driving license
Wednesday, October 12, 2005

To celebrate that I have held a California driving license for 20 years in January, I am going to get a UK driving license! That way, when we get a car (which is happening very soon) I will legally be able to drive it. Get this, when you first live in the UK, you are legal to drive with a foreign license for the first year. Thereafter (unless you are EU, in which case it is fine) you must have a UK driving license to drive legally. So the first year, when you have no clue what the signs mean, how to manouvere roundabouts or which side of the road to drive on, you are cool to risk life and limb. Thereafter, no go.. bizarre.

I started reading one of the DSA (Driving Standards Agency) manuals today. This test will largely be a matter of learning British english. For example, there are at least 4 different names for a crosswalk. Like most British names, they are really cute and twee:

  1. Zebra Crossing - marked by zig-zag lines
  2. Pelican Crossing - a signal controlled crossing (flashing amber lights)
  3. Puffin Crossing - like a Pelican but no flashing lights
  4. Toucan Crossing- like a Puffin
I was just looking for a picture of a zebra crossing and discovered that there is logic behind the twee-ness, two of the crossings are anacronyms:
  • Pelican = Pedestrian Light Controlled Crossing (sort of)
  • Puffin = Pedestrian User-Friendly INtelligent

Posted byKarma at Wednesday, October 12, 2005  

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