The Road to Knowledge

I see driving in the U.S. more of a necessity for us as individuals, along with many other factors, to become independent beings. My name is Ana  and when I was 13 years old, my family and I were victims of a car accident. It was 7 in the morning when my family of 4: mom, dad, sister, and I, were taking my grandmother to PriceSmart –the biggest supermarket in the country which is located an hour and forty-five minutes away from where we used to live, to do food shopping for the holiday that was coming around the corner. Now, you may be wondering “why would you travel that far for food?”, “didn’t you guys have food stores or supermarkets nearby or within your place of living?”…well, we did but, PriceSmart is just the same as Costco and Sams Club here in the U.S., where becoming a member with the store and purchasing in larger quantities is way more convenient than going out and grab some errands at the store next to your house, therefore, yes, it was worth it.

Most of the highways built in Guatemala are two lanes two ways: one in direction to your destination and the other to come back home; and cars are not supposed to pass each other since the road is painted with 2 solid white lines and a yellow one the entire ride. 30 minutes on the road/since we left home, we had a trailer with no load behind, tailgating us, there’s no speed limit but the one that you decide that is appropriate and would show your prudency as a driver. My dad on the wheel, decides to let the trailer pass us and 30 seconds later it comes to a complete stop when it crashes against a full ‘chicken bus’ (public bus transportation) that made a stop in the middle of the road, taking with him and destroying the last 2 seat rows of the bus, leaving the person that was being dropped off hurting on the road when the impact pushed the bus and the person away, and with us half behind and half under the trailer.

Speed limits are placed on the roads and set as rules for us to follow for a reason. I believe that if my dad had driven at a higher speed, our car would have completely ended up under the trailer with the five of us dead to decapitation. Of course, we will never see public transportation making a complete stop in the middle of any highway here, and we have 3-5 lanes for traffic to drive towards one direction specially for interstates or roads that tend to be from moderate to high flow of ongoing traffic, and still accidents occur. This makes me compare America’s traffic laws and traffic control and management with Guatemala’s and I think that the leaders in our American society (cops, justice entities, government) do care about us and our safety when speeding is penalized, and traffic violation actions are taken legally seriously as their goal is to encourage us to be responsible when being behind the wheel while having a structured system that does work.

What some drivers may be lacking is awareness playing a crucial part in reducing the number of motor vehicle deaths in the U.S. Yes, cops can be driving around giving speeding tickets, warnings for driving without a license, car insurance, plates or to-date stickers, the city may penalize you for parking where you were not allowed to as well, but the human being does not grow up knowing everything, which is one of many reasons of why school and education are implemented in our society so we can learn most of the things you need in life and beyond.

Having this two-step system/system in order to get your driver’s license is a good way to first make individuals learn about the rules, laws, signals, lights, and how traffic works in general in their local city, state, and American in general, and then test their skills on the wheel.

Although, there should be more encouragement for people to read the driver’s manual when issuing their permit or license, I’ve known and heard about individuals looking for the answers and doing online ‘practice tests’ and failing the real test when showing up to their appointment by the fact that they didn’t quite know about the driver’s manual. This can lead to them not being well educated about traffic laws and signs, making them part of those risky drivers out there with high possibilities of causing an accident or committing traffic violations.

Skills are necessary to learn when driving, they can help us to avoid any potential traffic incident caused by a third person and save ourselves, or the other way around, a third person can save itself from a mistake that I made on the road if we are being taught about them.

Appropriate behavior behind the wheel. There is so much danger that can be avoided by driving with a positive and appropriate behavior because at the end of the day we are all traveling to get to our destination with no need for us to cut somebody off at the light, to speed up when there’s incoming traffic to your lane so they don’t get in your way, or to get mad at a driver due acts of selfishness from oneself. It only causes more traffic and makes the journey a bad and dangerous experience for all drivers. Bad behavior can also encourage individuals to spread it out on the road because they generalize that in the city or if a specific group of people act like this, they will too.

Driving school shouldn’t only be required for some teenagers or a specific group of people. We cannot assume that all adults from 18 to 21 years old and beyond are equally developed and possess the logical knowledge and skills to prudently drive. As part of getting our driver’s license, it could be a requirement for us to attend this school and complete at least 2 hours under supervised driving (as an example) prior to issuing this document. Preferably certified people that know about traffic, laws, skills, appropriate behavior, and awareness.

Well-educated drivers are less likely to be involved in accidents or show inappropriate or acts on the road that can potentially cause an incident.