You're A Drivin' Me Crazy

If you're heading overseas from America for an extended period the International Drivers Permit from AAA is an important tool to have. Backed up by some treaties and crap it ensures that you can drive anything within the bounds of your existing license, so in my case cars of any transmission type and motorcycles. Sorry, no commercial trucks or farm equipment. The problem, however, is that this permit is only valid for one year from the date of receipt and I've been in Japan for eleven months now, with expiration of that flimsy looking AAA card creeping up quickly.

So I have to get my honest to goodness Japanese license sometime soon and with the help of my supervisor a test has been scheduled. But the test to get a license to drive in Japan is a special, special thing and has virtually nothing to do with one's ability to drive. It's a hellish gauntlet of technicalities and following orders to the letter where jumping through hoops is more important than being able to work a stick shift, avoiding kids running into the middle of the road and good braking habits. It's all done in Japanese so, naturally, foreigners find it tough. I was able to practice part of the course today at the Kusu Driving School with an instructor and think I have it down pretty well. The main thing one has to watch for are the visual checks paired with verbal cues. What do I mean by that? Starting the car one must do a four-point check around the car and say "Yosh!" each time, turning right is a two-point check, left is a three-point check, crossing railroads are another two-point check, etc., etc., each time saying "Yosh!"

So annoying...the supposed average amount of times one must take the test to pass all the technicality checks is three. I'm not looking forward to it.

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Finished my triangle map of, well, Duboce Triangle today after a couple weeks of work. My favorite yet!



--Matt