The Hindu : Tamil Nadu / Chennai News : A day of dazzling roadshows

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Monday, Aug 06, 2007
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Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu - Chennai

A day of dazzling roadshows

J. Malarvizhi

Chennai hosts three colourful automobile processions

— Photo: M. Vedhan.

OLD AND NEW: Vintage and classic vehicles take to the roads amidst modern automobiles in the vintage car rally, organised by the Vintage and Classic Vehicles Foundation of India in Chennai on Sunday.

CHENNAI: ‘An amazing race for the clinically insane’ was flagged off from the St. George’s Higher Secondary School and Orphanage here on Sunday morning. Thirtytwo teams would be making the journey from Chennai to Mumbai in autorickshaws as part of the CEAT Mumbai Xpress Autorickshaw Rally 2007 that’s covering 1,921 km in 12 days.

The participants from the United Kingdom, Hungary, Bosnia, Croatia, Ireland, Canada and the United States were put in teams of two or three and had racked their creative brains for inventive team names. From the cheekily-named ‘Poppadom Preach’, making simultaneous reference to Madonna’s hit number ‘Papa don’t preach’ and the controversy around Jade Goody’s reference to Shilpa Shetty as ‘Shilpa Poppadom’ on the ‘Big Brother’ show, to the ‘Pukka Tuk Tuk’ (tuk tuk is how the autorickshaw is called in Thailand), the humour was as international as the participants.

The autorickshaws were decorated with loud artwork or, in the case of the ‘Pirates of the Caribbean’, festooned with skull and crossbones flags. The participants themselves had dressed for the occasion with true team spirit in matching sporty wear, overalls, black and white wigs or tuxedos (to live up to the team name of ‘Tuk Tuk Tuxedos’).

Participants would also be stopping off at a village along the way to deliver aid material that they have sponsored. Former Additional Director General of Police K.V.S. Murthy, ADGP-Administration Letika Saran and Automobile Association of South India president T.D. Sadasivam flagged off the rally and congratulated the organisers on having chosen the themes ‘Road Safety’ and ‘Awareness of Child Abuse and AIDS’.

Vintage car rally

For the nostalgic, there was the vintage car rally that was flagged off from Hotel Savera the same day. An Austin ’30, Morris ’37 and a Mercedes Benz ’55 were among the golden oldies which the Vintage and Classic Vehicles Foundation of India promised would be participating. More than 84 cars had registered to take part in the Vintage, Classic and Post-Classic categories, corresponding to the pre-1940, ’41-’60 and the post-’60 periods.

Another 100 cars hit the road from the Lady Andal Higher Secondary School on the day that Chennai went rallying. For this one, the Mom’s Club of Lady Andal School was responsible. As part of Friendship Day celebrations, families took to the road in their favourite four-wheelers to pick up clues from various locations that told them where to go next.

About 40 km was traversed in some two hours, after which participants were treated to an exclusive lunch at the Hotel Asiana, the newest five-star hotel on the Old Mahabalipuram Road that has not been inaugurated yet.

Actor Shyam and Prema Kumar, Correspondent, Lady Andal School, flagged off the rally.

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