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Until you call a doctor in the UK.


To whit, having learned to drive on the left, the “easy” turn that does not cross traffic is always a “left” turn to me, regardless of living in a country that drives on the right. Makes giving directions to others quite interesting.


I learned to drive in the US, but lived over 10 years in Hong Kong, and have driven in New Zealand and South Africa.

When I first moved to Hong Kong, I kept making eye contact with passengers instead of drivers when crossing the road on foot.

In New Zealand (my first experience driving on the left), I turned on my wipers (on a sunny day) the first couple of times entering a roundabout (the turn signal is on the other side of the steering wheel). Also, I couldn't resist the urge to glance over my left shoulder for oncoming traffic in my blind spot when making left-hand turns, despite the fact that traffic approaching me from there would need to be driving the wrong way down the road.

Thank goodness that the manual shift pattern and pedal layouts are kept the same between left-hand and right-hand drive models. Driving in South Africa could have been a disaster had the shift pattern been reversed.


I drove a Japanese car in NL traffic and whenever I had to downshift for turns in the first couple of hours after switching cars my right hand would slam into the door :)




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