Wednesday, June 16, 2010

Some things are just ridiculous

Some incredible things about life here...

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A few days ago I felt like the tyres on our VW Golf were a little sluggish so I insisted on visiting a petrol station to fill air.

And ya know what? Ya have to friggin pay for the air!

Pay for air!

They give you 5 minutes for 50 cents.

We didn't know how long we would take, so just in case, we prepared everything before inserting the coin. In the end, we took 3 minutes to finish up, and that's with the two of us. Wow, they really cut it thin, don't they?

Pay for air!!

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Drivers on the road don't care about the sidewalks. Driving, parking, reversing... they'll do it all on the sidewalk if they have to. No wonder there're so many shitty old cars here. If you have a shiny new car, people will call you a bastard and think, "Serves you right" if you get a scratch. Basically, having a shitty car is almost a way of survival.

Yesterday, while stuck at a standstill near Rotterdam Centraal, there was a DHL van mounted on the little island sidewalk next to us. The driver had delivered something nearby and was now back in her van, trying to get out. So she inched forward, trying to turn the van around and out of there. And, never bothering to reverse and adjust herself, she inches forward all the way and scrapes our car... pretty badly.

So I get down to check the damage. She continues adjusting her van, then just simply drives off!


Such good road manners, I tell you. Naturally, we called DHL to complain today and report her van license plate.

But seriously, in the whole 10 years that I've been driving in KL, I've never seen so many cars just drive over sidewalks as if they're not there, as in the 6 months that I've been here.

2 comments:

melissa chan said...

Well if you pay, the pumps better be working! I don't mind paying, because have you tried the pumps around KL? Most of them don't work...! Because they never bother to maintain the pumps...so it's quite annoying. Perhaps you are paying for the maintenance?

We don't have ppl driving over sidewalks in KL...mostly parking on the, yes...but i think the malaysian taxi drivers as just as bad!

shoobaba said...

Yah, I get ya. But 50 cents here is kind of expensive compared to 50 sen. I sound like Scrooge McDuck here, but 50 cents is actually worth something here! Haha... can get a box of 4 croissants for €1, for instance.

However, the pumps I use around my house and in Bangsar are usually working, that's why I'm complaining so much about having to pay for air here.

The problem in KL is not the sidewalks but the DOUBLE PARKING!!! Urgh!