Yesterday my conscience got the better of me (and the hassle, when asked for ID, of having to explain every time where your date of birth is printed) and I swung into action to get my own California permit. It'll make a nice souvenir of our time abroad.
I wandered up San Pablo Avenue to the local Department of Motor Vehicles office. It's always comforting to find unifying factors of existence. If only the human race could band together against bureaucracy I'm sure we'd see the end of all wars. There was certainly lots of aggression building in the queue I waited in to get my numbered ticket, which allowed me to join the queue to go to a numbered window and be processed, from where I was sent to the photo queue, where after being snapped I was shown the red line on the floor to follow (no joke) which led me to the testing area.
The test is in two parts. You have to do a written theory bit before they let you behind a wheel. On finally reaching the front of the test queue an incredibly grumpy lady handed me a multiple choice form and explained that when I finished I should put it in the basket...and join the same queue I'd just been in! This was innovative, even for such an advanced bureaucracy as this.
The exam is a strange mix of questions that purport to be testing your knowledge, and ones that preachily tell you what's right. Some of the answers seem to have an invisible "obviously!" printed after the correct choice. Example: Whose responsibility is it to know how your medications affect your driving? a) Your pharmacist's b) Your physicians c) Yours (obviously!). If you'd like to have a go yourself, look here.
Test finished I was queueing again. The kid in front of me was told he failed, and asked if he'd like to take it again now. Apparently you can do it three times in a day. The one in front of him had used up his three strikes and walked off with his tail between his legs, told he had to leave at least eight days (of shame!) before returning.
You're allowed to get six of the thirty-six questions wrong, and I was called forward to be told that I'd only dropped one! "You have a license from another country?" the lady asked. "Yes," I grinned, proud of the robustness of English motoring education and happy that she'd recognised it. Unfortunately being foreign just meant that I couldn't book my behind-the-wheel test through their automated system and she wanted to make me aware of this.
But 35/36 isn't bad, eh? Dana was pleased to tell me that she and Amir got 100% first time, but I feel that perfection is something to be constantly striven for rather than easily attained. I left the DMV office happy, managed to avoid getting run over on the way home, and have just negotiated their automated telephone system ("I'm sorry, I didn't get that. Could you repeat it in your best impression of an American accent?") and booked my practical for 9th September. Keep death off the roads!
