[SDP]

Originally Posted by Anandv267

Incident which happened yest eve while returning from office
...
After a few kms he comes near my window again . I roll it down and say "boss i spologised for scaring you. what now"
his reply was "I am sorry boss. it is completely my fault. BTW i just noticed your teamBHP sticker. Now i know why you follow road rules so religiously. And please dont take that wrench out again. It scared the s*** out of me. Dont scare others too. Am very sorry"
..

Thanks for sharing. Beautifully narrated as well.
Liked the happy ending.

BUT, purely from your own safety concern, I would strongly advise against 2 things:
1. Stepping out of the car
2. Brandishing a wrench

Don't want to be paranoid and paint dooms-day scenarios, but just imagine, what could happen if the other guy carries a bigger tool/weapon.

Drive safe buddy.

[Anandv267]

Originally Posted by SDP

Thanks for sharing. Beautifully narrated as well.
Liked the happy ending.

BUT, purely from your own safety concern, I would strongly advise against 2 things:
1. Stepping out of the car
2. Brandishing a wrench

Don't want to be paranoid and paint dooms-day scenarios, but just imagine, what could happen if the other guy carries a bigger tool/weapon.

Drive safe buddy.

I am known for my calmness and patience amongst my group(They also call it cowardice). I never get into fights. I have even smiled and tol no problems when people have rear-ended my car because i know they did not do it on purpose.(they ofcourse apologised). But this fellow kicked my car. i dint even mind the abusive language. And the final straw was him trying to hit me. I had no choice.
And i was ashamed of my act. That is why i apologised . I have told my self that i would never do such things again.

Regarding getting out of the car. Am a local and the guy who tries to rough me up wont last half a day after he touches me. (Bad people should be taught a lesson. i would call it implementing karma from my side)

[nandans2005]

I do not know what to conclude from this incident

!!

Conclude what ? Conclude that this is the most foolish thing both of you could have ever done.

Ideally, you should calmed the other fellow and sent him home. Brandishing a wrench is not great heroism. Being an educated person, you should have excercised restraint instead of just reacting to the situation.

We as Bhpians should exhibit calmness and try to invoke the same with other road users. Please note that you were the first guy to have rolled your window down and said the first few words. This is the start of the entire episode. You could have remained absolutely calm in your cabin.

Please exercise better restraint from next time. Buddy.

[mooza]

Originally Posted by nandans2005

You could have remained absolutely calm in your cabin

Absolutely.

Nowadays my windows are always up and AC always on, door locked and music on, at all traffic junctions, and slow moving traffic. Keeps me calm all the time, unlike earlier days when I used to make / return eye contact and react to provocation of any form . It's just not worth it.

[Anandv267]

@nandans2005
I know i shouldn have rolled down my windows and talked to him. He looked like a decent family chap with a girl with him. That is the only reason i talked to him. And i was not going to just sit there while he tries to bully me around.

I made way for him the moment i got the chance. He could have moved on. But he wantedly came and created problems. If you read carefully i was very calm and decent till the time he tried to hit me. I wont stand there doing nothing while some random person tries to hit me for following the traffic rules.

The wrench was just to show him that i could hit him back too.

All said i shoudn talked first. Even now i am ashamed of what i did. I apologize.

[DRIVE_ADDICT]

Hi Anand i can understand sometimes its very hard to stay cool, but that is THE ONLY best way to be out of trouble. Like others points out, its better to be inside the closed cabin rather than taking care of these offenders.

But if someone comes to hit, with this situation.. I don't know what else to do.

[carwatcher]

I really want to say Enough of this preaching.
If the person gets angry at you for not breaking the law, eg Not jumping Red Signal, Not allowing other a U-turn which he/she knew was illegal, etc. you are told to avoid and move-on.
I am concerned ONLY about MY and MY FAMILY's safety ONLY and hence I drive in High beam inside the city. I also do this as 90% drivers also do this. WoW. Well those 90% are not T-BHPians.
Now even if a person is wrong and dares to kick someone else's car, I ask from where he gets that courage. IMHO its because he is sure that there is absolutely no Law and order in our country, and most importantly, the other fellow will move on. Its chalta hai attitude or Jhukti hai duniya jhukane wala chahiye attitude.
I also ask that why when someone cuts me and while I do the same (yes sometimes I return the favour especially if overtaken from left side) then why the same fellow who cut me maintains half a km gap (behind my car) then onwards and starts driving sanely.
I must say that there is a limit to everything. If we keep quite even after the car gets kicked, bangles hurled at us, expecting someone else to come and protect us one day, I think even GOD can't help us. I don't think traffic police will come and catch people at each and every turn when they are breaking the rules. Its not our duty to teach others to follow rules but if someone is flashing to you continuously while coming from the wrong side on one-way, its your duty to make way even though there is no way you can do it.
What I intend to say is for small things, its better to avoid and relax, but there is a LIMIT to everything.
The wrongdoers are allowed to get away with almost everything and person following the rules is asked to control and behave, this is the typical Indian mentality, practised day-in and day-out in all the walks of life.
Can anyone tell, if the person kicks your car, it is mainly due to you are not coming out to talk, and you should not come out to talk because of safety concern, isn't it really a catch-22 situation for any car owner.

[Anandv267]

Originally Posted by DRIVE_ADDICT

Hi Anand i can understand sometimes its very hard to stay cool, but that is THE ONLY best way to be out of trouble. Like others points out, its better to be inside the closed cabin rather than taking care of these offenders.

But if someone comes to hit, with this situation.. I don't know what else to do.

I agree drive_addict. what i did yesterday was uncalled for. I feel ashamed of it. The sight of the guys face when i took the wrench is still fresh in my mind and i am very guilt about scaring him.

