Tuesday, April 24, 2007

No Sheep Is Safe Tonight

The following has subject matter unsuitable for parents and grand-parents, so those of you related to me in any way, shape or form, please stop reading now.

Our driver, Qin, who drives slowly and carefully when Chase and I are in the car, must be starting to feel a little more comfortable with us - or maybe he didn't want to wait in bumper-to-bumper traffic.

This afternoon he surprised me by driving the wrong way up a freeway off-ramp and then proceeded to make a U-turn to join the vehicles that were speeding by us in the opposite direction. A bold driving maneuver, I must say. Definitely not for the faint of heart.

Maybe the thing that surprised me most is that I wasn't actually terrified for my life, I was concerned, but the driving here is so whacky that it didn't feel as scary as it would in the US.

At this point, I can just chalk it up to my list of crazy driving experiences - like when I was in a taxi and the driver made a left from a far right lane (in front of oncoming traffic), or when I was in a taxi and the driver sped toward a red light in the oncoming traffic lane, so that he was the first car to hit the intersection when the light it turned green. Oh, and then there was the time in Shanghai when our taxi driver decided to set the speed record in transport from the airport and Hubs had to bang on the window and yell at him to slow the *@^# down.

I have never been more terrified than I was on that day.