Unwritten law.

In every culture there are unwritten laws. While breaking written law can assure you trouble, breaking unwritten laws can certainly do the same. For example, at the dinner of an extravagant event with prestigious guests you could break wind and receive many questionable glances. You have just broken an unwritten law. Just like written law the penalty can increase for repeat offenders. If later in the evening, at the same dinner and social event, (all dinners are), you are standing in a small circle of celebrated individuals and you commit the crime again, with guests who will easily recognize your earlier blunder, you may lose a networking opportunity, which could mean a job opportunity, which could mean the absence of a salary, which could mean you are evicted and put out on the street. Your life changes all because of a puff of gas; an unwritten law, broken. Now this is an extreme example, but you see my point. (It would be a unique circumstance but I suppose that in the right situation this would not be impossible.) In some ways, what is not clearly stated can have a greater consequence than what is. Wouldn't you rather get speeding ticket than be on the street because you are viewed as an impolite flatulence maker?

Every culture has unwritten laws. Some cultures, while different, have many similar unwritten laws. Some bear almost no resemblance to each other and some are very complex. Some unwritten laws of the past that have been entrenched in society over a long period of time may today seem utterly ridiculous and completely impractical for the age that we are in now. But since they are unwritten, at times if the culture and period call for it these laws slowly slip away. A strange existence.

Some unwritten laws are important since they can work for the well being of society as a whole. Some are ridiculous when given much serious thought and may prove to be impractical over the passage of time. And some are imperative; an absolute necessity. Breaking the unwritten laws of this last mentioned category can hurt you. They can even get you killed. The unwritten laws of Bangladeshi traffic are of this kind.

Today on a bus back to Dhaka in the rain, I sat next to a young man who seemed about my age. Over the course of six hours our conversation meandered, eventually reaching the traffic situation. I am always interested in getting the local feeling about the situation since mine will always be that of an outsider. I have ideas, but I need validation. He then told me that in the past few days, on this same road, with the same destination, in similar conditions, he had counted 28 traffic accidents. Most of them were minor, though one truck was split in half. Nonetheless, at one point twenty-eight collisions on one road in six hours happened. (No one was drunk, beer is hard to find in Bangladesh.) Moments after he told me this I felt our bus tires slip off the road onto the gravel side in a rushed maneuver around some thing. I forget what this thing was; I was looking out the window, not in fear but with awareness of this movement. My companion turned to me and smiled, "just don't look," he said. "That's what we do. We just don't look and act like we are going to make it." Good advice if you can accept it.

Sometimes I look at the fronts of Bangladesh driving schools and think to myself that I would probably fail. I might just make it onto the road and never leave because I am afraid of turning back against oncoming traffic. "Just one more intersection!" I would probably say. "I will do it at the next one." This is Bangladesh traffic. It is like a competition in which everyone forgets they are on the same team. This time also has many unique participants. Taxis, goods trolleys, buses, trucks, cattle, carts, rickshaws, bicycles, and people. I like to categorize these as big, bigger, and small. (I will not clearly define which is which, big, bigger, or small, since the laws I a about to state are applied in a relative fashion depending on who you are.) To me, the first and most obvious unwritten law is: small makes way for big or bigger. This can be restated as: big wins. When a bus is rocketing down a road, all the various traffic mentioned above can come into play. People will be walking on the sides of the road and pedaling their bikes and rickshaws. From your position on the bus it may not look like they are aware of the enormous mass of metal and peeling rubber that is headed their way, but on the majority they are. They understand the unwritten law and they respect it. As the bus, being big, is coming their way, they, being small, will move onto the side of th road. If necessary they will move farther, into the grass, onto the sidewalk, or into the irrigation ditch, dragging their cows and bicycles with them. Also interesting is that many of the people do this with their backs to traffic. They use their senses, as well as habits introduced through time and experience, to follow unwritten law for the sake of their well being. This is the first.

The second I will mention is not as apparent unless you are in the middle of it: this is the law of movement with expectation. I am convinced that this rule occurs throughout Bangladesh and for the sake of the best example I can think of, (there are probably better), I will use the countryside. The roads in these areas are almost always in two lanes and two lanes only. They also seem to have a buildup of potholes, bumps, ruts, and cracks that are not repaired as often as similar problems in the cities. Now no one likes to run over a pothole, it can be harmful, and since most potholes and other forms of crumbling asphalt seem to form at the sides of the road, buses prefer the middle. Actually, buses take the middle. There is a serious issue with two buses hurtling head on down the road; your mind and heart will tell you so. But neither bus slows down. They get closer and closer. Closer and closer, until the unwritten law of movement with expectation takes effect and both buses swerve back into their actual respective lanes at the last possible second, sounding their horns the entire time. Meanwhile the people and small things on the sides of the road move; they move with expectation. The buses move at the last second in expectation that the opposing bus (so they are led to think according to the law), and the rest of traffic moves farther over to the sides, knowing that they are smaller and with the expectation that the buses will move back.

Unwritten law; breaking it can kill you. I am sure there are many more relating to traffic just as there are many relating to everything other aspect of life, but these two are important, that much is certain.