Night in Tunisia

Safety IQ and Dead Men

There are a few things about the culture of this place that get to me.
This isn't the last time you'll hear a rant about this sort of thing
from me, I'm sure. But the thing that upsets me the most is people's
attitudes and education around safety practices.

Each morning that I get into a taxi (which isn't every morning) I tell
the driver where I want to go, and I buckle up my seat belt.
Unfailingly I am told that a seat belt "n'est pas utile", is not
useful. I curtly reply that I prefer it. Sometimes they shut up.
Sometimes they don't; and then I have to listen to five minutes about
why seat belts are dangerous. Mostly it comes down to the excuse that
they prevent you from getting out if the car rolls, catches on fire,
or some other unlikely event. Of course, they never seem to touch on
the fact that the most likely type of accident is that you hit
something, and then go flying into the windshield, unless, of course,
you're wearing a seat belt.

I keep my mouth shut. That, I can stand. You know what's worse?
People drive down highways at 90+ kph with their child standing in the
back, leaning forward between the two front seats jabbering away to
his or her parents. No seat belt, no retraining device of any kind,
separating this child from the windshield if the car has to come to a
sudden stop. Do you realize how much this child weighs? Sometimes
less than 40 lbs. And it doesn't take much of a change in momentum
for a child to lift off and go sailing through the air.

I get a ride home with people who do this. It's cultural, and I can't
blame them for not seeing the danger. After all they've done this and
seen it done their whole lives. And because it's cultural, I really
can't say anything. People think I'm nuts, or take offence that I
think they might allow their child to be put in danger, you know?
That is not my intention at all. So mostly I sit in the back seat
with my eyes peeled for traffic anomalies and get ready to grab the
kid if I need to. I have nightmares that I wouldn't be able to react
fast enough.

Did I mention, by the way, that I saw a dead man in the road on the
highway I take everyday to an from work? He had fluorescent yellow
socks, a white sheet over his body and blood all over the road
spilling from under the sheet where his head should be located. I'm
guessing he died on impact. He was surrounded by people (maybe 50-60
along the roadside), with two officers standing over the body. Nobody
was coming to get the body for a while, and according to a friend who
had traveled the same route he had been that way a good 20 minutes
before I got there.

I was just about sick that night. It's a lot less glamorous than what
you see in the movies. In fact the horrible thing about it is how
normal it is. It should seem totally out of place, but it doesn't.
That's what makes it shocking, I think. After I got over the shock, I
was mad, and I've been mad ever since.

I want to scream at the cab drivers, the parents of free standing
children, the idiots who build an elementary school next to an open
highway, the workers on unstable parapets and platforms, the motorbike
drivers without helmets, and generally anyone with an abysmally low
safety IQ: "If you don't give a crap about your own lives, at least
spare me the need to see your dead body in the road."

I don't of course. I can't. And for the most part, if I did they
wouldn't understand me anyway.

For all of you living in your safe homes, driving on your safe roads,
working in your safety-smart work spaces; for all that it's a pain
sometimes (and I know it can be) say a little prayer of thanks that
you live in a world with all the precautions that exist. I love you,
others love you and your society's systems are keeping you safe.
Remember to see it that way from time to time.

And so you know, I promise, and I have made Loren promise, that
whenever we get into a taxi, no matter how much we think we will be
ridiculed by those around us, we fasten our seat belts.

posted by tiaraletourneau @ 9:29 a.m.