Roads and traffic: What the hell is wrong here?

Makes perfect sense.....to a Chinese person....

Makes perfect sense.....to a cop....

e-bike vs. car

do the maths! The road rules follow the maths.

... glad you weren't hurt more.

Joe, I think you should move that post Upstairs.

Benhur style wheel blades and judicious application of spikes. Wear a helmet with a horse hair plume or a large mohawk on it, leather shoulder pads, like the roadwarriar.  Nobody bumps my bike, or steps up or gets in my way.  They dont look me in the eye either, of course the wandering glass one with the screaming mouth design for a pupil means they dont know which one to look at.

Seriously, unless I go out of my way to stand out, they always crowd me really bad and step up on collision course.  I find myself wondering what would happen if I dropped a shoulder and dropped a pedestrian.  I played noseguard for years I can drop one of these scrawney F'ers in a heart beat, but I dont...  I cant figure out if theres rules that only they know  or if they smell nondeoderant pheramones like ants and so just avoid each other but because I WEAR deoderant and Im not Chinese they cant smell mine???

I really want to get a hold of the driver's manual for the Chinese road system, and read it. Just to see if there are, in fact, rules.

A friend who's been here a number of years said: "No. Not really. They enter traffic without looking, and when a collision is immanent, they just stop. Because the person driving has to pass a test, they must be better at the roads than you. They do this because their parents did it. And their parents did it. And their parents didn't have cars on the road, and the fastest moving vehicle was a rickshaw."

The odd thing to me though is they dont seem to run into each other that much though.  I mean there are a lot of accidents but considering the lack of apparent rules or organizaton of traffic into lanes or taking turns etc, why arent there 10 to 20 times more accidents and and why dont they run into each otehr when their walking around on the street, sidewalk, in the mall etc the way they run into me? 

How long did it take for you all to stop saying excuse me when you bumped into someone by the way? I still find my self doing it even though they don't say a word when they barrel into me and I'm sure most don't understand my words either...  Of course I don't live there full time like most of you either so...

Parallel universes is the answer to the 1st question.  The components of the traffic all exist in parallel universes, with the white lines being the anchors for these universes. This is the only logical reason to have the white lines.  Road decoration seems an improbable waste of money. When these anchors weaken is the time when the universes collide and accidents happen.

Your second question - I still apologise after 4 years - but instead of saying 'excuse me', I now say 'bu hao yisi". Always gets a 'mei guanxi' in response.

What Lotus said.  I still give the "aiyou! Dubuqi" when I clip someone in my black SUV that never goes offroad.  At least until the cheeky little vermin yell at me for compensation, at which point I instruct my driver to whack them in the shins with a cane and swipe their wallets.

Here in a sleepy historic town in Malaysia, the drivers like to play a game:
go real fast and almost hit the bicycle with your car.

I'm the one on the bike. And its for sure just a matter of time. Unless I get the heck out of here first. I'm saving my pennies.

I don't miss the drivers in China at all. Or the bicycle riders or the pedestrians for that matter. In China I went from screaming and banging on the hood when drivers would run the light then try to run me over to just photographing them. Have a camera with an 'instant on' with you at all times.

My girlfriend has had two accidents in the last month.  She has been riding her E-Bike and there was a car in the bike lane, she was turning left and when the traffic light went green, the car suddenly turned right and striaght into her and the bike.  She was amazed that loads of chinese people stood in front of the car so he couldnt drive off.  He had to take her to hospital and pay for everything, luckily she wasnt too hurt.  The second time she just came out of work and she was going past a slow moving car, the dorr suddenly opened and smashed striaght into her fingers. The door shut quickly and the car drove off.  Luckily nothing was broken. 

I have had people suddenly swerve into me when I have been going in a striaght line on a big road with no one else on it, I was like 2 metres away from the guy and its like they go into a day dream and just go lala.  I have had to kick a few bikes out of the way when they have done it.

Pedestrians walking off of bus stops is the worst, they never look, they just walk straight out into the bike last.  I have seen loads of accidents next to bus stops. 

I have only fallen off my bike once, when a couple walked straight out in front of me, looking directly at me, i slammed on the brakes (even though I should have slammed into them) and the back end slid out and I fell off.  They just continued to stare and walk. 

I have only fallen off my bike once, when a couple walked straight out in front of me, looking directly at me, i slammed on the brakes (even though I should have slammed into them) and the back end slid out and I fell off.  They just continued to stare and walk. 

To Mister Barfly:

I am sorry that they continued to stare and walk. As a fellow human being, I see no excuse for such black-hearted and callous behavior, but I have only seen this in China or other extremely racial locations where you're the odd-one-out.

It's interesting how your girlfriend was treated kindly. I have seen this as well. Also, middle-aged female teachers seem to have no experience with how abusive the Chinese can be to foreign males (especially when on their own without a friend).

Anyone lovers of China want to defend that behavior? I don't see any excuse for it myself. This kind of coldness happened to me several times in China and then one time when I wiped out on my motorbike in Thailand. Just cold stares.

This is NOT a racist phenomenon, but a 'I don't want to get involved' phenomenon.  Happens all over the world, not just with accidents, but rapes, beatings, muggings etc. People will stare, walk carefully around someone on the ground and keep going.  Happens in Australia, the US, UK - you name it. 

The very best you can hope for sometimes is that someone, when they have gone far enough past you not to be linked, will call the police or ambulance.

That would also not be a new attitude, LE.  As I recall in the story of the Good Samaritan, several people came along, looked at the victim and continued on their way.  Without helping the injured man.

I agree Amonk.  And as a lover of China - I don't condone it here - or anywhere else in the world!

Not that I have experienced an accident or incident in China, but perhaps Lotus Eater has a point about people just not wanting to get involved. I expect it is a worldwide problem as the majority of people go about their daily lives and don't really want any more hassles than those which they have to deal with. I see the behaviour of Asian people in particular at the Casino. It seems to be every man for himself as they push in front of you and nearly trample you to death to get into the lifts... it's nothing personal. Having said that, I have experienced several instances of Anglo saxon Australian people behaving in a manner which is unacceptable to me, but can only fall under the heading of "not wanting to get involved". On one occasion, a man was being kicked to death on a main street footpath in Darwin. Crowds of people walked past and did nothing despite its  being obvious that the man was unconscious. I had to lie on top of this man to save him as I screamed to a shopkeeper to call the ambulance...no one helped! A lady had an epileptic fit on a very full train, again no one moved to help her. I ended up alone with an unconscious woman on a near deserted railway platform. I must admit that the train guard did help me to carry this lady off the train and on to the platform. (he then jumped back on the train, blew the whistle and the train took off)The ticket inspector did call an ambulance and walked back to his office and left me with a woman I had never seen before. To top that off, people who got off other trains, just stepped over her legs (she was near the edge of the platform) Again no one offered to help. I waited half an hour for the ambulance and the woman did not regain consciousness during that time. I have other stories of similar types of behaviour by people from my own country, Australia. If I hadn't experienced these things, I would find it hard to believe that a broad spectrum of people could behave in such a manner. I won't even go into my trying to evacuate a two story building on my own during a bomb scare or the fact that I fell over (following hip surgery) and could not get up. Yeah, you guessed it, a lady saw me fall as she was jogging behind me;she crossed the street, rather than get involved and help me to my feet. I had to wait for my cries for help to be heard by neighbours down the street.
 All that I can conclude is that people do not want to get involved, which is no doubt Lotus Eaters experience also.