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Notes -
My only formal experiences as a student taught driving were our weekly Driver's Ed classes that in I think sophomore high school. I remember the football coaches (for some reason) were the teachers--I wonder if they got paid extra for that? We had these machines you sat in and turned wheels and stared at video screens and worked the foot pedals. But mostly it was a dry-as-a-bone watching videos of re-enactments and remembering the rules of the road. In these videos you'd be on some residential street and suddenly a ball would fly out into the road. What, what do you do? This would have been around 1982 or 3.
When I had to drive on an actual road for the first time I was around 15, which is the age at which you could get a driver's permit (meaning an adult had to be with you in the car. I don't know if this is still the case.) We only ever had manual transmissions in our cars at home so I had to learn to work the gears and clutch, and there was a lot of herky jerky. Once I can clearly recall my dad, my brother and I driving to my grandfather's house, which was then about 15 miles away. My dad getting out of the car, me getting out, circling around from the passenger to the driver's seat. When we hit 55 it was the fastest I had ever driven, but this was a slow speed for other drivers and people were overtaking me and I had slower people in front and I had a moment of near-panic. I remember my dad telling me to man-up, though he did not use those words. "BUT I'VE NEVER DRIVEN THIS FAST!" I said. His response: "Well then I guess we're all going to die."
I will never forget those words, and what I guess was the resignation borne of frustration with which he said them. Anyway whether I in fact man'd up or not I don't know, but we did survive, got to the house, and I suppose I kept driving. Years later when I drove automatic it was like driving a bumper car at the fair--so easy as to be bizarre. And to my way of thinking offers much less control, though with the way cars are automated now I suppose controlling the car yourself is seen as quaint.
All this to say I recall the moments of panic, if not enervation. I never did driving school, though. And when I got to Japan and my international license ran out and I had to take the course test, I failed a total of five times. Bastards. I think this is because I was taking manual (what they call "mission") and the obscure Japanese rules for this regarding hand positions were unknown to me (Japanese people pay upwards of 4K to take driving lessons at driving schools, which teach these esoteric rules so people will pass the tests. It's a racket.) When I gave in and took the automatic test (by then my wife and I had an automatic anyway at home) the rater guy looked at me at the end and said "Where'd you learn to drive so well?" My father's words came back to me, but I just said "From my wife," which seemed to satisfy him.
Now I'm curious. What are these rules? It seems like it's pretty unnecessary to micromanage that behavior, so I'm kind of surprised.
Micromanaging is I believe a way, along with car costs, driving school costs, and periodic car check-ups (called shahken) to thin out the road herd. It's already pretty congested even though public transportation is excellent.
I don't actually know all the fine points but I know I wasn't supposed to keep my hand on the gear shift as much as I did.
This is established MT lore in the west as well -- resting your hand on the shifter when you aren't using it can accelerate wear on the synchronizer rings and shift linkage parts. (or the gears themselves if you want to go back to, like, 50s lore or heavy trucks)
I did once replace the shift dog assembly on my dad's truck due to it wearing out rendering 1-2 gears inaccessible -- luckily you could get it from the top. Not sure whether this was driver habits (I don't think my dad or I lean on the shifter, but previous owner is a possibility) or shitty Ford engineering, but it did happen. Unclear why the government should care, but they do like things to be done properly in Japan I suppose?
They do indeed. TIL.
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