I slowly bumped into a Focus driven by a Turkish family... the road was slippery. Repairing that car cost about RM 6-7k... what the ...? Must have been his friend doing the repairs... charging more than he should have (ripping of the insurance company). There was no damage at all to my car (as far as I can see). Airbag didn't go off, I might have done 3-5 km/h at the time of impact.

I wouldn't use American drivers as an example. Really, no. Even though their roads are straight and they drive really slow they still have more deaths on their roads than the Germans.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_count...ated_death_rate
Watch this documentary: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ORGu20C2-I4 (It is a bit exaggerated, but still rather good).

They will never overtake on the slow lane, instead they will flash and tailgate lane hoggers until they give way. But most drivers look out for others and give way, try to drive on the right most lane etc.

I think it is the speed that is driven on the Autobahn that makes for good drivers. You have to pay attention and stick to the rules when the trucks are driving 100, normal drivers of small to compact cars around 130-140 and some up to 250-300. Most are concentrating on driving, not on doing their make-up, eating, drinking (only occasionally), talking on the phone (especially not without a handsfree set). Americans get distracted too much, same here in Malaysia.

Btw., not slowing down until the last second is quite common in Germany when approaching lane hoggers. Rarely causes accidents. On the other hand they tend to make way when another car is approaching fast.

Germans also can't afford German cars la... they buy Korean or French. Ok, they do buy German cars, but not all. Japanese cars in Europe also ok, 6 airbags or more, 5 stars EuroNCAP, ... but Japanese companies in Malaysia try to sell lower quality cars at higher prices, and surprisingly they are successful with that. Look at the EuroNCAP website, most cars sold in Europe are pretty safe, regardless of size, price and country of origin.

But yeah, I think it's a combination of driving style/lack of driving education (ok, the Americans have that too, but perhaps not as bad), a kind of egoistic attitude (I wan't to be the fastest to arrive, don't care about others, skip the traffic jam by driving on emergency lane or pretending to just enter the highway, etc.), roads that are a bit more dangerous (potholes), cars (0 to 2 airbags, no ESC/ESP, sometimes even no ABS, some cars use 4 different tyres or tyres that are already blank in combination with really heavy rain), and I guess most of all bikers that drive like their life is worth nothing, with no protection gear.

Anyway, I hope at least some of this will change with the new driving license (haha) and the ASEAN NCAP (that is what made cars become much safer in Europe, since no one would buy a car that's not safe anymore and it is easy to compare them this way).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vSJbZiGQ_KI&feature=related

This post has been edited by kadajawi: Feb 15 2012, 02:42 PM

Well, at least 2 airbags are mandatory now. Also cars in Germany AFAIK do not need to have ESC/ESP, however it is required to get 5 stars in EuroNCAP, and cars that have less than that usually won't get bought. I think there only have to be 2 airbags too, since the baseline Dacia models only have 2 and they get sold in Germany. I think it's not mandatory because the market makes manufacturers implement those features anyway. Daytime running lights are a must on newly introduced cars though, these lights must turn off/be dimmed when you turn on the headlights though.

Yeah, for 5 stars you need ESC. But you don't have to have 5 stars to sell a car in Germany. The Dacia's are all 3 stars, and they are sold (and bought). You see them everywhere. They are just so extremely cheap, and at least it's better than some very old banger. As soon as you move up to a Korean car though...

http://www.euroncap.com/latest.aspx
You can see that most cars are 5 stars, some 4. Very few 3. They all get sold. (Strangely enough the Jaguar XF performs pretty bad...).

I think people are more prone to photograph expensive cars that have been crashed, rather than yet another turtle Myvi.

Where do you see the Golf? Touareg could be, yes. But I don't see any Golf around... Polo also not. You mean the turtles?

Not by me, but... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NIlYkNV28SY&feature=related imagine this happening in Malaysia. The number of casualties would be so much higher...

This post has been edited by kadajawi: Nov 25 2012, 02:49 PM