Also known as: “the other driver.”
Another something that popped into my head on holiday, which isn’t very remarkable, since we were on the road almost every day. The first three days were filled with car-travel anyway, driving from the Netherlands to Croatia can’t be done in one day. And entering Croatia in less than two hours, waiting at the border, is also impossible.
My dad is the only one in my family who is able and allowed to drive a car. I don’t think he minds driving very much, but after a few hours on the road, it’s quite obvious he’s starting to get annoyed. By the other drivers, to be precise.
Most foreigners who come to the Netherlands complain about how our drivers don’t stop at red lights and zebra crossings. Well, I’m going to Switzerland at the end of August and I’ll tell everyone there that Swiss people don’t care about queues. Waiting at the Croatian border, we saw three Swiss cars (and this is no lie) leave the line, accelerate to pass maybe two or three cars, only to join the same queue again. Well, congratulations. You just managed to have two cars more behind you. It brings you nothing - you still have to wait for the people in front of you.
And the thing is, you can’t just stop them from joining the row of cars again. Because they’ll just push the nose of their car into the smallest gap they see, and unless you want to crash into them as a punishment (for them or for you, reader’s choice) you can only brake and wait for the gap to widen so they can fit the rest of the car in.
I am actually not kidding.
Another thing about the “other driver” which starts to annoy my dad after more than two hours of driving, is the changing-lanes thing. Here on Europe’s mainland, people drive on the right. Which means if you want to overtake a slow car, you have to change lanes to the left, since overtaking on the right is, by law, forbidden. If you’re a fast driver, you will drive on the left lane. My dad is a fast driver, especially in Germany, where on some parts of the highway there’s no speed limit.
So if another car gets stuck behind, what do I know, grannies in a Toyota or a Polish truck, the car will change lanes to overtake. But some of them, and I don’t think this is very country-based, as with the Swiss at the Croatian border, some of them just go. What do you have a rearview-mirror for? To look whether the car behind you is far away or too close for you to change lanes. Is that practical? Yes, it is. So why don’t people use it?
Because they’re too self-absorbed to notice or to care.
And it’s really bloody annoying when you’re driving fast and all of a sudden, some idiot changes lanes not two meters in front of you, so you have to slam your foot down on the brake if you want to avoid a crash.
I don’t know why people keep saying Dutch are such horrid car drivers. Why don’t you look in the mirror first! I have been to Croatia, Italy, Austria en Germany these past three and a half weeks, and they’re doing it everywhere.
Sure, Dutch don’t stop at zebra crossings too much. But really, there’s a lot more rudeness on the road in Europe than just that. (By the way, I’m sure my dad doesn’t stop at zebra crossings either, only in other countries. That’s a funny thought, isn’t it? In our own country, we behave bad. But in others, where they’ve got different - unwritten - rules, he’s quite a polite one.)
I’ll leave you on that very interesting note.
Sweet dreams!
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