Valet Parking

Chennai has a real paucity of parking spaces. Shops appear right next to the road. Pavements in busy areas are taken over by street markets selling everything from trinkets to plastic knick knacks to shoes to pins, toys and clothes. It’s like a parallel economy functioning at the second level – High Street coexisting with Main Street. In this scenario, parking is not for the faint-hearted. Slipping a car into the narrowest of spaces requires a level of skill that combines dexterity with split-second timing and judgement. The traffic never eases off. Reversing into the traffic flow if you’ve got the first try wrong can make a nervous wreck out of most drivers.

With typical Indian ingenuity, the shopkeepers have now started offering Valet Parking in order to ensure that they don’t lose out on customers who simply drive away than face the prospect of wrestling with the problem. I stood watching the other day as an intricate ballet played out between several valet parking assistants who had to ease one car out, another one in and simultaneously take over a car that had just arrived. It’s a miracle that cars emerge unscathed from the experience becasue there are literally centimeters to spare between spaces. 15 cars fit into a place meant for 12. India, as usual learns to adjust. We must be the ultimate ‘compromise’ nation figuring a way around a problem rather than solving it. If the owners, who so regally drop off their car keys with the assistants were to stop and watch the elaborate parking routine, they would probably lose their appetite or their urge to shop.