Driving in other countries
joeparaski
Posts: 1,865
We got sidetracked in the "amazing video" thread so I thought I'd start a new thread about driving in other countries. What are some of the strange or wild things you've seen when driving in another country? Here is what I wrote in the other thread:
I was in China a few years ago and I can tell you that on a number of occasions I thought we were going to die. We hired a "driver" (we're not allowed to drive in China) and this guy would pass a slower car on a 2-lane road, on a mountain, on a curve, with no way of knowing what was coming from the opposite side!! But oddly enough, I didn't see any accidents at all. I just found it amazing that drivers whiz by other cars and bicycles and even pedestrians by mere inches...and nobody seemed fazed by this at all!
Another weird thing...we'd be driving along on the highway, and suddenly there would be several pieces of wood blocking the lane...this was because the farmer in that area would lay out his wheat to dry on the road! So our driver would have to go into the opposite lane to avoid the farmers' piece of road. It all seemed like a pretty normal thing to do over there.
Joe
I was in China a few years ago and I can tell you that on a number of occasions I thought we were going to die. We hired a "driver" (we're not allowed to drive in China) and this guy would pass a slower car on a 2-lane road, on a mountain, on a curve, with no way of knowing what was coming from the opposite side!! But oddly enough, I didn't see any accidents at all. I just found it amazing that drivers whiz by other cars and bicycles and even pedestrians by mere inches...and nobody seemed fazed by this at all!
Another weird thing...we'd be driving along on the highway, and suddenly there would be several pieces of wood blocking the lane...this was because the farmer in that area would lay out his wheat to dry on the road! So our driver would have to go into the opposite lane to avoid the farmers' piece of road. It all seemed like a pretty normal thing to do over there.
Joe
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Post edited by joeparaski on
Comments
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I remember the first time I ever drove on the "wrong side of the road" in Scotland. We were on some back roads and hadn't seen any other cars in a LONG time and I had started to revert to my American ways and along comes a car in MY lane - quickly pulled off to the side laughing our arses off.
I don't even want to talk about Cairo - a-holes and elbows. No one stays in their lanes on the freeways. I was scared to death.
Was on a mountain road in the Alps in Germany a couple years ago. Got impatient with some slow drivers and got myself out into the passing lane on a twisty road. All the cars were packed pretty tight and I couldn't get back into my lane for quite a while. Should have seen the look on my wife's face. I was probably white as a sheet.
I took a taxi ride in Hong Kong that was pretty funny. Neither of us spoke each other's language. I showed him a map I had but he still couldn't figure out where my hotel was. We crossed the bridge over to the island part of Hong Kong and he forgets to pay the toll and slams on the brakes 100 feet later and runs back. We both are really laughing by now.
So he calls his dispatcher and hands the mic to me. But the connection was so bad we couldn't talk. So eventually he jumps out of the cab and runs into the crowded sidewalk to find someone who speaks English and Mandarin (sp?) Chinese. He succeeds and gets my hotel location translated and we both laughed our arses off all the way to the hotel.
Oh, I remember driving in Tazmania back to Hobart. Me and my wife had been hiking in the Cradle Mountain area. Driving like a rally driver through the hills! What a blast!
Probably some other stories but that is what I can think of now.
:D
Chris -
Actually the best story was St. Maarten. I had a chance to stay with a friend at a rather nice villa for free some years ago. So my friend picks me up at the airport and we're driving by this golf course. He says "they drive through this golf course when the weather is bad." I'm thinking, "yeah, right"
Anyway, the weather turns bad a couple days later and this tropical depression settles in - raining like hell for a couple days. It let up for a while and in the evening I headed into town without my wife or anyone else to catch a hockey game on TV or something (can't remember).
So I come out of the bar and am driving towards our place and it is just raining like you would not believe. There's this cop car in front of me and and he reaches this depression in the road jumps out to place a sign. I'm thinking NO NO NO because I thought he was going to close the road and I would have to drive counter clock wise all the way around the island to get home.
But the sign is an arrow pointing to the left onto the GOLF COURSE. And the cop starts driving on the golf course. So I start following him!! Raining like hell, I can barely see. What a nuts scene. I actually had no idea how to get off of the golf course but the cop car led me off several hundred feet later. Crazy.
Chris
