How did we come to be on the roof of a bus in the Himalayas? Well, Your Honour, the bus was full and we needed to get to the Indian border; other people were climbing onto the roof, and so we thought, ‘what could possibly go wrong?’ And for the first hour it was quite exciting – apart from the dust clouds and the exhaust fumes and the extreme discomfort. The bus tootled along at a leisurely pace, we stopped in little towns to let more passengers onto the roof, and from time to time fruit sellers came past and sold us slices of oranges. It was all fairly civilised.
Then we started the long winding road down the mountainside towards Sonauli and suddenly it began to get scary. The road dropped away dramatically on one side. Great views and all that but it was too terrifying to keep your eyes open for long. The driver put his foot down and now we were tearing around hairpin bends at breakneck speeds, clutching onto the roof rack for dear life. We clung on and prayed for about an hour and at the next stop we climbed down and found a seat in the bus. I think perhaps the next time we’ll take a taxi.
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