Culture: Finland drivers’ obedience, a Cultural shock

Perspective: I have best experienced to see the drivers in Finland giving pedestrians right on Zebra crossing.

It was in the morning and day school. I woke up early to catch my classes at Turku University of Applied Sciences. I was with one of my colleagues who we stay together in Retrodorm accommodation. We had to walk for 15 minutes to reach the school campus crossing nearly 4 zebra crossing.s We actually were surprised to see the drivers stopping their cars 6 metres away from the zebra sign to clear our way to school.

I mean isn’t so surprising to be treated with such manner. Everyone is up early from bed running to office, others catching up appointments schedules, others taking their children to school as we were also going to school, others are on the bus running to open up their shops and offices. Why someone does has to care that there are two students crossing on the road so we should stop to let them pass?

Pedestrians at the Market Square in Turku waiting for the traffic rights to cross

 

I realized that it is about making the right choice giving others their freedom and rights where it should be. We live in one global giant planet but we share different backgrounds of where we all come from. I would dare say that in Africa we take things for granted like nobody cares others business but in Finland it’s different. Trust me, you will never see an African driver stopping a car waiting for a pedestrian to cross. It is something rarely to find may be in 10 drivers none.

I also like to comment on the pedestrians themselves also. They are simply amazing with the road safety rules. This was also something that I had to learn from the Finnish people. Well, it is about our lives and the decisions we make but who in Africa for no reason will wait for the green guy to show up so as to cross the road? It is something that you would not find it in my country and may be in Africa at large. We live by chances because no one knows when the day of judgement will come so it is important that we all make right choice to enjoy every bit of moment we have in the universe.