I do not think that driving in Thailand is any more dangerous than driving anywhere else. It is certainly no worse than say Indonesia. Oh two wrongs don’t make a right I can here the “panel” saying.
I wonder if what the nay sayers actually mean is that they have to actually concentrate on the driving when they are here and not being able to do all the other things that people do instead of driving. As an example, I am always amazed when drivers involved in a conversation actually turn their head to look at the passenger instead of the road.
When driving in our own countries we got used to certain things that are not necessarily laws, we learn to drive sometimes with a local sixth sense. Example, people turning right will usually move naturally towards the centre of the road. There are many other such examples. Here in Asia there are very few such subliminal indicators one could argue none. Sometimes we get lured by them and I'm not immune. The other day the car in front "indicated" and moved to the left so I moved to the right to pass and he/she attempted to turn right. amid much honking. I was distracted by something and the subliminal part of my brain saw a signal and a car moving to the left. As I realized later he/she actually had the right hand signal on but I was in “western” mode and reacting with sixth sense.
A lot of what we (an by we I mean people born and raised in the west) do in life was gleaned by assimilation we weren’t necessarily taught it. I learned how to fix a bicycle by watching my father fix mine and he learned by watching my grandfather fix his.. Same goes for driving. Even before we were old enough to drive we were passengers and observed what other do and my father watched his father etc. In Asia that same transfer of information hasn’t necessarily happened for things technical. I used to wonder in Indonesia how an industrial tradesman could sometimes not see an obvious error until I realized that the first piece of technology his father saw was a planed piece of lumber. I used to sit cursing behind some old Indonesian farmer in a 30 year old Toyota driving at 30mph on a flat wide road. Then It occurred to me that from his point of view 30 was white knuckle speed as the fastest thing he had before was a buffalo. Thailand has a huge number of first generation drivers so what would we expect.
Some of the other things we complain about also happen in the west. What about the farmer in rural France who always drives down a deserted road on his tractor. He’s been doing that same journey for 20 years and one day Joe holiday maker comes round the corner. Who is more surprised to holiday maker or the farmer. Thais ride step-thrus in villages where the roads may not be paved, there is not much traffic and there are certainly no lines. Then we complain when they ride/drive badly in the cities. U turns, X turns (whatever they are) are just different to us as we are not used to them.
One hopes that GT-Rider forum members as motorcyclists concentrate more, are more observant and less distracted when we drive. We have to be or we wouldn’t be here.
Sorry I’m ranting here as a distraction. The wife has been bending my ear about everything that is MY fault.