Alonso who? asks our correspondent who was witness to the Malaysian Formula One spectacle
Behind my hoity-toity hotel in downtown Kuala Lumpur, I can hear boom-boxes cluster bomb the surroundings with the latest Mollywood numbers.
My foot taps not so much in line with the mushy rhythms, but as physical evidence of a deeply cerebral exercise. I'm trying to figure out how to get to the Formula 1 circuit in Sepang, an hour's drive from KL, in the cheapest manner possible.
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A couple of long phone calls to Mumbai in the dead of the night entailed by a mix-up in my room bookings have severely traumatised my wallet. The consequent delay in getting to the right lodging had also made me miss my circuit shuttle.
I flash my best possible smile at three Japanese teenagers who're leaving the hotel in a BMW 3-Series convertible and a Mazda Miata, and enquire whether I could hitch a ride with them.
"Sorry, no room," they say and get ready to scamper off. Of course, there was room at the back! Room enough for a magnificent Steinway with a 60s Hindi film heroine leaning on it. I wish further recession on Japan and plunge mental Katanas through the jelled hair-dos of the teenagers, who are by now receding into the distance.
I check out the cabbies who are waiting outside the hotel, and eventually one among them agrees to take me to Sepang for a fare that's about half the usual rate. But there's a catch. Kumar's cab (Kumar is a Tamilian whose forefathers settled in Malaysia somewhere in the early 19th century) has already been booked by an elderly Brit couple, but I am supposed to be his friend who is taking a lift with him to Sepang. So, in another 10 minutes, Kumar, his friend from India, and the genial couple are on their way to attend the second race of 2003's Formula 1 season.
20 minutes into the drive on a winding, broad river of tarmac, and I can see why 'going to the race' is such an occasion among F1 enthusiasts. Our cab is part of a bling-bling automotive procession. Riders on modified, spray-painted Vespas bumble past, running rings around bigger and thunderous Harley-Davidsons, shiny Valkyries, and Yamaha R1s.
On either side of our Proton Saga cab are the latest cars