Sweet Jesus, I have to tell a story: A client of mine, and somewhat influential communist party administrator, invited me out for a walk on Smell Mountain last Saturday, he said he'd give me a ride, buy my dinner, and give me 200rmb for my trouble (no homo, NTTAWWT). I get into his car, and he starts driving. After about 5 minutes of waiting for him to go faster, I realize that actually, 10km/hr is his top speed, whether it's a side road or highway. As he's casually talking to me about work and asking me about other countries, scores of cars honk loudly and speed past him screaming "SHA BI!" quite audibly, which I pretended not to notice. This continues for about an hour, him causing traffic endangering other drivers until we get to Xiang Shan, and to Chinese drivers credit, nobody has murdered him yet like they would in America.
After we finish our hike, while we're on the on-ramp to the 4th ring road, he suggests we find a restaurant, then points out one to our left. "Too bad it's too late." I foolishly say, not realizing that traffic laws to him are about a useful as a girl to a Catholic priest, and my client slams on the breaks. We're on the on ramp, so there's lots of cars behind us, but that doesn't discourage him. "Who are all these fucking cars?" he asks while he calmly backs up into traffic. As each of the 50 cars behind him pulls out of his lane to pass, it creates a 5 foot buffer for him to back up into before stopping again. Great! It only takes him 5 minutes of this to get back to the fork where he can turn off the ramp and go to the restaurant. Then, he blocks both lanes of the highway while he clumsily performs a 17-point turn and drives directly across the highway to the restaurant, mounts the curb, and probably parks on somebody's dog.
I have never, ever, seen a shittier driver in my life. EVER. So I casually work it into our conversation, "Say, Communist Administrator with a lot of money who I pretend to like guy, how long have you been driving?"
"Seven years!" he says with a proud grin, akin to a boy with downs syndrome who just finished his first 2-piece puzzle.
I took a taxi home.
After we finish our hike, while we're on the on-ramp to the 4th ring road, he suggests we find a restaurant, then points out one to our left. "Too bad it's too late." I foolishly say, not realizing that traffic laws to him are about a useful as a girl to a Catholic priest, and my client slams on the breaks. We're on the on ramp, so there's lots of cars behind us, but that doesn't discourage him. "Who are all these fucking cars?" he asks while he calmly backs up into traffic. As each of the 50 cars behind him pulls out of his lane to pass, it creates a 5 foot buffer for him to back up into before stopping again. Great! It only takes him 5 minutes of this to get back to the fork where he can turn off the ramp and go to the restaurant. Then, he blocks both lanes of the highway while he clumsily performs a 17-point turn and drives directly across the highway to the restaurant, mounts the curb, and probably parks on somebody's dog.
I have never, ever, seen a shittier driver in my life. EVER. So I casually work it into our conversation, "Say, Communist Administrator with a lot of money who I pretend to like guy, how long have you been driving?"
"Seven years!" he says with a proud grin, akin to a boy with downs syndrome who just finished his first 2-piece puzzle.
I took a taxi home.
