Picture this. It’s a hot summer’s day (though virtually every day is hot in the city of Chennai) and you are standing at the Mylapore temple tank bus stop, waiting for the Metropolitan Transport Corporation’s Bus No. 29C. You have had the most tiring week already and it’s not even Wednesday yet. It's tough going.
The wait just goes on. You’ve been there for close to 25 minutes now and there’s no sign of a 29C yet amid the hustle and bustle of traffic that swells on the road. You are sweating like a pig, thinking of a nice cold shower, and calculating just how much time you have already wasted standing here.
Another five minutes pass… 10 minutes… You decide to give up and take an autorickshaw home. But you check your wallet and find you have exactly 11 bucks with you.
You decide to look on the bright side. Hey, at least you can take a bus to the Adyar depot and then walk it home. You try to convince yourself it is indeed the bright side of the situation.
Just then Bus No. A1 comes up, and you hop in gratefully, secure a ticket that costs exactly the 11 bucks you have, and get the most uncomfortable seat in the vehicle, the one right above the tyres. So there’s absolutely no breeze and no space to stretch even your tired legs.
Anyhow, you end up at the Adyar bus depot within 10 minutes, courtesy Bus A1, and you start walking home. You are literally dragging your feet when suddenly, a 29C passes by. Within the next five minutes, two more of them have whizzed past, the last one so empty it looks like it set out for the sole purpose of mocking you.
Now the Law of 29C states clearly that on a particularly bad day, after waiting for an hour or so, if you decide to give up the hope and go for an alternative mode of transport, you will see at least three empty 29C buses going past. Hence proved.
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