If you thought the Sri Lankan drivers are the worst drivers in the world, you are not alone. Almost everybody seems to share this popular opinion. Join the club. I’m one of them.
Those who haven’t been to Sri Lanka believe the Italian drivers are the worst.
There was a post on the blog වෙදගෙදර about an incident where a driver who tried to pick up the phone he dropped while driving causing an accident.
Actually this isn’t a scheduled post. I was in the middle of the series “Close Encounters Of The Cops Kind”. Anyways this seemed so relevant and a kinda ‘eye opene’r so I decided to insert this interrupting my series.
On the other hand this is hot and was screaming for priority.
Kokola, who is a very good friend of mine has been a great inspiration for me to be a blogger, though he is not one himself. I met this dude while working as a teacher in the country I’m currently working. It’s amusing that I’ve never met him back at home in Sri Lanka, except at the airport. Anyway he was my kid’s Physics Teacher, too.
Kokila, who is now in Michigan, USA, set off to see The North American Motor Show in a friend’s car. Kokila and his wife were sitting in the back seat of the black state car in the photo. At a color light controlled intersection they made a right turn on the green, when the young woman in the white car jumped the red which she didn’t see as she was busy texting on her cell phone. She rammed into our dudes’ car and you can see the result in the photo.
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Luckily they escaped without serious injuries thanks to the airbags that deployed a in a split second! And also, due to the fact that it was the engine compartment that took the impact and not the mid section which would have changed the outcome. And these winter days when the tarmac is icy and slippery things could have been worse if they ended up in an uncontrollable spin!
The funniest thing according to Kokila is according to the Michigan Law, it is only texting while driving that is illegal, not talking on the cell phone. So that woman can’t be prosecuted for driving while talking on the mobile phone jeopardizing other people’s safety!
Another day, he wrote to me, while he was at the wheel waiting for the green light at an intersection, he saw the young woman behind the wheel in the next car was busy texting. So, he was on the lookout. When the lights changed she hit the gas and shot the car forward and swung in front of Kokila without turn indicators or anything. Kokila who was half expecting something had just managed to take evasive action and save himself.
Another day a driver who had parked on the shoulder of a highway (an interstate I think) and changing a wheel was hit and killed by a woman who was driving while using a cell phone.
When I blogged this in my Sinhala blog, Kokila commented that when he told this incident to one of his American friends, he said that he saw a woman one day driving on the interstate while reading a book. So he honked to get her attention, mouthed the obscenity “What the F…!” and steered clear of her way.
And they drive like this in a country where the traffic laws are tight and fines are high. And where there is a system of scoring demerits for each traffic violation which could lead to the suspension of the driver’s license for months or perhaps years making the driver to take the driver’s test again.
So, do Michigan girls beat our private bus driver dudes, truck driver dudes and the lot in their own game? I’m definitely gonna think it over…
This is simulblogged© at මට හිතෙන හැටි in Sinhala titled පොඩ්ඩක් ඉන්න! ලෝකෙන්ම එපාම කරපු රියැදුරෝ ඉන්නෙ ලංකාවෙද?
Well, in every country I visited I saw mad drivers..However those were exceptions. In our beloved country the low abiding drivers are the exception. How can you expect average people to honour the law when law makers are the worst breakers ?
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