The evolution of seatbelt and car seat safety is pretty amazing isn’t it? I don’t know about you guys... but I have no memory at all of sitting in a car seat... or a booster seat... nothing. But, I do remember laying across the front (bench-style) seat of my parents Chevy station wagon with my head on my mom’s lap as she drove home from the store. Did this make them bad parents? Not at all, I turned out okay... I only twitch from time to time... but this non-existent car-seat was normal when I was a kid.
Now? When we see an unrestrained kid in a moving vehicle we question the drives competency to parent. Oh, how times have changed... or not... being in Belgrade, where using a car-seat is not a social norm, let alone wearing a seatbelt for that matter, things can seem a bit strange... at least from an American perspective... but don’t worry folks... Grayson is still rockin’ the car seat... but I have noticed that I’ve been going a little native when it comes to my own seemingly engrained seatbelt habit... at least as a passenger in a taxi cab.
You see? For some reason taxi cab drives in Belgrade despise seatbelts. So much so, that most driver keep them tucked behind their seats... their backseats... seriously... they will fold their backseats forward, tuck their seatbelts behind, and then snap the seats back in place. Doing this makes it impossible for the backseat passenger to access the seatbelt at all. Why go to this much trouble? I haven’t the foggiest.
I have seen a taxi cab driver who had gone to the trouble of cut out his own seatbelt with a machete, retrieve the metal buckle piece and insert it into the latch, evidently to keep his car’s seatbelt warning from beeping.
I’ve had a friend, while sitting in the front passenger seat of a taxi get yelled at by the driver for putting on his seatbelt. Apparently, the driver was greatly offended by the action. To him, having a passenger put on a seatbelt was a great insult to his abilities as a driver.
But, a couple days ago... I was in a taxi and saw the greatest misuse of a seatbelt that I have ever witnessed. After giving the driver my destination and before he put the car in gear he started pulling at his seatbelt. Of course... this took me back. A taxi driver putting on his seatbelt? In Belgrade? This is a first... but, I am also aware that Belgrade is in the process of passing a new seatbelt law, so I was impressed that the taxi driver was taking it upon himself to take action now, rather than wait for the law to pass. Well, that is what I thought... until he tucked the buckle under his right leg rather than latching it in its proper place. Yes folks, my taxi driver was practicing how to dup the law... not adhere to it... I feel it is important to also point out that this guy was driving a manual transmission car. Sigh.
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