Whoever thinks driving in New York is crazy has not been to India. Driving here is nuts. First thing, there are like a billion people on the road. There are rules but nobody seems to follow them. They will make U-Turns by going the wrong way on a one-way road. They drive in the middle of two lanes. A guy can make a right turn from the very left of the road. Or a guy can stop and start going in reverse on a busy road while all the other drivers maneuver around him. I even saw a guy stop his car in the middle of the road, make a U-turn and start driving the wrong way.
At first I could not understand how they drove without getting in accidents because even with the driving situation being so crazy, there are very few accidents. Then I noticed two things. First, they do not drive very fast. We had to have a long stretch of open road to get the driver to actually floor it, and even then he was not going that fast. He is going about 80 KPH which is around 50 MPH.
The second thing is there excessive use of the horn. See, in America you use the horn to let someone know they fucked up. They cut you off? Horn em'. They drive too slow? Horn em'. In India, however, they use the horn more as a system of letting the drivers around them know where they are. So every few minutes the driver would honk the horn to let everyone around him know that he is there. I have even seen signs on big trucks that say "HORN PLEASE." I mean, they actually ASK to be honked at.
It works great actually. No real rules, people just horn to let people know where they are. If a guy is driving too slowly, you just horn, and then maneuver around him, even if that means driving on the other side of the road towards on coming traffic.
I think we should use this driving system in America.
Anyway, tomorrow is the first official day of work. Time to get some rest.
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