Crazy Asian Drivers

Most of the time, I just go along and do my thing and totally forget that I live in Korea. I spend most of my time on base, which aside from all the Koreans who work there, is just like being in America. So it's easy to forget that I do actually live someplace that is not America outside the walls of the military base as well. But there are random moments when I'll be walking down the street, snooping around the Korean market like the impostor that I am, or laughing over the gaping mouths of Korean children as they watch me walk past with my pale pale skin and blonde hair and get struck all over again that I do, in fact, live in Korea.

I had one such moment last night.

David and I hung out with friends to eat a little dinner and rock out. [I think I'm about ready to step it up to hard on drums.] We left a little after midnight and if we leave that late we generally just take a taxi home. So we waited on the curb where we know we can generally flag down a taxi. I should have instantly known this ride would be an adventure when David flagged down a speeding taxi cab and the driver hit his brakes so hard and fast that he skidded a little and killed his engine.

Still, we hopped in fast and took off, just happy that we'd managed to get a taxi so quickly. (We generally have to wait a little while to get an open taxi.) My second clue that this would be a hair raising adventure came when David and I realized--with a little bit of horror--that the seatbelts had been cut out of the backseat. I don't know why you'd cut out seatbelts from a car, especially a taxi, but we had no choice but to dig our feet in and hold onto the door handles and each other.

Since only designated cabs are allowed access onto base (and this wasn't one of those cabs), the quickest way to our neighborhood from our friend's house was to go around the base and drive through a convoluted series of twisty streets barely wide enough for two cars, down a mountain. So our speedy cab driver was barrelling down these streets, barely slowing down at the speed bumps or when passing another car and generally driving like a crazy person. Halfway down the mountain, I realized that "I'm not in America anymore" and started to laugh.

We had the cab driver drop us of a few blocks from our house and walked the rest of the way home, laughing over the ridiculousness of the ride we had just endured.

But hey, at least it was the shortest cab ride home ever.

But next time, I want a seatbelt.