I almost feel like Rip Van Winkle. It’s almost as if I got up after a deep sleep of a few years and am looking at a new world. A world that has changed shape, changed texture and changed the basic game rules of highway travel.

Let me explain. I have been off the road for a few years now due to some health issues. Only towards the end of last year did I manage to drive down to Bangalore on the new highway and came back ecstatic. We could now do Hyderabad-Bangalore in less than six hours. I could actually believe that if two of us were to leave at the same time from the same place. And one of us drove down while the other caught a flight, the chances were that the road trip would get you there faster…point to point…Hyderabad to Bangalore.

On the Bangalore Highway I was introduced to a whole new bunch of pit stops because the old haunts had almost vanished or had been swept away by the path that the highway carved for itself. And I was suitably charmed by all the modern rest stops I was introduced to. There were also stretches where trees dotted the boundaries of the road just like in times of yore when a drive to Bangalore involved a drive through a shaded tunnel of trees.

But today, my trip to Nalgonda was quite a different experience. The road of course was super and the journey a breeze, but the Vijayawada Highway differs from its Bangalore counterpart in quite a few ways. For one, the number of eating joints accessible from the highway are too few on the Vijayawada route. Those lovely dhabas have all but vanished and no alternatives have yet made their appearance.

The other difference is that the Vijayawada Highway has more of fenced in look with miles and miles of railings and the tree line almost twenty yards from the main highway. This not only robs the highway of any natural beauty, it also deprives travelers like me of the friendly neighborhood tree that we used to run behind for a pee stop…Having said that, let me clarify that both highways suffer from an absence of easily accessible utilities but the Bangalore stretch is more eco friendly and you can always go and hug a tree.

The Vijayawada stretch (at least till Narketpally and back) is an impolite one and poses a major hurdle for people like me in circumstances such as these. Take for instance the fact that I am a diabetic (my need to pee is often greater than yours), I am on diuretics (something to do with my water retention problem), I am extremely sensitive to cold (instead of freezing the plumbing, extreme cold somehow gushes open the taps in my case), rain has a therapeutic audibility about it (the sound of the rain increases my trickle quotient) and if I drink beer, I have this tremendous urge to…well, you know by now what I mean.

And today was Aquarius day…when the moon was in the seventh house, and Jupiter had aligned with Mars…or rather I was in a car that had a super efficient air conditioner, the ambient temperature had dropped a few significant degrees, I was, as they say, fully fed up…having had a sumptuous meal, and I was imbibing beer on the highway…and then it began to rain.

So here I am in traditional white pajama kurta that was the ‘de rigueur’ uniform for the special function I had had to attend in Nalgonda. And I am bursting at the seams. The driver is maintaining a steady 140kmph on a wonderful road and I can’t see a place where I can be discrete. The first problem is that thanks to the railings, there is no way I can walk across to the tree line. Plus there is a service road that serves as an inconvenient interruption. Even if I was to brave the railings and let go, chances that a vehicle would pass by on the service road that was not just adjacent, but a few steps below the main thoroughfare, contrived to give me a centre stage feel. Not exactly the sentiment you want to come to terms with when all you want to do is pee.

And then the most unexpected thing happened. We hit a bump.

The road which until then had been a smooth ride, suddenly cropped a bummer. Some repair work or a construction flaw resulted in an aberration and the car thumped at high speed waking all of us from our personal reveries with a jerk. Except that in my case the bump played havoc with bladder control.

I have no idea how that happens but I know from experience that bumps on the roads don’t bode too well for self control of the urinary kind. And now, with all the elements conspiring to make me weak at the knees the bump was the last straw. I had to take a call. There was just no choice. So I squeaked to the driver that he better pull over to the left, pronto!

When he switched on the indicator, I was relieved…when he switched on the hazard lights, I was empathetic…and when he pulled over, I was grateful.

So I got down from the car in a jiffy and my boat took off. The wind mistook my kurta for a sail and made it swell as if bellowed. And I was being swept along by the wind and sleet away from my car. With a superhuman effort I dropped anchor a few yards away from the car and negotiating the sailor’s knots that held up my pajamas, unfurled the protective fabric and then ‘sang in the rain’.

My audience, I could feel was applauding. One moment there was nothing on the service road below, and the next there was a bus full of pilgrims driving past me in shock. The expressions on the faces of the window sitters was divine. And in a flash, their look of devotion was corrupted into a jeer, a sneer and a derogatory laugh. And then they were gone. Leaving me blushed from embarrassment and flushed from relief.

I tied down the sails, or rather my pajamas and the kurta, and swam to the car. Having got in, I proceeded to wipe my glasses that had become a wind-slush splattered windscreen in just those few minutes that I was out there. Wiped my hair with a hand towel that my kids handed over and we were off.

Back again on the highway, back again at speed. The next time, there better be a loo, I thought as I swore never to go desi again on the national highway.

An hour later my facilities at home gave me a fitting welcome and I signed off from road trip mode, back to planet earth and the bulb began to flicker. It was raining. It was windy. I could hear the sound of thunder and lightning. Looks like the electricity wanted to take a leak. With one last dying flicker it died out…leaving me in the dark with memories of a warrior who had braved the storm and made it safely to land.

Me, my wet look, my relieved senses and my ‘Gila’ shoes:-)