Road rage!

Life Cars & Motorcycles
21

It’s a '92 Ford Telstar. I was fortunate in that the previous (American) owner was incredibly careful and thorough in its maintenance. I’ve had a few minor issues with the body (the handle fell off the back window!), but absolutely no problems with the engine.

That is kind of funny. I doubt most people on the roads have licenses, but if they do it just proves the driving test here is worthless.

I read in an old Lonely Planet that it is acceptable to use a US driver’s license along with an ARC. This is what I’ve been using, and it seemed okay the two times that I’ve been stopped by the police. I used Tealit and Taiwanted to find my car.

22

Interesting. Thanks for the info.

23

It’s a '92 Ford Telstar. I was fortunate in that the previous (American) owner was incredibly careful and thorough in its maintenance. I’ve had a few minor issues with the body (the handle fell off the back window!), but absolutely no problems with the engine.

That is kind of funny. I doubt most people on the roads have licenses, but if they do it just proves the driving test here is worthless.

I read in an old Lonely Planet that it is acceptable to use a US driver’s license along with an ARC. This is what I’ve been using, and it seemed okay the two times that I’ve been stopped by the police. I used Tealit and Taiwanted to find my car.[/quote]

When you run into the annoying cop with English to practice and a quota to meet, you’ll regret not having that license. It ended up costing me 6K a few years back and I doubt the fine has dropped since then.

What you’ve got allows you to plead ignorance with the nice guys but my Canadian license/ARC didn’t do it for this one copper near warner village. Later that week, I got myself a license! Still had to pay the fine, though.

24

So, what does the test involve? Was it hard to get?

25

I did the whole test too. The theoretical part is on a Computer, questions are in english and written on screen as well as spoken on a headset. You have to pass 85% if I remember right, that’s from 40 questions which have different values for the correct answer.

You can chose between a test for manual or automatic shifting, the manual one covering both. It’s 7 exercises starting with backwards parking into a spot 90 degree to the street, than a parallel parking next to the street, a straight line driving with speeding up and switch to 3 gear, stoping on a simulated railroad crossing, driving up a small hill, stoping on the way up and get going again without rolling back, stoping on a red light (which you actually first have to wait till it gets red otherwise you fail) and a tricky S-curve which you first have to drive in front and than backup out of it.
All of this stuff has some regulations like which lines you cant cross, how much minus points you get for touching the side sensors, etc. Not that difficult but also nothing to do with real world driving.
I am actually afraid of most people I saw passing the test there, well trained to pass the test and pretty much clueless about everything else.

26

I found out today from a wife that her husband actually paid someone to sit by him and steer the car through the entirety of the driving course in order to pass his test. :ponder:

27

What does it mean when I am not even a tiny little bit surprised while reading this lines? :laughing:

28

You can also use an International Driver’s Permit. Just get it stamped at the Motor Vehicle Office. I do this yearly, gettign my folks back home to send me the application.

I took an afternoon’s lessons once in prep for my drivers license here and felt the entire process was so preposterous I wouldn’t go any further with it.

29

Oh, so like how they learn English then?

30

A little OT, no?

31

Mucha Man: That’s interesting. I vaguely remember only getting a three month international licence though. :frowning:

The licensing test does seem a bit ridiculous here.

(Interestingly, when I type your name, it changes the c to a z. Why is that?)

32

Is a 6k fine the only penalty for driving without a license? It seems to me you’d be arrested driving without a license in the US.

One of the two cops I’ve been stopped by so far could speak English. He looked pretty unfriendly, but he let me go. Here’s what my 2004 Lonely Planet says, on page 331:

Don’t know if that information is just blatantly wrong or out of date, but it’s worked for me so far.

33

Yes, it’s wrong.

I’d be quite worried if I were driving without a valid license, not so much because of the 6K fine, but because I imagine in the event of an accident where I needed to use the third-party insurance, the insurance company would have a get-out clause and I could end up in huge financial trouble.

34

Somewhere back on page one, this thread changed from Road Rage to Licenses. But anyway, had my worst case of road rage today…

I picked my boy up from the babysitters tonight and then had to go get gas. Got the gas and road down the laneway by the gas station then stopped at the T intersection. A couple of really slow scooters were coming from the left so I decided to wait, I could have made it if I pulled out fast, but decided to wait, I wasn’t in a hurry. So the two scooters when past then so I pulled out and then I need to go only about 30 metres to turn left into my laneway, but it is on a right curve so as I am approaching the curve a bunch of scooters come the other way and one cuts through the curve into my path so I had to swerve a bit and I gave him a blast on my horn in case he wanted to keep cutting into me. Well I turned left into my lane and then I need to go another 50 metres up the lane to my B1 driveway. I got to the card swipe machine, and I heard a scooter pull up behind me, didn’t think anything about it, it happens all the time. So I coasted down the drive as usual then as I reach the bottom I notice there are 4 scooters. One tried to cut me off as I went between two cars into my parking spot, two blocked the passageway between the other cars and the 4th went to the other side of the parking spot. I thought it looked really strange that so many people come home at the same time.

