or: Today I Saw My First Car Accident In Mauritius

Same as in most countries I’ve lived, driving in Mauritius is on the left-hand side of the road. It makes driving here for me a fraction easier than if it were on the other side.

There are a few factors that make it difficult for me:

• incredibly narrow, two-way roads in most of the village ares (not like the one in the above photo, that is more of an exception as it connects two villages)
• an inordinate amount of blind corners
• I am not use to the courtesies drivers extend to each other and they appear to be a little inconsistent

These three factors combine to make driving for me not as much of a pleasure as what others find it. Actually, driving for me has always been about function rather than the joy of driving to the point that while I’d really like to go in a convertible down Route 66 in the US, I don’t need to be the one doing the driving. I’d be happier as the co-pilot with  control over the music.

Going down a narrow, two-way road necessitates keeping a close eye on what is coming from the other direction as whomever is nearest to an outwood dent / curve in the road is the one that needs to pull over and that can be quite a distance from where you would actually pass the car if you were both to keep going at a constant pace. You need to stay in there until all the cars have passed unless there are more cars behind you and the next ones on the other side are at a further distance. Then you can go.

Hand waves all round.

It is not advisable to play the car radio too loud as it is important to be able to hear the motorbikes (in particular) honking their horn as they pass t-intersections as they know they may not be seen. Many houses have built high walls on their corner so seeing around it is impossible. It involves slowly edging forward, keeping an eye out for pedestrians (they generally seem to ignore the beeping of reverse lights as well as honking so it is really important to watch closely!), looking repeatedly in both directions before edging forward a little bit more and then flooring it to turn the corner.

Sometimes cars will stop on the adjoining road to let you in. They will flash their lights and make hand gestures once the car on the other side stops too (usually that’s the side you may not be able to see and it’s also usually the one that would hit you first).

More hand waves.

Cars will routinely stop in the middle of the road to let cars reverse out of their parking spots that are perpendicular to the road. They will also swerve to the other side of the road to pass buses and parked cars (remember, the roads are fairly narrow).

Sometimes they don’t.

In the back of my mind I also have the knowledge there is a high rate of motorbike accidents here so I’m a little paranoid about how they drive too and have seen one go up the back of a stationary truck. The truck had stopped in traffic (the traffic had been slowing so it was expected), the motorcyclist wasn’t paying attention, hit the back of it (fairly slowly), got the wobbles, pulled to the side of the road and regained his balance and then took off again. We kept at a distance from that guy for the rest of the trip.

The minor miracle in all of this is I have seen no instances of road rage.

Today is the first car accident I’ve seen.

Missed the hand gestures.

* Thanks to Madness for the title to this post.