Filipino Drivers

In my first visit to the U.S.A. 3 years ago, I experienced for the first time riding in a car driven by my sister who did not even know how to drive when she was still in the Philippines.  Before leaving for America, my eldest daughter offered to teach her how to drive, but she declined, saying that she would never learn because just thinking of driving makes her nervous.

When I was there, my sister told me that Filipino drivers who are used to driving in the Philippines would fail the driver’s tests given to those who apply for Driver’s License in America.  Sure enough, when my brother who had been driving in the Philippines for decades, and who later migrated to America, applied for a Driver’s License there, he failed the test twice.  It was only on the third time that he was able to pass the test.  My sister who learned to drive in America took the Driver’s test only once and passed it.

This only shows that drivers in the Philippines are terrible drivers.  Although there are rules to follow, they deliberately do not obey them.  In America, when a sign on an intersection says “Full Stop”, the driver would stop, even though there are no cars coming from the other side.  Here, when drivers see that there are no traffic enforcers around, they look for a chance to violate traffic rules such as beating the red light.

Rules for driving in all countries are relatively the same.  The only difference is that drivers in the Philippines are either ignorant of the rules or they deliberately disobey them.