As promised, this is the second and final part of my blog entry entitled “7 Ways to Avoid Road Rage”. The first four points covered in Part One are:

1. Be courteous.
2. Observe traffic rules.
3. Always signal your intentions.
4. Don’t tailgate.

Here are the remaining tips:

5. Observe the proper parking lot etiquette. – This is one of the most important tips to remember, since a lot of people have died just because of parking lot scuffles. Some of the parking lot rules of thumb to consider are: observe the first-come-first-served basis; if a space opens up, turn on your signal light to the direction where the parking space is to indicate your intentions, in turn, drivers who see this should understand not to take that space; when a parking space suddenly opens up behind you, don’t back up anymore and just move on; and stick to the lane you are in and try not to get too greedy with the area you are surveying.

6. Watch your high beams. – When driving at night, nothing pisses me off more than some half-blind driver forgetting to switch to low beams when approaching cars or tailing them. (In the Philippines: Jeepney drivers do the extreme opposite. Most of them drive around at night with their headlights turned off, only relying on their darned park lights!)

7. Turn down the bass. – As with tip number 6 above, here’s another example of drivers with defective senses, and this time it involves their sense of hearing. I don’t understand how people driving boom boxes for cars can drive properly and responsibly if they can’t hear what’s going on outside. Along with the sense of sight, I was made to understand that a good sense of hearing is also a prerequisite for safe and defensive driving. Not only is the half-deaf driver not able to hear cars honking at him or ambulance/police car sirens begging for road space, but some studies have shown that loud music with fast beats tend to draw out aggressiveness in people as opposed to soft, slow soothing music. This makes people more prone to succumbing to road rage. (In the Philippines: Again, a lot of Jeepney drivers are guilty of this. Heck, these drivers can’t even hear their passengers shouting “Mama, para po!!!” (to indicate that they want to be dropped off at a certain spot) or “Mama, eto pong bayad ko!!! (to indicate that they are about to pay their fare) at the top of their lungs. Mind you, a driver-passenger road rage confrontation can and does happen because of this!)

Following these tips does not guarantee that you won’t succumb to road rage or be in the receiving end of one, but it does help make the streets safer and more peaceful for everyone. Do you have anything else to add?

Happy driving!

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Related Blog Entries:
7 Ways to Avoid Road Rage – Part 1
Pasig Road Rage: Justice and Peace for Ed and Kay
Pasig Road Rage: Pasig Road Rage: Lawyer Released on Bail

What’s the popular buzzword nowadays? The term “road rage” is one of the most popular terms being used today in the Philippines, particularly in Manila. This is mainly because of the recent spate of unfortunate road rage-related crimes happening across the metropolis. It’s such a major concern, especially in this traffic forsaken land of ours where machismo, pride and ego predominate.

So how can we lessen or contribute to the elimination of road rage in the Philippines?

Here’s Part One of: “7 Ways to Avoid Road Rage”.

1. Be courteous. It pays to be a courteous driver. Just imagine what the world would be like if every driver followed the “Golden Rule”, which simply means “Do unto others what you want others to do to you”. The increase in the number of courteous drivers will help decrease of road rage incidents, which means safer streets for our everyone to ply on. But it’s quite unfortunate that a lot of stupid drivers still follow the “Do unto others before they do it to you” maxim, which really sucks.

2. Observe traffic rules. – Traffic rules were meant to aid people and help improve our overall driving experience, not limit them. Just imagine how organized and efficient our roadways will be if all drivers obey existing traffic rules – one ways, no overtaking, speed limits, no parking, etc. This leads to lesser headaches. (In the Philippines: You’d expect law makers and law enforcers to set an example, but this is more often not the case. With heavily tinted windshields, diplomatic or special plates, blaring sirens, and police escorts, they seem to think that they’re above the law, those fu#*@rs!)

3. Always signal your intentions. – If you can’t do the simple task of engaging your signal lights prior to turning or changing lanes then you shouldn’t be driving at all. Admit it, your brain just can’t handle simple multi-tasking tasks so much so that it’s eating up all of your concentration just to focus on the road ahead and not anything else. How can people expect you to handle complicated tasks such as making good driving judgment calls or performing successful evasive maneuvers? Your brain will probably be overwhelmed and “lock up” when situations like these occur. It gives a whole new meaning to the term “pea brained.” Ha!

4. Don’t tailgate. – Some people just have a fixation for trains. They seem to think that they’re the train’s caboose. (In the Philippines: You’d see these tailgate jerks swerving around, nipping at your rear, stuck to you like glue and driving in the wake of speeding ambulances, diplomatic convoys and, if they happen to have color-code violating license plates, right smack at the tail end of just about any car they come across so as to hide their plates from those “ever vigilant” law enforcers!)

Part Two’s coming up in my next post. Can you figure out what the remaining three are?

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Related Blog Entries:
7 Ways to Avoid Road Rage – Part 2
Pasig Road Rage: Justice and Peace for Ed and Kay
Pasig Road Rage: Pasig Road Rage: Lawyer Released on Bail

This is yet another blog on the ongoing Abalos scandal allegations. Because of the lack of transparency in the dubious deal brokered between the Philippine government and Chinese firm, ZTE Corporation, you can’t fault people if they make highly spectacular and weird assumptions. Everybody is entitled to his or her own opinion. In short, “It’s fair game.”

And so, due to lack of transparency, these are “5 Hypothetical, Tongue-in-cheek Reasons Why the ZTE NBN Deal Should Be Junked.”

5. On the wake of Mattel’s recall of about 19 million alleged China-made toys worldwide, detractors fear that copper-based network wirings that will be installed by Chinese firm, ZTE, might end up being replaced with lead. “Well, uhm, you know, uhm, Superman can’t see through lead! How’s that for security? ;-p”

4. The $329 million deal comes with a stipulation that the Philippines relinquish its claim of the “Spratly Group of Islands” in favor of China. It’s a “phone for fish” trade.

3. The almost $200 million worth of alleged bribes comes with a stipulation that all allegedly recalled and rejected China-made toys in the US be diverted to the Philippine market, which also includes lifting the “White Rabbit Candy” ban. Tit-for-Tat.

2. Implementing the National Broadband Network claims to reduce the government’s phone call expenditure to a minimum, since inter-department calls will be via Voice-over-IP (VoIP) – unlimited and free. Aside from the savings in phone calls, the government would also save on costs for hiring and training espionage personnel and paying certain unscrupulous telco employees for its alleged phone tapping activities (well, at least tapping is limited to government agencies). A bit of code here and a few system commands there, and viola!, all calls are recorded and logged into a central database. “Hello Gar.. er.. Pap.. er.. bye!”

And, the top hypothetical reason for junking the deal is:

1. “Broadband? Whaddya mean broadband? Here? In the Philippines? Duh! I’ve had enough of hearing broadband. NBN = No Broadband Now. Better rename the project: National Dial-up Network (NDN) dude. It’ll have the same speed and cost us less.

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Related Blog Entries:
The Abalos Scandal: ZTE and the National Broadband Network (NBN)
NBN Scandal: “Sec, may 200 ka dito.”