Oftentimes, playing dumb keeps us expats out of trouble.
"What's that? Can't ride my bike through here? Sorry, I don't understand. Bye bye!" "Hmm? I can't take pictures of this? Huh? Sorry...don't understand." *click, click, click*
There are other times when playing dumb isn't quite as effective. Hitting a pedestrian with your bike is one of those times.
I may not publish this for a while...at least until my mother knows I'm safely back on US soil...so for reference I'm writing this on May 17, 2014, 5 days after my run-in with the Tianjin Police. This past Monday I was riding my bike home from a nearby shopping center. I had paid my phone bill, gotten some food for dinner, and it was a beautiful day. There are few things I love more on a beautiful day than riding my bike around China. On this particular day, I had left school early and I was enjoying a stress-free ride home with very little traffic.
Cue careless lady stepping out from behind a parked car and into the street.
Before I get into the details of what followed, let's review my China traffic record: 2 years and 0 accidents. Aside from the time I fell in the mud, I have ridden hundreds of miles and had no mishaps. I'd call that a pretty good record. So fast forward to this past Monday when the woman basically walked into my moving bicycle.
The nice thing about my bike is that it gets me from point A to point B pretty quickly. The bad thing is that when you hit something you're likely moving fairly fast. So I was cruising along when I saw this lady step out from behind a parked car a few feet ahead of me. I don't really know where she was crossing to, as there was nowhere to go on the other side of the road, but she was on a mission and wasn't paying attention to who may be driving or riding past.
Let me stop here to say that YOU SHOULD ALWAYS LOOK BOTH WAYS! Especially in China! Always, always look both ways. No one actually follows the traffic laws, so don't assume you can meander safely across the street.
Anyway. I saw her step into the street, but I was already right on top of her so I rang my bell, yelled, and tried to miss her but it was impossible. I plowed into her and sent us both flying. Thankfully I was wearing a helmet, but she wasn't so lucky. She busted her face on the street, and I'm not sure exactly how I fell because I was down and back up before I even had a chance to think about what had just happened. My injuries would suggest I fell on my right arm/elbow, which was in turn jammed into my right side. After I scrambled back to my feet, I grabbed my bike and started to move out of the middle of the road, looking down to check on the lady I had hit. She was sitting up so I thought, phewf, she's okay. About that time she grabbed my bike and started screaming at me. We're talking arms and legs wrapped around my bike, top-of-her-lungs screaming at me. In Chinese. Screaming. Hanging onto my bike for dear life.
I've heard horror stories about foreigners getting into accidents in China, and from what I can tell they are always found to be at fault, even if they were an innocent passerby trying to stop and help. So all I knew was I was probably already in big troubs and I shouldn't say anything to get myself into more trouble. The more she screamed, the more I pretended I didn't speak a word of Chinese. I just repeated every foreigner's favorite phrase - ting bu dong - over and over. "I hear but I don't understand! I hear but I don't understand!" She screamed louder, yanking on my bike. I yanked back. All I could think was, "Get off of my bike, you lunatic." She started clawing at my bike and at me, taking out her phone and waving it around, yelling to people walking by for help as if I were attacking her. She drew quite a crowd. People tried to talk to me and I stuck to my guns - ting bu dong, ting bu dong, ting bu dong. I have never been so terrified or unsure what to do. Eventually I was able to get my phone out of my backpack and call a man from work. He happened to be with a Chinese friend who talked to the hysterical lady and calmed her down a scosche, although she still wouldn't let go of my bike and by this point she was pressing her body against me and yelling directly into my ear. I was going from compassionate and scared to angry really fast. Too bad I don't know how to say, "Stop touching me, you crazy bat!"
Cue the police officer.
He and I stood there staring at each other for several minutes because he didn't speak English and I was crying and still refusing to speak Chinese. I thought, "This is it. I have less than a month left here and I'm going to spend it in Chinese jail. I can't. I'll never make it." I got the guy from school back on the phone and he assured me that they were looking for a Chinese staff member who could get there quickly and help. In the meantime, the police man convinced the lady to take a few steps away from me, and the urge to punch her subsided. Eventually some people from school showed up to help and the crowd of onlookers dispersed. I called a friend to come and take my bike home lest it be confiscated. The Chinese women from school negotiated with the police man for a few hours. There was talk of taking me (to where, I'm still not sure), taking my bike away, making me pay the lady's medical bills (although she was clearly fine), etc. Finally we decided that it was in everyone's best interest to settle it there and be done with it. So my friends and I pooled together enough money to satisfy the crazy jaywalker and police officer (who I'm convinced somehow made a profit off of this), and we got the heck out of there.
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