Horn Ok Please

I love the French. Everything about them reeks(no pun intended) of culture and class. Their food with the pate and baguette, their clothes with the robe and the chemise, their language with the o la la! and Mon Dieu, their names with the Pierre and Philippe! Everything sounds so much more sophisticated in French.
And not to forget their quaint quotes for every and all situations - mostly Indian.

So when my French amie remarked over coffee the other day,"o my Gud! Pune his so orny place." I have to say I was tres tickled. With Pune being nominated as the most 'active' city in the east I thought wow! Up to date with the news and vocal about it! Hmmm. I ventured to clarify what exactly she meant. Much to my relief she was referring to the noise pollution in Pune generated by our horn loving public. "oh!!!!!!!!", I said. "Comme ca."

And just like that, here I am blogging about the excessive use of horns in Pune. There is a horn for every emotion and verb in the English dictionary and some for words that do not exist in any dick-tionary. People in Pune use their horns more than they do their rear view mirrors and almost as much as they use their clutch. I have endeavoured in this blog to identify the reasons why people honk. If I have missed out any please do feel free to add..

Lets start with the most common.
move - Honk
move I say - Honk honk !
arre move na... honk!
not moving!! HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOONK
$%^& move move move - Honk Honk Honk!!!
deaf MCBC! ( while moving past him from the left) Honk!

Then there is the classist honking my soon-going-to-be-related-to-me Parsi friend subscribes to.
$%^ driving a VW? - Honk!
Cheapo cant afford a Mercedes - Honk Honk!
Oh God a BMW! - MC Hoooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooonk!
I will race you with my hero honda - hnk!

Ofcourse the 'I am high and happy' honking which happens after 9 pm.
High - Honk!
High and happy - Honky Honky!
High and gay - Honky honk!!
Just acting High - HOOOONK!
Drunk - Hoonk Hoonk Hoonkyyyy!

The most annoying one however, is the 'I need attention' honkers.
Here I come - Honk
Just behind you - Honk!
Still behind you - Honk
Loving the back view - Honk Honk!
Coming up to you now - Honk Honk!
Celebrating independent India - Hooooooooooooooooooooooooonk!
Feel like making noise - Honk Honk Honk!
No cop in sight? - Honk Honk!
Tailing you - Honk!
Racing you - Honk Honk!

Last but not least are the rickshaw hater honkers. And I must admit I am one of them. If I see a rickshaw in my way ( or even out of my way) I honk. I bloody honk till the bugger moves almost onto the footpath - wait! there aren't any in Pune. Ok so you get the picture. Rickshaw hater honkers I think are born from their deep rooted disgust of rickshaw drivers who will rob you of your handkerchief if they could. The Puneites hate them, the expats suffer them, the cops... well, are almost as bad as them and all in all - they deserve to be honked to hell!

So, to wrap up this honk of a blog, Pune has got to be the honkiest city this part of the world. I would fast for a noise pollution tax but that would take the focus away from Anna's current fast which I must admit deals with more 'current(cy)' issues.