38th parallel: Traffic in Seoul, Korea…..

Friday 20 July 2012

Traffic in Seoul, Korea…..

Although the public transport in Seoul is absolutely fantastic, it definitely has sometime its advantages to take the car to your place of destination!

Anders and I do so, when we go to Sung Nam golf course, take a tour or like I yesterday, to visit my friend Carmen to celebrate her birthday and meeting several of her friends.

Not many women here at Yongsan Base drive “off-post” by themselves and honestly I do understand them…. However, the different culture and driving in central Seoul is also a part of my adventure being here.

With a borrowed, Korean, GPS (for ours has apparently too few digests making it impossible me to find a specific destination, in the jungle of many roads) I went off to Carmen!

Where to start? Besides that it’s very, very crowded on the roads, the amount of roads is massive roads and the driving behavior, somewhat different from what I've been used off, after almost 30 years living in Sweden. The switching from one lane to another is constantly, and just as the overtaking done from; both left and right!

Taxi drivers, definitely take the price, red light here, I believe is just an advice, for I never, ever, have seen so many cars ignoring red light!

Dangerous? Absolutely, but it keeps you allert!

These professional drivers, are simultaneously the ones honking rapidly and a lot as soon as someone else is cutting a corner or violation some rules.

But there is an advantage to the overloaded roads here in Seoul, and that is that the average speed is very slow, probably around 40 kilometers per hours. So the accidents that do occur (although not as many as one might expect) are mainly just having the result of material damage and yes…. Even longer cues.

And me? Well, I have the advantage of saving money for I’m not having any fines for over speeding, which I'm glad for, because I now can affort the gasoline, while standing in oh so many cues!

But inpite of cues, a Korean GPS, I did reach my destination on time and had a wonderful afternoon, with good food, water (for I was driving :), something which is now a hot debate in Korea.....) lots of laughter and meeting with again many great, fun and interesting women!