The Fort Kochi Lorry

One of my most enduring memories of Fort Kochi is the lorry. It sat outside the police station in Fort Kochi for years waiting the resolution of its court case, getting more and more forlorn and more and more spattered with bird poo and draped with vines every time we saw it.
It seemed appropriate on our last visit that it was gone, replaced by a selection of broken and deserted autorickshaws which would probably be gone before they got to their day in court.


The owner presumably did not have the money to release the vehicle, and possibly not the driver.
One night, on his way home and possibly a little fuddled from toddy, which he denied ever drinking, Narayan swerved to miss a cyclist and demolished a wall and the front of his car.

Anil was called to the police station in the middle of the night, where a terrified and intimidated Narayan was trying to explain that if he hadn't demolished the wall he would have demolished the cyclist. Large amounts of money changed hands to prevent the case going to court, a process which could have led to Narayan being in prison for several years and the costs going even higher.
To make matters worse, he lied about his age. Although he was properly licensed and insured, the police inspector thought that he was too old to be driving and took his license away. On reflection, and a further sum of money, it was only taken away for a year. This was bad enough as it was his means of support and there is no social security in India.An additional stress was his usual futile attempts to amass enough money to make a good match for his daughter.
Narayan spent the year working as "security" for Anil's brother, possibly as a night watchman and we doubted whether we would see him again. In the end he turned up at the wheel again, as cheerful and as gung-ho as before.