Red Lorry, Yellow Lorry & a Donkey

Today I was driving home from the airport, for those who don't know, I live really near the airport. In fact if you've ever been on the phone with me I'm sure I've often had to put you on hold till the overhead aircraft passes and I can hear you again.
Anyway, being so close to the airport I find that I am the default man on all airport reception/departure duty. I don't mind I love the adventure of negotiating the traffic infested streets of Bedian Road (the most notoriously, treacherous, dirty and accident friendly road in Lahore if not the world), I love the idea of waiting in the heat surrounded by sweaty, leering and unimaginably yet imaginatively smelly men (seriously I once stood next to a skinny little man who smelt of dead flower water and cabbages...quite a combo!).
Kher all that aside, today I was once again on reception duty receiving some friends in the middle of the afternoon, peak sun and smell time. These friends of mine were visiting Pakistan for the first time, I was highly conscious of this as I left the relatively internationally acceptable Allamah Iqbal International Airport and swerved to avoid a runaway donkey cart, a funny contraption somewhere between a motorbike and an ice-cream truck called a Quingi and a series of brightly colored maniacal Bedford trucks!
I turned to my friends apologetically, expecting to find them cringing with fear in the back seat of my suspension-less car. I was totally surprised at their looks of content delight at the surrounding chaos. They were pointing out of the windows and muttering things like 'How quaint' and 'So lovely', 'So clean'!?@#! Was it me? Have I just become hyper-sensitive after living in the over manicured Los Angeles for the last year? I was baffled! Startled!Shocked even!
'So' I said, finally having a clear enough road to make conversation, as we turned into the relative peacefulness of the Defense Housing Authority 'How was your stay in India?'