Dubaibun 3

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The Indian bicycle keeps left, even in Dubai, the better to avoid onrushing lorries. For minimum efficiency, it is pedalled with the heels, bare or sandalled. The trapezoidal stand is fitted with a broken retaining spring to help it trail along the road. The rear pannier rack is perfectly adapted to carry forty flattened cardboard boxes or a serene wife whose flowing saree just knows to keep clear of the spokes. However bumpy the road, she never drops the baby. The bell works. If you graduate to a small truck, you hang it all round with painted chains and festoon the cab with tassels and tapestries.

Those the advertisers dismiss as no-ones
those without the money to bloat the bloated
burgeon through the city in forms and colours
born of their genius

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