- There is no footpaths, people have to walk on the side of the road.
- Seatbelts are not mandatory, and neither are helmets on motorbikes.
- Horn blaring from a vehicle is an indication of “move over, I’m coming through”
- High-beaming, constantly, during the evening, with no thought at blinding the opposite car.
Don't I look cooool??Everyone overtakes, dodging traffic, squeezing themselves into any available gap, and only miss other vehicles (and people) by millimetres. Seriously, you would not stick your hand out of the window. Everyone has their sideview mirrors turned in, just so they have that much more room to move with.
The humps in the road are also not marked, I don't know how they see it, but they seem to know it's there, even though, it's dark! Although, one time, my auto driver missed the hump, and went over it full speed. I hit my head on the roof, causing my neck to crack. Ouch! I had an egg on my forehead for the next couple days (it wasn’t that visible, but it hurt, nonetheless)
You would think, with this much chaos, how does anyone get anywhere. But on a motorbike, you can get there so quickly. Going through the tiniest gap allows you to get in front of others.
Traffic, itself, is a nightmare, I’m about 30mins (travel time) out of the city, so getting there is quite difficult and time consuming. So, you don’t go out on weekdays, and Saturdays are just chockas, the traffic is worse than a snail’s pace.
Apparently, it's worse in the metro cities, e.g. some people take 3hrs, commuting to work in public transport. That's just unheard of! There really would be no motivation to get to work!
The kings of the road are the public buses and the red killers (see earlier blog entry), you would always give way to them, because they will not give way to you. Never take them on, is the motto, you do not want to risk it.
Not surprisingly the road death toll is quite high, pretty sure, there is at least a death somewhere in the state. Even on my mini road trips, there is some sort of accident that we pass.
4 comments:
I would LOVE to know what the official death toll is. NSW laments its 23 or so every Easter holidays .. did you know Malaysia's annual death toll is over 4000?
Man, hitting your head on the roof .... lucky you don't have Marissa's disproportionately large head... it might have come off.
OH and yes you look cool on that bike . :) Good shoulder muscles! :)
I'm not sure what the annual death toll is, and it could match Malaysia's death toll, or even more, due to their population issue. You know, the more people, the more chances.
More like fatty arms ;) Gonna have to do some muscle cutting during the winter (which may be quite difficult to do in the cold, will be very unmotivated)
very nice post :)
its true, never take on the red kllers, a lesson i learnt my first week on the road there. they're coming down hard on them now, its no as bad as a year back :)
-LiT
Post a Comment