(Originally written on the 28th of July, 2009. Also apparently tags are sorted alphabetically, not in the order you wrote them. That kinda spoils the joke I had in mind. Oh well.)
I got into my first major accident today. Previously I had just scraped a couple cars against stationary objects with barely noticeable results. Today, however, I was on my motorcycle, so the accident potential was a lot higher and the results were potentially a lot worse.
I had pulled out of the college parking lot and was waiting for a break in traffic when this girl pulled up next to me in a car that was blocking my view of most of the road. When I saw that the road was clear, I looked to my left to see if anyone was coming along the other side of the road. The car prevented me from seeing anything, but the driver was nodding towards the road with her head, so I assumed she meant that it was clear for me to go. In retrospect, she was probably just indicating she wanted me to go first after the traffic cleared.
A couple seconds later I was lying on the road with cars beeping and rushing past. My shoulder ached a bit, but I was still alright enough to stand and push my motorcycle to the side of the road, shift the gear back to neutral, turn off the engine and kick down the stand. The guy who had hit me (or who I had hit) was lying underneath his motorcycle, and before I could hobble over to help him up a taxi had stopped and carried him to the curb. My motorcycle's stand was being a bit wobbly and my shoulder was starting to get more sore as the adrenaline wore off, and soon I was sitting on the curb with my motorcycle on top of me. Another person who had stopped to help came to my aid and moved the motorcycle further down the road and put it on its stand properly.
After that, I called up my friend to tell her I couldn't drop her off anymore as I had been in an accident. I filled in some contact details for the other guy's coworker and asked how he was doing. Then I called up my dad told him what had happened. He said that he was coming over soon with my brother.
My injuries weren't so bad. I had a hole in my pants near my pocket, some road rash on my left arm, a scraped knee, and a sore shoulder. The other guy's knee was hurt pretty bad and his arm wasn't so great either. He also had a gash on his calf, but it was all scarred up and thus quite obviously an old injury. I was relieved. If I had caused something like that I would have a hard time forgiving myself. I took out a chocolate bar from my bag and offered it to him, but he wasn't interested so I ate it instead. He was much more occupied with telling passers-by that it was "Salahnya", which I admitted to in English every time since it obviously was my fault for rushing blindly into traffic. His friend asked me if I "boleh faham Bahasa Melayu" and I responded in the affirmative, but I added that I don't really speak it that well, I can just understand what's being said. After his friend relayed this information to him he turned to me and said "Bodoh". After a few moments of consideration he added "Cibai". I told him I was sorry and that it was totally my fault. We didn't say anything after that.
I had time to do some thinking before my dad arrived. I was able to reflect on how I should've inched forward and checked the road before driving, or how I perhaps should've waited for the car to go before going myself, or how great my day was going to be if I had made it home safely. The last point in particular stung quite badly, since I would've swapped my motorcycle for a car, returned to college to pick up my friend, and enjoyed the company of an intelligent and pretty girl all the way to Sentul and the latest hits on the radio all the way back. Oh well, shit happens.
When my dad came, he gave the other guy his contact number. My brother got the motorcycle working again and drove it off to get repaired. The guy was loaded into a car and driven off to the hospital while his coworker took his motorcycle away. I went with my dad to the clinic to get cleaned up.
The doctor cleaned my wounds and gave me a tetanus jab while chatting with my dad, and added that my shoulder should probably be x-rayed because it wasn't bruised or anything externally even though it hurt whenever I moved it.
So after stopping off at home for a quick bite and some show-and-tell with my siblings, my brother and my dad took me to the hospital for an x-ray. Unfortunately, the x-ray machine is only open during office hours, and so we decided to visit my mum instead. She was quite concerned and I had to reassure her a few times that I wasn't any paler than usual and the only thing that actually hurt was my shoulder, and even that only when I moved it.
Now that I'm home I've had time to go through the whole thing and see what can be learnt. I guess all I can say is that you should really look all the way down the road before heading off. It was a painful lesson, but you can be damn sure that I'll be looking twice from now on.
