Beijing and Cars

More than 30,000 new cars hit the road here every month in this city, each a dangerous weapon in the hand of a newly-licensed driver.  A friend's girlfriend gave me a lift home the other night and he and I screamed in terror about six times on the way home: the girlfriend shrugged off each near-accident and sped on, seeming unable to learn that accelerating and forcing someone off the road in a game of what amounted to "Chicken" was perhaps not the best way to stay accident-free (let alone alive.) This was BEFORE the snow hit: I can only imagine the little vixen gunning her engine and trying to stop on a kuai in the slush.

Most people drive as if this is the first day of Driver's Ed. I often see new drivers backing over fences, hitting small shrubs or trees, or racing through red lights. The attitude seems to be "I am invincible because I can afford a car." Most cannot back up, a fact the small fences in my compound attest to plainly. Children remain unrestrained: there are no car seats, and most don't even wear seat belts. I saw this on a morning walk: Dad drove, cigarette in mouth, while toddler son sat on his lap, hands on steering wheel. Older child--perhaps five--hung out the window with a glass bottle of Coke (hard to find here) and a stick lollipop in his mouth. Dad let toddler steer, which meant an impact with a delivery man's bicycle. It is his livelihood, I might add. Dad inspects the damage to his car, swears a blue streak at the delivery man for putting a dent in his car,  then gets back with toddler hanging off the back of his neck now--and drives off. Delivery man tries not to cry as he inspects his ruined bike. Crowd rumbles disapprovingly but the car apparently had some special license plate and no one wants to get involved. Older child vomits out the window, perhaps a result of the Coke bottle and lollipop working in tandem,  a move which garners much interest from the crowd. Suddenly Britney doesn't look so bad.