Miguelito wrote:What would you guys do in a similar circumstance, being foreigners driving? When I first arrived I heard a lot that the first rule of driving would be to drive off and away from any scenarios such as this. But getting chased down and the windows smashed like that is a bit unnerving. Thoughts?
I can give you a first hand account if you like as I have been in this situation back in 2009. Three drunk freshie boys on a moto decided to do a u-turn on Russian Boulevard right in front of my car that was doing about 30-40mph, roughly where that old locomotive is. It was 2am and I was on my way with the wife back from the old Orange club if my memory is working; but I had not touched a drop. I managed to avoid the idiots for the most part, they actually toppled over drunk by themselves, and I ran over the front wheel of their bike - if I'd swerved right any harder I would have wiped out a couple on a bike alongside me near the kerb - I decided to take the front wheel of the bike instead.
I stopped initially, head out of window gave them a bunch of verbal abuse in finest Khmer, and then pulled off slowly. Soon after I noticed I was being chased by four or five motorbikes, mates of the idiots, and decided the best course of action was to get to the nearest police station that I knew would be open that time of night - the one by Canadia Tower was closest, but I had a shitty RX300 back then that couldn't do a u-turn on Russian boulevard (no barrier there back then either!) - so I put my foot down, got to Toul Kork police/prison up near the old Plaza Hotel and pulled over.
The mob arrived shortly after and kicked off, the police of course had them all making nothing more than "Joy mais barang" comments from a safe distance. At this point the wife took over and went into full Khmer bat shit mode, drowning out the mob quite easily with a Khmer shriek & finger pointing. Whilst she did that I inspected my car, no real damage at all except to the front left wing, and right down by the wheel - it was clear that I'd run over something and not actually impacted any moto on the bonnet/wing, etc. I explained it to the main police guy when he turned up in his shiny big Lexus, wife translated and he inspected the same & just had a wry smile and told the mob to sod off else he would arrest them/charge them for the damage to my car - which was about $30! pretty nerve wracking, but I knew if I could get to the police station my story would stack up & I'd not get mob justice. Of course had to pay the big guy - this was about $50 again if memory working, but wife paid so not entirely sure other than she wouldn't usually carry more than $100 anyway.
Kingdom of Wonder.