So I was backing my bike up and getting it into position and I see this ugly, dirty guy, maybe early 20s come walking over to me and then it clicked what was happening, so I stopped my bike out of position and got off, I didn’t want to be caught off balance sitting on the bike. I got my boy off the bike and told him to go, get into the elevator, but he just froze wondering what these guys wanted. So I said to the main guy that walked up to me in Chinese if he had a problem, " Ni yo wenti ma" and he said something back to me, but couldn’t understand a word he said, maybe couldn’t hear him too as I left my helmet on. Only the one guy looked menacing at this time, but the other two blocking the passageways came and stood behind him, I lost track of where the 4th was. Man what a disadvantage I was in. So in my mind, I was ready to just spring forward into the guy with a head butt and a big push back if he lunged forward, hoping he would go back onto the other two, but then even with running, I still would have had to wait for the elevator, which would have given them time to recover. And I was still wondering where the 4th guy was… behind me somewhere.

So I said to the guy, “Ting bu dong” and started to push my boy to the elevator and the guy kept following me saying something. All I picked up was “Ni ting bu dong”. Luckily, the elevator was waiting on B1, so I pushed my boy into the elevator so if those guys tried to do anything at least he could be safe, but I followed him in expecting them to follow, at least I know there is a camera in the elevator. So I went to 1F, went to my security guard to watch the video and call the cops in case they started breaking stuff. And shit, I forgot I left my keys in my bike in the excitement downstairs.

We watched them ride out, they were quick so I hoping they didn’t damage my bike too much in that short time, I was totally expecting to see it being ridden out of the basement as the keys were still in it. So I went back down to B1 to check my bike and it was still there and it wasn’t damaged at all. I told the security guy I want a copy of the tape for B1 to get their plate numbers which were clear when they went out and if there are any repurcussions, well they can be identified.

When I went back down to the B1 there were two resident guys there and they asked me what happened, why were there so many people standing near my bike. I think I was lucky that they must have come in so they decided to leave…

Fucking Assholes, come onto my side of the road and aim at me when cutting the corner, they nearly smash me, and then they still want to blame me. Fucking Assholes, I hope they try the same corner cutting trick on a gravel truck…

35

Man, what a bunch of tools.

What did you say to your kid?

36

I think that case could well have been a group of guys that really had no idea of how to use the road and so perhaps thought you were the rude one for sounding your horn at them. It was a typical case then of too stupid for their own good, which plays out hundreds of times a day, going by what happens to me alone. When people aren’t basically intelligent enough to figure out how to get on a train or into an elevator, letting the other people out first, then Darwin was wrong. I’m going with creationism, but god must have run out of grey matter when he finally got to Taiwan; its the only thing that could explain it.
What gets me is how the exact same thing which happened to you, happens to me, but I’ll be driving a car when some pillock decides to cut me up with a scooter. This is absolute proof of lack of intelligence when they can’t even differentiate between big heavy hard things which will potentially kill them, and other scooters. Dumb, selfish phuckers! If only brains were as common as ill mannered people here, we might see some improvement.

37

I put a lot of it down to the education system, and probably the family unit too, which actively discourages people from thinking and encourages a certain follow-the-leader attitude, which is fine if someone is actually taking active command. However, the inherent problems with such a way of doing things become immediately apparent once someone has to make any decisions for himself or herself, ie. getting into an elevator or driving a scooter.

An alternative hypothesis (for the driving), as proposed by a colleague, is that there are so few real avenues of dissent and rebellion for most people that they express their reckless behaviour and pent up energies on the road.

38

But… but… you were totally in the wrong, so what else did you expect? Sounding your horn is a FAR worse offense than driving recklessly or dangerously or even running somebody over. No wonder they were angry!

Seriously though, why did you use your horn? The ONLY time I ever use mine is if I’m actively seeking a confrontation, and it nearly always works.

39

I lost it for the first time in months last week - in the car, daughter in the back, pulled up to a T-junction to turn left onto a small narrow bridge. There was a car coming from the right. Again, if i was local i could’ve pulled out in front of him, causing him to brake sharply, but I don’t do that cos I was taught to drive in a different way - so I wait, and let him pass. This small truck (not blue :sunglasses: ) behind me then decides that he’s had to wait for 2 seconds too loong, so as i do my left-turn, he pulls out from behind me and goes to overtake. Very little room to pull this off, and even less when the scooter comes over the bridge towards him, as he’s now on the wrong side of the road. So he has to massively cut me up. I brake hard, and swerve close to the bridge wall to avoid him.

Adrenalin pumped, I find the horn and then chase him down to the next set of lights, where we had an exchange of views. Stupid, and luckily for me he was not too aggressive.

I think I do real well everyday, letting everything wash over me when I’m driving, but occasionally, just occasionally, it’s so hard to let it go.

Surprised there aren’t more of these threads :astonished:.

40

My girlfriend has learnt a whole new English vocabulary since riding on the back of my scooter. Favourites of hers now include wanker and arseclown, and I have to settle her down from getting too excited about abusing other motorists. For instance, a car several spaces back was hassling everyone to move out of the way so it could turn right, but no one could actually move out of the way. She then turned around, gave the driver the finger and started swearing at him in English. What have I created?!

Recently, she was taking her friend on the back of her scooter and they were following me, and she pointed out that every time I see something stupid, I shake my head from side to side, which is to say that I shake my head a lot when I drive. Haha.

Having said all that, I think I’ve finally got it into her that you don’t overtake on blind corners going up a hill through roadworks at night when the road is a little wet. If I have changed one bad Taiwanese driver, then my mission on this island is complete.