Early Morning Hilarity

I've accidentally confined myself into the sleeping room.
There is a rubber doorstop that gets flipped up when you want to move the door, and flipped down when you want to keep the door in place. I think the doorstop fell into the down position overnight while the door was closed, and now I can't pull the door open. I feel silly to wake up Makyil and Kunsang for this, so I might just wait until they're awake.
In the meantime, a story about a near miss with the Indian authorities...
***
Coming back from the Lotus Temple, we enter the metro at Kalkaji Manjir, and it is one of the newer stations, with great tall, airy ceilings. As with all metros, you first pass through the metal detector (as keeping with the theme of gender separation in the metro, men and ladies use different detectors), get frisked by a guard, then place your bag into the X-ray machine, and then after that swipe your metro card. There is usually an armed guard in some visible spot standing behind a U of sandbags with a rifle mounted and pointed forward, ready for use. Yes, Indians can be intense about these things, given their history of terrorist attacks. Sometimes I wonder though, if these rifles are not just for show. Look at the casual way that these guards outside the Lotus Temple sling their guns over their shoulders like man-purses.

So Makyil, Kunsang, and I pass through the detectors, X-ray machine, and metro gate. We take an escalator up, which provides a bird's eye view of the whole rigamarole, and I snap a photo of it. As we get to the end of the escalator, a guard comes up from the same escalator we just took, and calls for Kunsang to go with him. Uh oh. They saw someone take a picture, and figured it must have been Kunsang (is this gender discrimination?). This is apparently forbidden in the metro. My heart jumps inside, I don't know anything about the authorities here, and how they treat members of the public, and Kunsang is being called over instead of me. I turn to Makyil, and she is still, as always. The guard keeps calling Kunsang over 'Please come with me, sir.'.

I whisper to Makyil and Kunsang that it was me who took a photo, and they don't react. Kunsang cheerfully says 'I will go.' A second guard approaches. I am really not feeling good about this, and my brain is quickly trying to figure out if I have time to take out my camera and delete the photo before the guards get close enough to see the camera in my hand. Makyil steps forward with her phone in hand, and nonchalantly says 'We are students here, coming from the Lotus Temple. Why should we take photos of the metro?' She shows her phone and the pictures she's taken to the guards, and Kunsang does the same. My heart is racing inside while I grip my camera tightly in my pocket, wondering what we would do if they asked me to show them my pictures, and how incriminating it would be to be found to have lied. But I put on my best concerned and confused idiot face, and the guards pass over me. Makyil repeats herself, this time with annoyance in her tone. The guards look at us for a moment longer, then wave us off.

The metro arrives. We step in, and I breathe a sigh of relief. Makyil seems unperturbed.

I would like to post the photo that nearly got us into so much trouble, but don't think I'll run the risk!

Let's just say I learned a lesson about street smarts today.

***

People are up! I get the door open! It's a new day!