“No, I don’t work for the postal service.”
But there are still people who think I bought my latest piece of JDM heaven BECAUSE it was right hand drive, instead of despite it being RHD. There is a Lilliputian mirror on my left fender that allows me to see the center line, but not much else because parking backwards/curbside usually means a ticket. Yet everybody who sees it, wants one! I’m not sure why?
I’ve hopefully shown that RHD isn’t dangerous in a previous story and possibly I’ve convinced you that the challenges are worth the hassle? But sometimes RHD serves to inadvertently showcase our own diminishing faculties…?
I’ve been driving from the right for almost 13 years.
So of course at this point I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve gotten into a domestic (LHD) vehicle on the curbside, when I was supposed to be the one doing the driving. (Admittedly, it is entertaining when a passenger gets into my vehicle on the RIGHT hand side, closes the door, and then suddenly spots the steering wheel IN THEIR LAP. But I digress.)
Sometimes, it’s the little things.
For example, with most North American stereos, the volume control is on the left. In a RHD vehicle it is only about 6 inches farther away from you than it normally is, relative to your arm length, but it feels like a mile! It’s the same thing with manual trans, even though everything shifts the exact same way. Heck, I’m left-handed, but I’ll be damned if I don’t find then grind first gear every now and then. Somehow it just feels too far away?
And no the pedals are not reversed, but the wipers and indicator stalks are. This isn’t normally a problem, until I get back into a LHD, and I’m suddenly doing everything bass-ackwards. Turning the wipers on before I change lanes just doesn’t seem to get my point across effectively.
Right-brained people are said to be more creative, and operating RHD in a LHD world sometimes needs a little of that creativity. It isn’t difficult, or dangerous. Let’s just call it publicly “misunderstood”.
But sometimes…? It’s just me.
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