I have just promised myself that come what may i will never got into a fight again. Infact i wont even roll down my windows.

[selfdrive]

Its quite odd for me to say this in hindsight but I would not say sorry to such a person. He started it, asked for it and pushed his luck. After all this, there is no way I am going to even speak to him forget anything about apologising.

But then I am probably less forgiving than you are. All said and done, I dont see anything else wrong in you choosing something to defend yourself and your car. I fhe used a bangle you used a wrench. At the end of the day he tried to act smart and met his match.
It would be better to adopt a 'horses for courses' policy.

[SDP]

Originally Posted by selfdrive

Its quite odd for me to say this in hindsight but I would not say sorry to such a person. He started it, asked for it and pushed his luck. After all this, there is no way I am going to even speak to him forget anything about apologising.

But then I am probably less forgiving than you are. All said and done, I dont see anything else wrong in you choosing something to defend yourself and your car. I fhe used a bangle you used a wrench. At the end of the day he tried to act smart and met his match.
It would be better to adopt a 'horses for courses' policy.

Are we realling having this discussion on the "How to avoid road rage" thread?

Even at the risk of sounding cliche, an eye for an eye makes the whole world blind.

Shouldn't WE be the ones observing restraint?

[selfdrive]

Originally Posted by SDP

Shouldn't WE be the ones observing restraint?

Restraint should be observed at the time of picking up the wrench. I am only saying I dont see any reason to apologise to anyone who started a brawl.

[n.devdath]

I m at Nairobi, Kenya for the past week and use a cab to come to office and go home, everyday.

My office is 14km from my guest house and I cross the city centre twice every day.

Most roads here are simple 2 lane (single carriageway) or, 4 laners at the most.

Road conditions are bad, there is not a single road which can be compared to our ring roads, for example.

Cars are generally old and are in a battered state. They are mostly refurbished Japanese imports.

Fuel is as expensive as it is in India, if not more. Petrol is Ksh 106.00 and diesel Ksh 97.00.

Very few intersections have proper markings, traffic signals and cops.

There are huge jams, every day, at most parts of Nairobi. One can easily see a kilometer or more of cars waiting to pass at a lot of junctions.

Y-E-T.

No one honks. The roads are deathly silent, almost like the US. Bliss.

No one breaks/jumps their lane.The only exceptions are the local Matatu (minibus) drivers and they are a million times better than any bus driver I ve seen in India.

No one comes too close to a car turning into one's lane or turning out of it. Again, Matatus are the only exception.


Almost everyone is so calm and patient behind the wheel and since there is no body cutting lanes or honking, they do not mind waiting and letting others pass.

In India where we drive like we are on a death race with all our ego at stake.


Why are we in such tearing hurry and at the edge of sanity all the time?


My observations:

Honking MUST STOP. It causes more than 50% road rage IMO.

Driving automatic cars/very easy to drive cars tends to make the driver a bit more patient since he/she is at ease behind the wheel.

We MUST increase our patience Levels, manifold, by whatever means.

[selfdrive]

Originally Posted by n.devdath

I m at Nairobi, Kenya for the past week and use a cab to come to office and go home, everyday.
We MUST increase our patience Levels, manifold, by whatever means.

Perhaps its to do with the overcrowding of our city streets which are anyway grossly inadequate. Apparently in Pune the road surface area is only 40% of what it should be.

some numbers:
nairobi - 4500 people per sq.km.
bangalore - 11000 per sq km
pune - 12776 per sq km

I do agree that we need to be more patient. I guess a lot of it is spent on daily uncontrollables.
Edit: uncontrollables = corruption, inflation, etc.

[n.devdath]

Originally Posted by selfdrive

Perhaps its to do with the overcrowding of our city streets which are anyway grossly inadequate. Apparently in Pune the road surface area is only 40% of what it should be.

some numbers:
nairobi - 4500 people per sq.km.
bangalore - 11000 per sq km
pune - 12776 per sq km

I do agree that we need to be more patient. I guess a lot of it is spent on daily uncontrollables.

Nairobi might have lesser people per sqkm because of its housing plans and designs. There are very few high rises which are residential in many areas, however the roads are extremely crowded during most part of the day since they are narrow.

Most things are controllable, it is only a matter of knowing how to control it.

[amitoj]

Originally Posted by n.devdath

I m at Nairobi, Kenya for the past week and use a cab to come to office and go home, everyday.

I have been in and around Toronto for the past one week and have been driving a lot between Pickering and Brampton on the 401, which seems like a lifeline feeding into Toronto. The 401 consists of a 3 to 4 lane expressway, with another 4 lane "Collector" running on both sides. The Collector is where people join when exiting or entering the expressway.
And there are a lot of repairs going on on this road that cause jams for kilometers! At one point, there is just a single lane joining collector to the expressway. Yesterday, all lanes on a section of the expressway were closed for repairs. The length of jams you can imagine, as there is heavy traffic on this road. I have been stuck in those jams 4 times in past 5 days (bad timing).

The patience that people exhibit can only be seen to believe. No one honks. People give way to let others join their lanes. And no one forms an extra lane. People do switch lanes but no one seems to object. No one attempts to turn around and go back!! And in all this, I have not lost my cool even once!

I guess what I am trying to say is that one of the positive side effects of moving here is that I have managed to bid farewell to an almost daily dose of road rage. Escapist I maybe but at least now i am not burning my blood!!

Cheers
Amitoj

EDIT: I dont think population density has that much direct impact on road rage as the disdain with which we see others breaking the rules and getting an edge over the law abiding road users.