The Car Rental

The shock of being in a foreign country began with the car rental. I don’t know about you, but I like the deep throaty purr of a high performance gasoline engine. At least I can tell when the thing is running! Well over here in southern Europe, it seems the best you can get is a hybrid that makes NO noise—at least outside the car. I turned it on and apparently off multiple times and still try to put it in gear when it’s off.

This no noise “engine” seems particularly dangerous when encountering pedestrians who regularly walk into the street wherever they choose without even looking up from their phones. I would think they might be somewhat concerned with their own survival so they must not hear these approaching silent vehicles, right? Or do they just think they own the roads? I’m serious. They step into the middle of traffic without the slightest care. Many times I have had to stand on the brake and watch for a rear end collision when someone just stepped out in front of me. So far, so good. I haven’t hit anyone. I’m reasonably confident however that it is purely by the grace of God. There have been countless opportunities.

Inside the car is an entirely different matter. The damn thing beeps when I go two kilometers an hour over the speed limit, and it beeps when I go under the speed limit. It beeps when I get too close to anything or something comes too close to me. It beeps so damn much it doesn’t do any good because it just beeps almost all the time. It’s enough to drive a saint crazy especially while trying to navigate high speed traffic even on incredibly narrow and busy streets. And by the way, the street signs are ONLY in the language of the country. No translation to any other language.