A Night of Domino Crashes and What It Taught Me About Life

My Monday started with the kind of exhausting routine that leaves you completely drained. I was glued to my laptop screen, trying to recover from a non-stop week that had absolutely no weekend break. By six in the evening, my brain was totally fried and I knew I needed to get out. I called up my friend and reminded him that it had been almost a month since our last beach trip, so we needed to make a plan for tonight. I had no idea that a simple ride would end on a chaotic, oil-slicked road where life and death felt separated by just a few millimeters of tire tread.

We headed out at half past eight on my bike. The weather was perfect at first, with a light drizzle and a cool breeze making the ride feel amazing. We reached the beach around midnight, enjoyed the cool night air, talked about everything, and ate roasted chickpeas. It was exactly the kind of relaxing night you need to clear your head after weeks of stress. But the ride back home was not going to be that simple.

On our way back, we were riding a bit fast when we suddenly saw an accident up ahead, and then another one. We slowed down immediately because we knew something was wrong. Sharah-e-Faisal is always incredibly busy, but tonight it had turned into a literal skating rink. Light rain mixed with leaked engine oil had made the road extremely slippery. All our good moods and plans for a happy ending to the night vanished, replaced by pure survival mode on a road full of crashes.

A road that normally takes fifteen minutes took us about forty minutes of pure concentration. Using the brakes was out of the question because even a little pressure meant slipping and crashing into someone else. Instead, we moved at a crawl, keeping our feet on the ground to slow ourselves down and balance the bike. The left side of the road was a nightmare, lined with injured people sitting next to their damaged bikes. Right in front of me, I watched a domino effect of accidents happen. One bike slipped and hit another, a truck slammed its brakes causing a pileup of bikes behind it, and then cars started hitting each other. It was easily one of the top five scariest road experiences of my life.

It immediately brought back memories of the time when 2 friends and me were chased by hunting dogs in a village. Back then, we barely escaped by flashing bright lights into their eyes right as one was about to bite my leg. But on this wet road, there was no quick trick to save us. Even if we rode perfectly, there was always the fear that some other bike or car would slide into us from behind. Navigating through that mess, hearing the sound of metal scraping on the asphalt, made me realize how quickly everything can end. It really makes you think about why the universe spares you when so many others get hurt.

Once we finally made it to safety, we decided to celebrate being alive with some food. We headed to Pizza Max. My sister had some discount vouchers from shopping at Bachaa Party, so we got a large pizza for only thirteen hundred rupees instead of the usual twenty-seven hundred. Getting cheap pizza at a place I have been visiting for fifteen years brought back a massive wave of nostalgia. This is the spot of so many birthdays, celebrations, and even those quiet, romantic dates that still make me smile when I think about them.

I wanted to share this with you all because surviving close calls like this gives you a completely new perspective. When the universe keeps giving you more time to live, being lazy and wasting it feels like a waste of a second chance. We should enjoy nature, take care of our families, and work hard to build a better life. Life is a beautiful gift that does not last forever, so we should make every single day count.