Friday, March 17, 2006
Helmets and Seatbelts and Laws, Oh My!
by venitha
"Put on your seatbelt," Jim said, looking over his shoulder as he eased the car into reverse.
I sighed but said nothing and, a moment later, obeyed. He was right, of course, but it was still irritating to be told what to do. By him, and by the law.
Yet I remember blithely telling a long-distance college boyfriend not to make the two-hour drive to visit me if he wouldn't wear his seatbelt.
I also remember glaring with annoyance at my Colorado neighbor as she waved her unhelmeted son off to school on his bike.
And I remember a police car behind me blaring "Pull the bike over!" on its loudspeaker, causing my friend Shari and I, two teenage hooligans riding double, to nearly swerve into the ditch.
In a mere nine months, Asia has transformed me, and now the US and my former self seem paranoid, hysterical, hyper-vigilant to a ridiculous point.
Jim and I have dug for seatbelts to no avail in cabs in countless countries, only to be assured in a babble of accents that there is no need: it's not the law.
In Taiwan and in India, entire families speed crazily through city streets on a single scooter, Father driving, Mother clasping his waist with one arm and Baby with the other, Big Brother standing boldly upright on the seat in between. Not a single helmet in the mix.
Even in proud-to-be first-world Singapore, bike helmets are a rarity, and it's common to see multiple riders balanced precariously on a single bicycle, racing the dark evening streets of Little India without a light.
As predicted, living and traveling in Asia has changed me in ways unpredicted, but to have transformed me into a Britney Spears defender is truly astonishing.
venitha
I sighed but said nothing and, a moment later, obeyed. He was right, of course, but it was still irritating to be told what to do. By him, and by the law.
Yet I remember blithely telling a long-distance college boyfriend not to make the two-hour drive to visit me if he wouldn't wear his seatbelt.
I also remember glaring with annoyance at my Colorado neighbor as she waved her unhelmeted son off to school on his bike.
And I remember a police car behind me blaring "Pull the bike over!" on its loudspeaker, causing my friend Shari and I, two teenage hooligans riding double, to nearly swerve into the ditch.
In a mere nine months, Asia has transformed me, and now the US and my former self seem paranoid, hysterical, hyper-vigilant to a ridiculous point.
Jim and I have dug for seatbelts to no avail in cabs in countless countries, only to be assured in a babble of accents that there is no need: it's not the law.
In Taiwan and in India, entire families speed crazily through city streets on a single scooter, Father driving, Mother clasping his waist with one arm and Baby with the other, Big Brother standing boldly upright on the seat in between. Not a single helmet in the mix.
Even in proud-to-be first-world Singapore, bike helmets are a rarity, and it's common to see multiple riders balanced precariously on a single bicycle, racing the dark evening streets of Little India without a light.
As predicted, living and traveling in Asia has changed me in ways unpredicted, but to have transformed me into a Britney Spears defender is truly astonishing.
venitha
