Extreme Sports - China style!

Extreme Sports - China style!

It's been an eventful week, on Tuesday April 22, it was my brother's birthday. He turned 39 (sorry Gary) and like every year we will be the same age for the next month and a half until I turn 21 again. Then on Wednesday April 23 while I was sleeping I sold my house FINALLY!!! And on Thursday, April 24 I got my chinese drivers license. And on Friday I borrowed the company car for the weekend and managed to get a parking ticket and apparently 3 points on my driving record. :( Not fair. Friday and Saturday nights I drove into the city to have dinner and do some shopping, etc. And Sunday I picked up 3 friends and we drove out into the country to a park in the mountains and had a wonderful day in the fresh warm spring air.

So how does a foreigner go about getting a chinese drivers license? It is very easy actually. You just need to go to an official place to translate your passport and foreign drivers license into chinese, then take a physical which is a joke and some pictures and get an official paper showing your address in china and get a book with about 200 questions and the correct answers in english. Read the book - takes a couple of hours, memorize the answers - most of which are pretty logical but some are kind of puzzling - such as:

48. The person concerned should assume tatal responsibility if:
A. escapes from the acene of a traffic accident
B. breaks traffic law
C. causes deaths or injuries
Answer is A

84. When moving the dangerous narcose or asphyxia wounded persons:

A. Should use the latericumbent lying posture

B. Should use the supine lying posture

C. Should use the prostration posture
Answer is C

37. One who has taken a little state-controlled psychotropic drugs or stupefacient may drive motor vehicles. T/F (F)

65. One can take a few fireworks and firecrackers when taking a taxi. T/F (F)

80. When carrying the dangerous goods, don't overload, don't mix the people with dangerous goods, and don't mix the dangerous goods with other goods. T/F (T)

87. The professional morality is not important for a driver but only good driving skills. T/F (F)

Anyway, the whole process took me 2 consecutive afternoons and cost a total of about 200RMB (<$30). Got most of the red tape done the first day and got the book. Read the question once, took the computerized english exam the next afternoon and passed with 100% score.

And my reward is this shiny new chinese drivers license. I was a little disappointed - one of my friends who has her license told me that when she got it 3 or 4 years ago they made her put a chinese name on it. But I had to put my english name on mine.

Now the fun begins.... Driving in china.

Luckily I've been a passenger, pedestrian and bicycle rider in china for almost 2 years. Because otherwise I wouldn't stand a chance of driving on the chinese streets. Actually once you come to realize that your fellow drivers will do the most illogical thing possible and the bicycles, three wheel delivery carts, electric scooters, motor cycles and pedestrians are going to come at you from any direction at any time and often all at the same time, and they will definitely run red lights and go the wrong direction down the street and cross traffic whenever they want whether you are coming at them at high speed or not, it isn't so bad.

If you have ever been here you know that the horn is the most important part of the car! And I think they should make foreigners take a class on how to use it Chinese style. It is your way of communicating with all the people you share the road with. Usually to let them know you are there and not to pull out in front of you. Most good drivers in china never take their hand off the horn. That is what I need to learn.

The car my company has allotted for me to use on evenings and weekends is a fairly old VW Jetta with a manual transmission. After working for Ford and having the benefit of the A-Plan discount, it's been a long time since I drove an old car like this. The clutch friction point is WAY out which I'm not used to yet, so there is quite a lot of engine revving going on. It doesn't run very well when it has been sitting for a few hours. And reverse is up and to the left of 1st gear. The trick to getting it into reverse is you have to push the whole shifter down very hard and then pull it toward yourself and shift forward. And 5th gear is very difficult to get into too.

So, about my first ticket. I have been living in my apartment building for 6 months now and every night my boss's husband parks his car on the street in front of our buildings. And he's never got a parking ticket from parking there. But, the first night I park there I get a ticket the next day. Why me? I'm still not sure, but it seems that maybe it is technically illegal to park on the street. At night there isn't enough parking off the street so people park there at night but during the day maybe you have to move the car because the police can come by during the day and give you a ticket which apparently is what happened to me on my very first day. Everybody agrees that I was very unlucky!

On Friday, I rode my bike to work but took the car home for the weekend. I didn't want to leave my bike at work all weekend, so on Saturday I left the car parked on the street and took the bus to work so I could ride my bike home.

Really bad luck because that day the police gave out tickets! No signs posted saying parking not allowed. Even if there were, I wouldn't be able to read them. Apparently that will be 150RMB (>$20) and 2-3 points on my license which really isn't fair. We're only allowed 12 points a year. I don't have a chance!

Actually, before I came to this company there was another foreigner, Bill that worked here. He didn't tell me this, but apparently he got about 10 tickets a month of one sort or another. Of course it didn't take him long to use up his points. But so that he could keep driving, he would pay somebody else to say they were driving the car at that time since it belongs to the company. He would pay 100RMB per point, plus the price of the tickets, so that's probably about 4000-5000 RMB (well over $500) per month.

How many more rules are there like this that I don't know about. So far I found out there are 2 bridges in the city center that have even odd day rules. Even numbered licence plates can use them on even dates, odd numbered plates can use them on odd dates. There are cameras on the bridges that take your picture and send you a ticket if you use them on the wrong date. And there is another bridge that can be used by anybody anytime. And there are several other bridges with no rules so I guess they can also be used by anybody anytime.

And there are several traffic lights or streets where you are not allowed to make a left or a right turn. They are camera controlled as well. Speaking of right turns, it seems that right turn on red is allowed at certain lights but I'm not really sure which ones. Of course there are lots of speed cameras and traffic light cameras. Cameras everywhere - Big Brother Is Definitely Watching You in China! So, my boss's husband bought a nifty camera detector which announces active cameras as you approach them. It also apparently tells you in chinese what speed the camera is set to take pictures at. Pretty cool! But of course these cool devices are illegal.

In summary, Driving in China is definitely not for the faint of heart. It's an EXTREME SPORT!!!