Benchmarks

I had forgotten about an early meeting scheduled at office the other day and was running late. Had to take a cab intstead of the Mass Rapid Transit. While the traffic flow was mostly smooth throughout, there was a brief jam near a fly-over which acts as kinda bottleneck during the rush hour. Being from India and having lived in Bombay, this brief speed breaker to the 90kmph cruise hardly perturbed me. To my amusement however, the cab driver was visibly irritated. A tad angry even. He was cursing away to glory. The reckless drivers, the shoddy infrastructure and of course the Govt of Singapore. I never mock at my country. India is truly a great nation with remarkable diversity...you know the story. But as a benevolent human being it was my responsibility to spare my cab driver any further misery. When I told him that traffic jams in India actually force you to a complete halt at times and that the stretch we expected to cover in 30 mins in spite of the jam could take one close to 90 minutes in Bombay, he almost jumped on his seat. Even after my earnest efforts, I am not sure if he was convinced I was telling the truth. At least he did not sulk as much for the rest of the journey.

Different countries. Different benchmarks.