Just another day in traffic

While driving home during my lunch break this afternoon, I witnessed a woman fly through a traffic light and strike a man on the crosswalk. I'm sure she would argue that it wasn't her fault since, after all, she did honk her horn insanely to warn everyone that she had no intention of stopping at the light. My impression here is that if you honk your horn loud enough and long enough, that sort of relinquishes any responsibility on the part of the driver to actually obey traffic rules. Here I come, you've been warned!

I think one of the things that bothers me the most about driving here is the number of avoidable accidents if people would just exercise some common sense. Prior to coming here, I had read something in Lonely Planet to the effect of "the Taiwanese would drown in their own bathtub," which is totally harsh but it sort of summed up the writer's impression of common sense in Taiwan. Sadly, on far too many occasions, I've seen how one might come to such a conclusion, especially while on the road.