Before you ride in China... Watch this!
 

Just thought this might be entertaining and slightly eye openning. If you are gonna goto China, be EXTRA careful. This video will explain it all.
Dont install the language, its not needed unless you can read chinese and I dont think words are needed on this video. 1 word will sum it up, WOW!!!:eek3:
I think this is the appropriate place for this. It is a safety issue IMO, as I never knew they were that bad there. I have rode in Thailand and it was nothing like this, it was just congested.

http://pop.6park.com/life2/messages/24007.html

I think that's just what it looks like when cars (and cement trucks) hit motorcyclists. I don't think I saw anything specific to China.

Of course, I gave up halfway through. Maybe I'm missing something.

Mark

Not sure why you singled out China - you could just as easily put together similar videos for the lousy driving skills in any western country!

It's a jungle out there.... everywhere!

Only reason I singledc it out as the Video is called that, and its fimed there. I dont think I have ever seen that degree anywhere else, so I'll have to disagree. I have riden in all of North America extensively, and Germany to Italy as well as a year in Thailand. Now, Thailand is Chaotic, but its sort of an organized choas, if that makes sense at all. There is a method to the madness so to speak.

I'm sure driving in China is chaotic, like it is in many other overpopulated and developing nations. The video was downright disturbing. But on the other hand I'm not sure that the video in of itself proves anything. After all, when you take a country with 1.4 billion people it would be relatively easy to come up with a collage of gruesome crashes and carnage over time.

I do appreciate the link to the video being posted but I'm not sure I'd use it as a "warning" about China or any other place (even though I agree that in many countries we need to be aware of "different driving styles" ...to put it mildly)

I was a long distance and local bus driver for 6 years and you'd be amazed at the idiotic, moronic moves I've seen out there (and that's just in relatively well behaved British Columbia). Such as playing high speed chicken with a bus (the bus wouldn't even feel the impact); making immediate right turns in front of a bus; cutting off fully loaded transport trucks; running pedestrian crosswalks full of people; I even had some moron in a sports car trying to "bully" my 15 metre Greyhound bus out of the way ....hahaha! A little Honda Civic got slammed up against a tree when the driver cut in front of me before even clearing my front bumper ...too busy yakking on her cell phone to pay attention. The point being that the video is simply a collage of carnage which can happen anywhere (granted, probably more so in developing nations than the so called developed world). Many similar videos can be found on Youtube, including one collage all about motorcycle crashes in unspecified locations.


...Michelle
www.scrabblebiker.com

Why would anyone ride through these countries then ?
Well ,I've taken many bus journeys in Asia and many times I feared for my life. 16 year old drivers in Nepal showing off to female tourists etc..
It's hard to compare risks to riding, it all comes down to temperament and luck.
At least the journey is more enjoyable.

A few of those accidents were borderline homicide...the low speed trucks riding up behind a bike and running over them? C'mon - that looked like it was on purpose.

That is a horrible video. But as other have said it probably happens all the time in lots of countries.

Horrible.

Even though the top corner of the screen say Chengdu, I believe that video was actually about Taiwan, not China - but even so it was still very disturbing.

3 years back I rode 7,500k through China and you can believe me when I say it was liking riding in no other country - and I've ridden through around 80% of them so I think I have a fair basis for comparison.

In China there had to be at least a dozen occasions every single day where I would have been killed if I had not had my wits about me. Having vehicles driving towards you on the wrong side of the road was such a regular situation it became the norm for me, and after a week I thought nothing of it.

It finally hit home how much the road conditions were getting to me when one night I woke up bolt upright in my bed after dreaming about the head on I had narrowly missed that day.

However, in terms of actual physical motorcyclist injuries on the road, I saw very few. The most, and worst, injuries were actually in Vietnam - usually by trucks and buses treating motorcycles without any respect, the old "might is right" situation.

WE had to laugh at your post when you mentioned the places you drove in before... Germany and USA ....

I think you'll find that most of Asia and Africa and Middle East are like that. We normally live in Shanghai and Fanny is born and bred there and I have lived there since mid 80s so China doesnt strike me as bad as most big cities. I have seen awful driving in LA and London too.

If you want to see something try Ethiopia (stone throwing), Cairo, Dar Es Salaam and Nairobi in Africa, Saigon in Vietnam, Jakarta in Indonesia, and Rome in Italy.... to name but a few.... and realizing we have missed many crazy places.

Drive safely

Rupert & Fanny
www.bigbiketrip.net
currently Nairobi - and thats a place to live on your wits on a bike:mchappy:

I think what you can pick up from this is the video is pretty nasty and although a lot of what was filmed can happen anywhere it's a question of how often it happens in any given place.

Heyya Rupert and Fanny
Dunno if while laughing about driving all over NA and Europe, if you noticed I spent a year in Bangkok Thailand. Im fairly sure BKK compares to many places. Especially on the country roads up in the mountains. But seriously, Detroit isnt the safest place either LOL. Hell Cuba was interesting in Havanna. But not as bad as BKK in Rush hour

Now not available
 

I can only get a message 'no longer on you tube'

Its possible the account it was on removed it.