Driving

One of the main things our friends from back home ask us about is how the driving is going for us. Anyone who's been to one of the countries where they drive on the "wrong" side of the road can probably empathize with the difficulty of switching all of one's reflexes. Think about it for a minute: when you get ready to cross the street, you look to your left, don't you? I wouldn't suggest trying that here.

Ditto for driving itself: everything really does feel quite backwards. I figured (wrongly) that I'd only have to get used to driving on the wrong side of the road. In fact, there are lots of things that are different. The rules for yielding are completely different, including something called the "left turn rule." I'll try to explain, and if it seems confusing then think about doing it while you're actually driving around in a state of near panic: if you're turning left and you notice that the oncoming car in the other lane is turning right, then yield to them. In other words, it is sometimes proper form to turn in front of oncoming traffic. If you ask people how you are supposed to ensure that nobody kills you while attempting this, then they'll invariably tell you to try to make eye contact with the other driver. Clever, except that it's often raining.

It's a weird feeling getting behind the wheel for the first time. It's like being 15 again: you don't have a good sense of where the other side of the car is, and you don't know where any of the buttons or signals are (try turning on your blinker and your windshield wipers come on). On top of all of this, once you finally figure out how to back out of your very tiny driveway, you're faced with really curvy roads that look something like this:



That's a two lane road, mate.

My first driving experience took place the day after we arrived. Beth, one of the psychiatrists with whom I'm working, took it upon herself to teach me how to drive to the store. She should have earned some sort of medal for this. We managed to survive with only a scraped up rim. My next few driving experiences involved Quinn screaming loudly in the backseat while I gripped the wheel tightly and tried not to kill anyone. The good news is that things improved pretty quickly as Amy and I found that we both calmed down a lot after a few hours behind the wheel. I even got the hang of the two-lane roundabout after a few days.

One wonderful thing about this city is that there simply isn't much traffic. I'm attributing this to the fact that the city is largely walkable and has great public transportation. At any rate, you can drive right through the middle of town with no problem. It's easy to drive from our house to the other side of town in 15 minutes even when the "traffic" is bad.

The upside to all of this is that it improves your driving skills dramatically. Well, at least I think it does. I'm interested to see what driving back in the US is like...

On tap for this weekend: trying to find Wellington's local seal colony, and another trip to the west coast. We'll keep you posted.