This post is provoked by the following news:
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cly23yknjy9o
and my penchant for always wanting to know where I am. The news is of a car, going over a half built bridge over a river and crashing into the Ram Ganga river below in Uttar Pradesh, India. The car was following Google’s driving directions—(..100 M on….on the 3rd roundabout, take the 5th exit…)
I have travelled a lot, mostly by car. I also had to direct road travel by others in the course of my business. The products I made-for Engineering Institutions, almost invariably had “Free Delivery at Site” & “Payment Against Delivery, Demonstration And Installation” as the commercial terms.. I used to have an Automobile Association of India, cloth backed, road map of India-measuring 4ftx4ft, tucked up on my office wall. The purchase order would list such and such equipment to be delivered to such and such Institutions in the States of say, Kerala, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Jammu & Kashmir, Gujrat and Assam. I would sprawl on the floor in front of that map, with a light focused on the map, adjust my spectacles and decide the allocation of the trucks and prepare a point by point road route for the truck driver. (Used to travel mostly between Metro Cities, few transporters were ready to work for me. My work required the truck to pause at small towns, and spend 2 days there for the installation, before moving to the next obscure town. So I hired trucks on “days’ basis). No goods were ever lost. No truck ever lost its way or hit a dead end or fell into a river.
When you go by a map, you know where you are.
I have driven long distances in America, the most memorable drive being from Boulder(Co) to Boston, via Kansas, Chicago & Niagara falls during Christmas time, about 2000 miles. Here also the route was determined by a National Geographic Atlas and the signage that the American highways have. We did not fall into the Niagara’s and have lived to burden you with this post.
I am not as accurate as Biplab, a batch mate from IIT Kharagpur, who is always gazing at stars and knows where he is in relation to stars. But I do recognize at least the star that rises in the east, every morning. I take my directions therefrom. I feel at home when I know what is to my east, west, north, south and am very uncomfortable when that awareness is missing. In fact, I had panicked once, and started banging on its doors, when a lift had stopped midway and its lights had gone out. My spouse, had promptly declared-“I have claustrophobia”.
I am therefore amazed when I see people constantly blabber “लोकेशन भेज दो”, in response to my giving an address. With an address, you know a lot more. A whole lot of imagery comes to mind invoking a whole lot of feeling. People come alive in the mind. That quaint old house. That bridge over that river. That Rosogolla shop. That Paan wallah. That Neem ka tree. That old flame you knew, before the current one gave you arterial inflammation. With the location, you are blindfolded. Like the Aadhar number, the location reduces you to a mere number.
Today’s drivers never know where they are. I am at loggerheads with these drivers all the time. Last monsoons, I was in Chandigarh with one such driver. He thought G is for Google, having learnt about the Goat from Google. We started back to Delhi from Chandigarh around sunset. There were no beautiful dusk colours. The sky had been overcast with monsoon clouds. Thunder rumbled and lightning flashed, drops had begun to patter on the wind shield.—it was like-you know Ramayana’s– “घण घमंड नभ गर्जत घोरा, प्रियाहीन डरपत मन मोरा “. My fears were different—they were for the slave(driver) of Google. I told him not to follow Google but to follow me. This had happened during the day also. Now his mood darkened, like the clouds. Being from Haryana, I am not the one to be cowed down. I told him I will drive myself. He would not move from the driver’s seat. We argued. The drops turned to a downpour. I called 24×7-the company that had supplied this driver. The company, was conscious that their check would be signed by me and not the driver. They told the driver: “जिस रास्ते से साहिब कहते हैं, उस रास्ते से चलो.” Amidst pouring rain all the way, and unknown to us that time, rivers en route-Ghaghar, Tigri, Markandey, had all broken their banks, river waters had even entered the Ambala cantonment, we reached home safe. I knew the route that Google would have taken—it is the time optimal route and goes through detours & back roads. It passes over an old, dilapidated bridge. That is where I knew I did not want to be that rainy night. The next day I read in the papers that there was a flash flood and that particular bridge had gone under water during the night.
It had been a good idea to know where I was.
As a technologist, I can’t speak against technology. But a thought bothered me on this cold winter evening:
डेस्टिनेशन डाली थी अमन और प्यार
टेक्नोलॉजी ले आयी चाँद के पार
न आब, न हवा; स्पेस सूट में करें प्यार
क्या से क्या हो गया मेरे यार