I got into my first major accident today. Previously I had just scraped a couple cars against stationary objects with barely noticeable results. Today, however, I was on my motorcycle, so the accident potential was a lot higher and the results were potentially a lot worse.
I had pulled out of the college parking lot and was waiting for a break in traffic when this girl pulled up next to me in a car that was blocking my view of most of the road. When I saw that the road was clear, I looked to my left to see if anyone was coming along the other side of the road. The car prevented me from seeing anything, but the driver was nodding towards the road with her head, so I assumed she meant that it was clear for me to go. In retrospect, she was probably just indicating she wanted me to go first after the traffic cleared.
A couple seconds later I was lying on the road with cars beeping and rushing past. My shoulder ached a bit, but I was still alright enough to stand and push my motorcycle to the side of the road, shift the gear back to neutral, turn off the engine and kick down the stand. The guy who had hit me (or who I had hit) was lying underneath his motorcycle, and before I could hobble over to help him up a taxi had stopped and carried him to the curb. My motorcycle's stand was being a bit wobbly and my shoulder was starting to get more sore as the adrenaline wore off, and soon I was sitting on the curb with my motorcycle on top of me. Another person who had stopped to help came to my aid and moved the motorcycle further down the road and put it on its stand properly.
After that, I called up my friend to tell her I couldn't drop her off anymore as I had been in an accident. I filled in some contact details for the other guy's coworker and asked how he was doing. Then I called up my dad told him what had happened. He said that he was coming over soon with my brother.
My injuries weren't so bad. I had a hole in my pants near my pocket, some road rash on my left arm, a scraped knee, and a sore shoulder. The other guy's knee was hurt pretty bad and his arm wasn't so great either. He also had a gash on his calf, but it was all scarred up and thus quite obviously an old injury. I was relieved. If I had caused something like that I would have a hard time forgiving myself. I took out a chocolate bar from my bag and offered it to him, but he wasn't interested so I ate it instead. He was much more occupied with telling passers-by that it was "Salahnya", which I admitted to in English every time since it obviously was my fault for rushing blindly into traffic. His friend asked me if I "boleh faham Bahasa Melayu" and I responded in the affirmative, but I added that I don't really speak it that well, I can just understand what's being said. After his friend relayed this information to him he turned to me and said "Bodoh". After a few moments of consideration he added "Cibai". I told him I was sorry and that it was totally my fault. We didn't say anything after that.
I had time to do some thinking before my dad arrived. I was able to reflect on how I should've inched forward and checked the road before driving, or how I perhaps should've waited for the car to go before going myself, or how great my day was going to be if I had made it home safely. The last point in particular stung quite badly, since I would've swapped my motorcycle for a car, returned to college to pick up my friend, and enjoyed the company of an intelligent and pretty girl all the way to Sentul and the latest hits on the radio all the way back. Oh well, shit happens.
When my dad came, he gave the other guy his contact number. My brother got the motorcycle working again and drove it off to get repaired. The guy was loaded into a car and driven off to the hospital while his coworker took his motorcycle away. I went with my dad to the clinic to get cleaned up.
The doctor cleaned my wounds and gave me a tetanus jab while chatting with my dad, and added that my shoulder should probably be x-rayed because it wasn't bruised or anything externally even though it hurt whenever I moved it.
So after stopping off at home for a quick bite and some show-and-tell with my siblings, my brother and my dad took me to the hospital for an x-ray. Unfortunately, the x-ray machine is only open during office hours, and so we decided to visit my mum instead. She was quite concerned and I had to reassure her a few times that I wasn't any paler than usual and the only thing that actually hurt was my shoulder, and even that only when I moved it.
Now that I'm home I've had time to go through the whole thing and see what can be learnt. I guess all I can say is that you should really look all the way down the road before heading off. It was a painful lesson, but you can be damn sure that I'll be looking twice from now on.
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