When it comes to major risks you face while traveling the world, Osama bin Laden has got nothing on Osama bent Fender.
Like most Americans, I treat driving as if it were a God-given right. But when it comes to traveling the world, I become a big believer in mass transit, and for good reason.
According to USA Today, the State Department has calculated that the Number One killer of American travelers since 2003 is neither terrorist strikes nor natural disasters. It’s traffic accidents.
Over those past seven years, more than 1,800 Americans traveling abroad have been killed in road crashes, roughly one every 36 hours.
Forty percent of those road fatalities were in Mexico — which means that if you come to grief south of the border, you’re much more likely to be taken out by a car than a cartel.
Thailand is second, followed by the Dominican Republic. Germany and Spain round out the top five.
Read the entire USA Today story here.
As a traveler, you face a lot more danger from ordinary road hazards than terrorism, plane crashes or strange diseases. According to the Campaign for Global Road Safety, 1.3 million people around the world are killed in accidents every year. That’s one victim every six seconds.
Within ten years — if the United Nations is right in its estimates — more people will be dying in accidents worldwide than dying of AIDS.
I’ve seen my share of full-contact motoring. Driving in Mexico or the Dominican Republic can put the fear of God into you. The concept of the kamikaze is not dead; it simply migrated to drivers in Bangkok. If you told me that five pedestrian “kills” in Rome made you an ace, it wouldn’t surprise me.
I haven’t been to India yet, but their traffic chaos is legendary. We who are about to drive, salute you.
I especially love the frustrated motorist who likened New York City drivers at rush hour to “ferrets on crack.”
This is one big reason why, whenever I travel outside the United States, it seldom even occurs to me to rent a car.
Driving is scary enough in places where the scenery is familiar and I’ve got every pothole committed to memory, much less in a distant locale where everything around me is new and potentially fascinating.
Also, I’d rather spend my time taking in the sights and meeting folks than having to focus on learning the local rules of the road game.
There are times when you have no alternative to renting some wheels and taking your chances, but for the most part, I’m perfectly happy to take el autobus or le Metro — and leave the driving to someone else.
Hell, I’m still trying to figure out those zig-zag lines painted onto the streets of London!
Want some real fun; try driving a manual transmission on the left side of the road with the steering column on the right side. Add to it 160kph or 3mph (there’s nothing in-between) crazed driving and you’ve got a wonderful Johannesburg, South Africa experience.
Think I’ll wait til the movie comes out. Like I said, this is why I stick to public transportation in certain parts of the world! Although that, too, has its moments. Like when the Mexican bus driver props up his bus with a bottle jack that came out of a Volkswagen Beetle, then crawls underneath it to fix a broken fan belt — after driving on it for 200 miles.