Israeli Drivers

Israeli drivers have a bad reputation. Sometimes it isn't justified, often it is. I travel between Ramat Beit Shemesh and Jerusalem at least five days a week and I am invariably witness to some rather creative driving.

My brother and his wife recently traveled to Israel for a holiday. Before they left I sent them an email with a list of things to look out for when driving on the roads. They were going to hire a car and I just wanted to get them "up to speed" (pun intended) on the Israeli driving culture. The basic theme of the email was: just pretend that everyone around you is suddenly going to do something stupid and be prepared for it.

Here's an example: busses drive super fast - sometimes I wonder how those huge boxes manage to not topple over. Cars drive even faster. But bus drivers THINK they can outrun the cars. So there you have bus drivers gunning it down the highway, car drivers being insulted that they are getting overtaken by a bus and the both of them exceeding whatever the speed limit is supposed to be. Then, in the middle of all this, you have the motorcycles weaving in and out between the busses and the cars. It's right out of a car-chase computer game. What fun.

I like it when taxi drivers lecture me on safe driving (while they are exceeding the speed limit, weaving between lanes and talking on the mobile phone). The irony is simply entertaining.

But driving in Israel is actually fun. It's a great way to see the country - and there is so much to see. You just have to keep your distance. Quite a number of cars have bumper stickers that say "Keep Your Distance" (in Hebrew) sometimes I think the drivers who are tail-gating them are just trying to read what the bumper sticker says.

One of my favourite jokes tells of a woman who calls up her husband on his cell phone, "Morty, I know you are driving home now. I just wanted to tell you to be careful on the roads. I heard on the radio that there is a maniac driving the wrong way on a highway." Morty replies, "Esther, It's not just one maniac, it's hundreds of them!"