Taiwanese traffic

When I was in Taiwan, I started to develop an addiction. No, not alcohol, cigarettes or even chocolate. No, I started to become addicted to adrenalin.The traffic there is giving me a massive adrenalin-rush. It always appear to me that the Taiwanese are trying to commit mass suicide, and back out of it at the last moment. Also the attitude in the traffic is completely different. As friendly and helpfull as they are in general, as homocidal and aggressive they are in traffic. And I am really talking day and night here, fire and ice, "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde"...well, you get the idea. There is hardly any consideration with other traffic what so ever. Once my wife and I were driving home from Kaoshiung. Nearby Taichung we got stuck in a traffic jam for no obvious reason (well, I am used to that, since that is common practise here in Holland). Since we had the idea, that we didn't get anywhere if we stayed on this route, we decided to take another route. So, we had to change lanes, to take the next exit. YEAH, RIGHT!!! Changing lanes in traffic jam? IN TAIWAN?? Good luck!!
I did everything that I was suppost to do, turn the signal lights on, move the car in the desired direction a bit already, etc. But do you think that any car would have the courtesy to let me in? They just kept on driving as if they didn't see me. Even when I was already halfway already, they still passed me, even if that meant that they had to drive AROUND me. Now, I did have some experience with Taiwanese traffice and knew a little bit what to expect, but I still was surprised. So,...I just went for it the Taiwanese way:"BOOM = HO!"

And it all looks like there are absolutely no traffic rules. LOOKS, because there sure are rules, surprisingly:

"The bigger the car, the stronger you are". This does suggest a certain hierarchy: as pedestrian you are nothing more than a notch on a gun, a bicycle is a little bit higher in the food chain (since the iron on the bike could cause more damage to your car then some flesh and bones), a Mercedes or Lexus is higher than for example a Honda, and when you are bus- or truckdriver.......yeah, you guessed it, the world is at your feet (or in this case wheels).

The following rule is also very important: If you see a gap, USE it! No matter how small it is, or how dangerous it is. With this in mind the most scooters are driving around like kamikaze-pilots, zig-zagging through the traffic as if Satan himself is chasing them.

For the next rule you need to practise a bit: when someone crosses the street, ALWAYS pass in front of him/her, NEVER behind them. And of course the trick is NOT to hit that person. Scaring the shit out of him is ok. In fact, that is mandatory.

Traffic lights are also funny. All pedestrian lights have a counter, which shows how long the light stays green.

However, does the light change to yellow, during your survival trip to the other side of the road, either run for your life or hit the deck. “Wait a minute…..you said yellow?”. Yes, yellow. Normally people should wait for their light to turn green. But here they wait, especially scooters, for the other light to turn yellow. That way they are already at warp speed when their light turns green.

On some places these lights are also there for cars, like for example in HsinChu. Except, here it is the other way around, and it shows how long the light stays red (after all, we are talking about Taiwan). The fun thing in HsinChu is that on regular basis races are being held by the youth, with earlier mentioned traffic lights as starting point.

As all the above proves, driving in Taiwan does takes some skill. However, when you are planning on driving here, you have to remember one thing: forget everything you ever learned about driving. Traffic rules are being made (and violated) on the spot. The first time I was driving there, I was really following the rules as I learned them in Holland. Not that I am driving like a saint here, but what if you run in Taiwan into a cop who haven’t met his target in tickets yet.
Well, let me tell you, you will stop driving nicely after a few days. You see, in Taiwan, the police is working on real crime, instead of small time traffic violations (unlike in Holland). So, there isn’t much traffic control.
Eventually you will get used to the traffic, slowly or in my case, fast. My wife already said several times already (when we were driving by car or bike): “you really are driving like a Taiwanese already”. Now, I don’t know if I should consider this as an insult or a compliment, but it does show how much I had adapted to the traffic. And once back in Holland, I had a hard time to get used to driving by the rules again.

By the way, do you know that people in Taiwan don’t learn how to drive a car, but how to pass the driving exam. Every morning on my way to school, I passed a driving school.

Well, actually I should put “school”, since it’s nothing more than a parking lot, changed into a track, where the basics of driving are “learned”, like turning in a street, driving backwards in a corner, and all those other VERY important skills. In Holland, all this is learned on the actual road, with “real” traffic around you. In Taiwan it is learned on previous mentioned parking lot, in a specially modified car. The car has little marks on the passengers side of the car, showing you what to do, when to turn etc. For example, when want to park backwards in line, there is a mark, which will tell you, that when that mark is aligned with for instance a lightpole, you need to turn the steering wheel a certain number of times.
So basically, people know how to drive a certain car of a certain driving school, but as soon as they get into another car, they might crash it. You learn how to pass for the exam. Experience you will learn in real life.

Therefore, this way, the worlds best and the worlds worst drivers are being created at the same time. Everyone is always doing their utmost best, with the little driving skills, not to scratch their most precious possessions, that despite the chaos, little accidents happen. Even with that huge amount of kamikaze pilots.
Once we were driving to Taroko National Park, which is in the middle of Taiwan, in the mountains. Since we left a bit later than planned, we ended up in a mist, or actually low clouds. And I am talking near zero visibility, 5 meters or less. And the road was a 2 lane road, or even a 1 ½ way lane. Now, I am not scared easily in the car, but even I was terrified. This was one of the very few occasions that I was actually keeping the speed limit, and sometimes even less. And believe it or not, even under these circumstances I was passed with a speed, even Michael Schumacher would have been scared of. Passing under these conditions either takes nerves of steel OR serious psychiatric help.

You can expect ANYTHING here in traffic. Busses are being passed in a curve on a 2-lane road, driving in the inside lane of hairpin bends, even when the end is not visible. And what if there is another car coming? Well, see the first rule I wrote earlier.

You might wonder, aren’t there any traffic signs, or traffic lights? Sure, they are there, but they are basically just for decoration. People are passing at a double line, U-turns are made at places where it clearly shows that this is not allowed, scooters are driving on places where they are not suppose to drive, etc.
Also when it comes to the cars itself, you can expect everything here. Anything goes, mirrored windows, coloured headlights.

As you might already know (or not), the national mode of transport is the scooter. And yes, in most cases this is the easiest and fastest vehicle. The fun part is that the whole infrastructure is based on this. There are special parking places for scooters, even entire parking garages. There are even special trucks to deliver the scooters to the shops.

Also there are lanes especially for scooters, like the bicycle lanes in Holland. And at the traffic lights usually the first 10, 15 meters are only occupied with scooters.

Another funny thing is the protection of the head on the scooters. A few years ago, the government had decided that everyone on a scooter should wear protection on the head, while driving the scooter. Apparently, they have forgotten to write down a good definition of that protection.

The result is, that even though everyone is actually wearing a helmet, but in some cases they might just as well not wear it at all, since it wouldn’t help anyway. People are wearing some sort of “baseball”- helmet, others are wearing helmets which are 2 or 3 sizes too big, or don’t have a chin strap. I wouldn’t be surprised if I would see someone driving around with a wok on his head. In case of an accident most of these helmets offer just as much protection as a t-shirt is protecting you from the rain. So, basically, the only protection they offer is for fines from the police.