a fuel-efficient lawn mower engine”.
We are getting a bit nostalgic here as the Mumbai Xpress 09 is just around the corner… I came across the below clip which is a glimpse/taste of Mumbai Xpress 2008 madness.
We are eagerly waiting for this year xpress as it’s going to be a BLAST!
Rickshaw on fire/ there goes the pimping team were just fine:)
Bangalore isn’t the small town it used to be and the traffic, traffic rules and road-conditions make it an extremely ardous affair to navigate through! The rickshaws promptly lost their way in trying to reach the school from the map provided with two of them breaking down enroute!
