I don't know how to drive a car. This is not some self-deprecating comment on my driving skills, it's just that I don't have a driver's license or driving experience to boast about and most folks react with complete disbelief when they find out. I don't blame them.
So not surprisingly one of my goals of this year is learning how to drive a car and although I've gotten away with being a car-less individual for most of my life it seems as I'm finally living in a place where that is just not an option. The UAE is all about automobiles. People have the fanciest, biggest and most expensive vehicles I have ever seen, often recklessly driving around at full speed. Sometimes the drivers don't even exit their cars when shopping: They honk loudly and wait for a Pakistani/Bangladeshi clerk to run out and take their order, whether it is for takeaway food or some other random item like a pair of slippers. I know it is a hot climate and staying within the air-conditioned space of your gas guzzler is tempting, but really... (I call this lazy-ass rich person syndrome)
In Dubai there's a metro and buses but here in the lovely backwaters where I reside there's not a bus station in sight so I'm going to have to take the plunge and get in a four-wheeled machine for some lessons...Watch out camels, date trees and other inanimate obstacles. I'll try to swerve.
The ironic thing is that I am currently captaining the dive boat. It does seem somewhat backwards (knowing how to operate a boat before a car) but how I love flying across the waves, picking up divers and kicking them overboard into the blue. In the nicest way possible, of course.
And I have this feeling that it will take a long time before I'll learn how to read traffic signs and use indicators but my hope is that I will enjoy it just as much as I love being a boat wench.
So not surprisingly one of my goals of this year is learning how to drive a car and although I've gotten away with being a car-less individual for most of my life it seems as I'm finally living in a place where that is just not an option. The UAE is all about automobiles. People have the fanciest, biggest and most expensive vehicles I have ever seen, often recklessly driving around at full speed. Sometimes the drivers don't even exit their cars when shopping: They honk loudly and wait for a Pakistani/Bangladeshi clerk to run out and take their order, whether it is for takeaway food or some other random item like a pair of slippers. I know it is a hot climate and staying within the air-conditioned space of your gas guzzler is tempting, but really... (I call this lazy-ass rich person syndrome)
In Dubai there's a metro and buses but here in the lovely backwaters where I reside there's not a bus station in sight so I'm going to have to take the plunge and get in a four-wheeled machine for some lessons...Watch out camels, date trees and other inanimate obstacles. I'll try to swerve.
The ironic thing is that I am currently captaining the dive boat. It does seem somewhat backwards (knowing how to operate a boat before a car) but how I love flying across the waves, picking up divers and kicking them overboard into the blue. In the nicest way possible, of course.
And I have this feeling that it will take a long time before I'll learn how to read traffic signs and use indicators but my hope is that I will enjoy it just as much as I love being a boat wench.
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment