Unreasonable fare

The advancement that our country has attained technically is beyond my comprehension. The distance that one used to cover in two days at the earliest could now be made within a day and we can call anyone in the world at the click of a button yet the attitude of the people remains same.

There was a time when I paid Nu. 50 as a luggage charge for a carton of chillies that my parents had sent all the way from Trashiyangtse to Thimphu in 2002 and 2003, and thought that trend has stopped existing but it was a great shock for me to learn that one has to pay unreasonable fare for the personal luggage. I had gone to drop a friend who was to travel to Bumthang and she had her bag and a small used mattress for which the handy-boy charged her Nu.500.

I did some internal calculation and found that her whole luggage wouldn’t even come close to 25 kgs in weight. The man was unwilling to load her mattress saying that it was occupying lots of space which led to exchange of some words. Finally the man loaded her bag and mattress and I saw him in disagreement with some other passengers. I could see the plight of a group of students who were made to pay huge luggage fare. An Indian teacher became his last victim as the bus pulled off the station and I saw him being dragged with one leg dangling outside the bus door.

Being a witness to such a scene, I am at the loss of words. The country has advanced very much in the field of technology but the attitudes of some people are degrading back to the medieval age. If such attitude exists, I wonder how long that bus service would survive. 

As for my friend, she has vowed never to use that bus service ever again!