Subjects Cleared: 1.05 & 1.06
I had my third practical lesson today. Things went pretty smooth. I am really kinda enjoying myself throughout the entire lesson. The weather over the past few days have been pretty bad. The sky must be feeling sad lately since it kept crying. Poor thing. Anyways! Ten minutes before my lesson, the sky changed from not bad to very bad. Growing up in Singapore kinda trained me well at being kiasu. Since it’s raining, there were two racks of umbrella for students to use. Before the umbrella are all gone, I swiftly made my way there to grab a good umbrella. Some of those are actually in pretty bad shape and they don’t really shield you well from the rain.
At 5:10pm sharp, the bell rang and the instructors made their way slowly to the parked cars. Mine was car number 124 this time round. I was there much earlier than my teacher of the day. I was kinda hoping to get a Chinese instructor this time. Guess my luck was running out. Mine was a teacher from my assigned group. He is a Malay from G8???2 and is No. 6??2. Okok! Please don’t misunderstand me here. I am NOT racist. The reason why I ain’t looking forward to Malay instructors because those in my group look really young. Further more, I think I read somewhere that if their number starts with 6XXX, they ain’t experience, impatient and no good. But hey! The one I got this time round was pretty steady too. He is much better than my first lesson instructor No. 2??4!
We kicked start the lesson with me producing my PDL, IC and that slip of paper. This teacher was quite gentlemanly. He was sheltering me while he asked me to put my umbrella n bag at the back seats. After which I got on shielded from the rain by his umbrella. But.. His movements was slow. Pretty slow!
I was instructed to go counter clockwise as well. Shamefully, I mounted two curbs twice and thrice respectively. Went about five rounds in the circuit. He said he would only allow me to get out of bbdc if I can make one perfect round. I am really sick of the circuit! Well, it seems easy, but it’s not! There are these two particular curbs out of the total four, have unfortunately identified me as their enemy. I held my breathe, in a very awkwardly stiff posture, finally completed that circle. Phew.
The instructor took over the driver’s seat and out we go onto the streets. As a normal pedestrian, we always jay-walk and didn’t realize how annoying it might be to the drivers. This is the first time I truly appreciate those drivers that stop at zebra crossings and traffic junctions for me to cross. Driving on the roads are so much fun than driving circles in the circuit! But your eyes will be mega busy. The instructor went about three rounds before allowing me to take over the steering wheel.
After all, this is my first time being on the streets driving, so you can imagine how nervous and excited I was. My eyes, brain, hands and feet were so so so busy. For eyes, I need to keep a look out of possible road hazards, the bumps, traffic light, oncoming cars, cars behind my car and so on and so forth. My hardworking right feet had to get busy between the two pedals, i.e. accelerator and brake pedal. Hands will be the steering wheel, the signal lights, wiper, gear and handbrake. How busy was that when trying to coordinate all of those together?
The instructor told me that I gotta step on the brake before the hump and let it go after the front two wheels are over it. I gotta go slower and get ready to stop when approaching the zebra crossing. Also, stop right behind the mandatory stop line I need to come to a halt. My instructor was pretty particular and insisted on me signaling the light early. When I type early here, it means really early! Like 4 seconds in advance.
At the last 20 minutes or so, I was asked to pick up speed to 50km/h. That was really fast initially. After a few seconds, I kinda got over it and it felt pretty alright. Haha! Looking forward to my next lesson when I can go up to 70km/h. Woohoo~
Next lesson: 24/12/2012