Tuesday, November 3, 2009

The Day Of My Drivers Test

I just realized I never wrote up about the day I did my drivers test. Well for one I woke up at 6:30am so I could be ready to be picked up at 7am because a friend of mine who lives out of the country was in town and leaving that morning but we were going to have breakfast first. Well apart from the fact that I was up 2 hours before the usual time the morning seemed like any other Monday morning, a lil bit blue, a lil bit grey – then I got ready, but the friend was stuck in traffic so the breakfast was running an hout late when at 8am, a reminder on my phone notifies me that I have my drivers test on that day – gasp! Now ordinarily in Cape Town one often rejoices when the date finally arrives because one often has to wait a good 5 to 8 months for a date, this was not one of those ordinary occasions as I was freaked out. One, I had not taken a preparatory lesson; I mean I do drive but I needed to know how to drive according to K53 which is always gratuitously more strict that ordinary driving. Two, I had not arranged a car to test with, and didn’t wanna use a driving school’s car cuz they only have non-power steering cars, which I don’t like. And I had no clue where my receipt which I needed to prove I’d paid to secure my date. Some would have taken the day off, but I treasure my leave days too much to waste them on a driving test I’m gonna fail anyway; I thought to myself and made my way to work. Then spent the whole morning trying to figure out where I was gonna get a car, didn’t manage to find one. So I went there to do my test, hired a driving school car, with no power-steering, and went inside reprinted my receipt and paid for it again and used one of the four pics I need for the license to get a new one. Finally this is all sorted now, I need to do the test, I do not remember the pre-trip inspection or anything at this point as the nerves have gotten the better of me! So I mumbling random sh*t about the car’s exterior, I was just naming everything car related counting on the fact that he cant say, I’m wrong for over-checking, I remember counting everything under the bonnet/hood; oil, water, brake fluid, fan belt, engine, gasket, radiator etc, I stopped upon realizing the man’s reaction was like, ’this is gonna take a while’. I did the inside and the guy said, good and let’s go. Then we drive to the testing ground, my nerves were beyond, the whether had suddenly become scorching, so I was sweatier than a strained Lebanese. And throughout trying to parallel park and everything, my clutch foot was shaking like a tail-feather. But to cut a long story short, I passed the field test then we went on the road and I was pretty good there, and when we got back, turns out I had passed – so what can we take away from this, lol, preparation is not always vital….when you’re awesome ;) Now I'm busy car shopping any suggestions welcomed.

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