We all know there are no free lunches, but what about free rides?
Well, in Indonesia, thrill seekers and free loaders alike travel into Jakarta by riding on top of trains. And the authorities have been trying to curb the train-surfing scourge for decades.
Now they seem to have come up with a concrete solution. I mean that literally. The state-run rail system has installed concrete balls about the size of grapefruits above the rail tracks.
They call them goal “bola bola” or “goal balls,” and the goal is to show fare beaters that it doesn’t pay to be cheap.
But there’s already been a glitch. It turns out officials made the chains too short leaving a gap of about 16 inches between the balls and the passing trains. They say they’ll get on the ball soon.
PDF This post was submitted by Fareed Zakaria, CNN / IM.
