As we mentioned in our "What It's Like" blogpost back in January, there's something that we call a madabeep that is unique to this country.
As you can tell from pictures from our daily commute posts, it is straight craziness driving on the streets here. There is no concept of sidewalks here (even in the few cases where they exist) so every time you are driving down serpentine impossibly narrowalleys streets you are always close to running over someone, something, some chicken, some goat.
Ah yes, the ubiquitous madabeep. This beep is not a blare, a toot, or a honk. It's the barest of beeps, you have to hit the steering wheel horn just enough to elicit the slightest sound. In Madagascar this diminutive beep is actually considered courteous when done with the correct timing. Typically (hopefully) people will take a half step out of the street when they hear the beep.
Oh yeah, and it's also done about 15 times during a half hour drive. When we were back in the States this summer I had to stop myself from doing it numerous times:)
Taxi-Bousse Corollary:
You can feel free to give a nice loud honk at the ubiquitous taxi-buses that clog up the streets. Their signature move is to only half pullover off the road to pickup/dropoff passengers. That way they can stop up traffic even more instead of using the full shoulder area.
The Chauffeur/Driver Corollary:
My Malagasy driver Julian, can get away with honking the horn much louder than I would ever dare (when he feels like certain pedestrians are being idiots). I've noticed the volume of these beeps is directly proportional to how far out of the street the person moves.
Stop, Look and Listen Corollary:
I get the sense that this is not taught to children from infancy as it is in the US. People frequently step right out into the street with nary a glance to the left or right. It's actually pretty scary to see sometimes.
As you can tell from pictures from our daily commute posts, it is straight craziness driving on the streets here. There is no concept of sidewalks here (even in the few cases where they exist) so every time you are driving down serpentine impossibly narrow
Ah yes, the ubiquitous madabeep. This beep is not a blare, a toot, or a honk. It's the barest of beeps, you have to hit the steering wheel horn just enough to elicit the slightest sound. In Madagascar this diminutive beep is actually considered courteous when done with the correct timing. Typically (hopefully) people will take a half step out of the street when they hear the beep.
Oh yeah, and it's also done about 15 times during a half hour drive. When we were back in the States this summer I had to stop myself from doing it numerous times:)
Taxi-Bousse Corollary:
You can feel free to give a nice loud honk at the ubiquitous taxi-buses that clog up the streets. Their signature move is to only half pullover off the road to pickup/dropoff passengers. That way they can stop up traffic even more instead of using the full shoulder area.
The Chauffeur/Driver Corollary:
My Malagasy driver Julian, can get away with honking the horn much louder than I would ever dare (when he feels like certain pedestrians are being idiots). I've noticed the volume of these beeps is directly proportional to how far out of the street the person moves.
Stop, Look and Listen Corollary:
I get the sense that this is not taught to children from infancy as it is in the US. People frequently step right out into the street with nary a glance to the left or right. It's actually pretty scary to see sometimes.
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