By Learner

"You're are going to drive?" Asks my brother. It's amazing how much cynicism one can pack into a cocked eyebrow and five words.

"No, I'm going to 'learn', 'how' to drive. Why?"

"Just asking. We may need to keep the police informed."

Huh. Fine, I'm known to be a little feather-brained by the general public at home and granted that I sometimes do things which others of my age and intelligence might not do. But those aren't sufficient reasons for raised eyebrows and smart comments about my competence at driving, when I hadn't even started 'learning'. And after all driving a vehicle can't be so hard? I mean, look at the number of vehicles that keep multiplying like the veneered single-celled organism in our traffic-infested roads. Also take into account the number of people who drive and go ga ga about the joy of driving. Surely, I too shall join these legions of road-masters in no time at all?

So, happily hopeful, one fine morning I am accompanied by my father into a famed driving school in the area. On the way I wonder why the driving schools call themselves so and so 'learners'. This has always baffled me and it took me some time to figure out that 'learners' were indeed teachers who taught how to drive.

My prospective teacher is an interesting character. Having been a traffic OIC most of his life, he - quite understandably - considers himself the authority on all matters of driving safely. His office is adorned with pictures of himself in uniform receiving awards from other uniformed men, several framed certificates and posters of traffic signs. He has a moustache which is not long enough to twirl but which always gives the impression of twirling everytime he raises his voice to clarify a point.

He says he will give me 15 lesssons at the end of which I would emerge a fully-fledged driver complete with the licence. With the picture in my mind of me driving breezily along a long road I tell him I wouldn't mind starting that very day. Those nearly became my last words, famous or otherwise.

Of course I didn't know what was coming. We sat in his van, and mustering up all the deposits and reserves of concentration I had in me I listened while he showed what each 'gadgematic' in the control panel was supposed to do. Then we drove a little, while I tried to make sense of the turning wheels, but ended up feeling nauseated at the amount of logic involved. You do this, and this happens; to do this you need to do this otherwise that breaks. But even with all that, up to that point life was fine, just fantastic.

Then he stopped, got down and with a wide smile said, "Now it's your turn".

Fine, so you can't expect to learn driving by doing anything else but driving, but I sure didn't expect to sit on the driver's seat the very first day. I looked ahead, and I looked behind and saw nothing but rows of cars, vans, lorries, motorbikes and bicycles spewing forth from the far horizon of the Galle Road. And for goodness' sake there were people! Then oh my gosh there were lamp-posts and buildings and trees and pavements and every possible thing that could be there on the sides of the road! And man, it's the Galle Road!

I clung hard to the safety of the passenger seat and looked to see if my teacher was talking to someone else. No, he was talking to me and he was waiting. I climbed onto the driver's seat with a sinking feeling in my stomach. Again with much patience he showed me how to get the engine going, how to change gears, how to... oh goodness, so many things to do at once!

Somehow I get the van going; one yard, two, three. It's really moving! Despite a formidable sense of disjointed nerves, I feel exhilarated. But peace in this life is short-lived. A pedestrian suddenly pops out from nowhere and is crossing the road a few yards ahead. I am told to loosen my foot on the accelerator and step on the brake a little. I consider which is which and press one foot and loosen the other, but it turns out to be the wrong one. The van speeds up a little (not enough to kill, anyway) and from the tone of my teacher's voice I know the moustache is twirling. Okay if it's not this one, it's the other, so I step on that one but forget to loosen this one. The moustache really twirls, and anyway the pedestrian is across the street by now. So I decide to stick to the original plan of just going without slowing down, but cannot remember what to do, nor figure out which gear I'm in. Man, driving is fun!

I keenly ignore the glances of passers-by and wish I could do the same for pavements and trees and dogs who stand and stare in the middle of the road till vehicles touch their noses. Snails crawl faster than I, and out of the corner of my eye, I marvel at the ease with which other vehicles seem to glide along the road. After what seems like ten years and fifty thousand miles I hear my teacher uttering the words of mercy. "Okay, that's enough for a day". Relief tingles my nerves, but darn, I still have to stop the stupid thing!

I do as he says, I just don't know what and why, but obviously I did the wrong thing because instead of smoothly coming to a halt, the engine splutters and jolts to a stop. I don't care if the moustache is twirling, because I feel such a great sense of accomplishment: I saved many lives today!

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