17 Sept 2008
"You are fifty times more likely to die on the roads in Rome than you are in London or Los Angele" - www.romebuddy.com
Its just a tourist website statistic, nothing official, but everyone says that driving here is insane. Not as insane as Mexico City, because here people actually follow the directions on 1-way streets. It is true that intersections are kinda a free for all, but people are not the assholes we imagine. No yelling and no crazy horn honking. The 1-way streets do mean that it can take me an hour to travel 7 km, but the locals know where to go. I will say that driving at night is scary because everyone drives faster, but it is still a free for all. Oh, and I did get rear ended by a car that got rear ended by another car. We were undamaged however. The real craziers are the two-wheel vehicles, which follow no rules what-so-ever. Kinda like the bicylists around CSU, only bigger and faster.
Here is an illustration of driving in Rome:
I drove a Fiat Scudo, which I regret that I don't have an actual photo of the one I was driving. It is quite small for an american van, but quite big compared to you average roman vehicle.
Lots of smart cars parking anywhere they want!
(pic from https:/.../PMC_News/
Back on campus:
Causing a rucus on campus - we were the curiousity of the day. Lots of people came to stare, but people seem afraid to talk to us. Maybe that's because we just stare blankly at them ;)
