Caution: American Driver

A few days ago I took my first spin in the new car and my first spin driving on the other side of the road. I was delighted to find that although the sensation of sitting on the right side of the vehicle and driving on the left side of the road are, ahem, foreign, the experience wasn't extraordinarily unsettling. It simply called for a little additional concentration and advance planning. OK, self, at that light up ahead, you're going to turn right. That means you need to turn across a couple lanes of traffic into the lane to the left of the median. It also helps that there are generally other cars on the road from which to take your cues.

Strangely, the most difficult thing so far about driving here was a complete surprise to me. It's the turn signal indicator. In the cars here, the turn signal indicator remains on the right side of the steering wheel. But for whatever reason, my brain expects the turn signal indicator to be on the left side of the steering wheel. Never have I driven a car with a turn signal indicator on the left side of the steering wheel, so this makes absolutely no sense to me. But the upshot of this idiosyncracy is that whenever I go to change lanes or make a turn, I automatically switch on (or off) the windshield wipers.

Now, I've never been a particularly glamourous driver. And neither did I ever have any delusions that I looked especially cool while driving. The only cars I've ever owned have been modest and sensible. I kept the interiors clean, but I seldom washed the outside. I wasn't self-conscious when I knocked my side-view mirror off and drove around for a few months with a plastic baggie over the stub to prevent rain from getting into the door panel. Nor did I mind when my Honda rebelled after my first winter in New England and, come spring, started spraying windshield wiper fluid out the side of the hood onto adjacent cars. My cars got me where I needed to go and got me there safely and reliably, and that was all that I really cared about.

However, living in a foreign country, I feel a little vanity start to creep in. Maybe it's my desire to put on a good show for the sake of all Americans. I want the kiwis to think well of us as a nation; therefore, I go out of my way to be friendly, generous, helpful, and above all, imminently likeable. It's actually a little nauseating, but I can't seem to help myself. So imagine me, trying to look cool. Trying to acclimate and show that Americans, too, can adapt to other cultures. Inching down the road like a grandma, with the windshield wipers and turn signals alternating erratically. Yeah, I blend.