I've got this queer displaced feeling now, something like a mind-displaced-from-my physical body kind of feeling.
It's been barely 5 minutes since I reached home, but it has been such a compelling encouter.

Some of the most defining moments happen out of the blue, this one happened when I was on my way home. Incidentally, I was crossing a small 2-way road because I missed my bus stop. (dozed off on the bus)
This particular cross-road is notorious for the long wait before the green man finally comes on, so I was impatiently hammering away at the button, hoping to somehow trick the traffic system into thinking there're many pedestrians waiting to cross the road. On the pavement opposite, I spotted another 2 waiting pedestrians, and one of them was hammering away at the button too. lol, I remember thinking if such a behaviour was a Singaporean thing.

So anyway, the green man came on eventually, and I began crossing the road.
Then it happened.
And it happened 2 metres away from me.
One of the 2 pedestrains happen to be riding a bike, and so she was almost halfway across the road before the other one had even crossed the first road-lane.
All of a sudden, this yellow mini-van came speeding along. I didn't see it coming, because the rows of vehicles in the nearer lanes blocked the oncoming mini-van from sight.
It screeched, so that I heard it before I saw it, and crashed
right into the poor damesel and she half-flew, half-fell from her bike, onto the road.
It happened so fast, it was over in a split second, but the entire sequence of events was so shocking that my recollection seem like a full 2-minutes to me.
It was so close, the woman, the yellow-minivan and the falling. Right in my face.
And I stood, transfixed and just shell-shocked.
It was like a bomb blew up in my face, and the reality, the shocking-ness of it all was just sinking slowly, dreamily, like ppt in a test-tube.

The driver was stunned too, he sat in his seat, with a weird expression on his face.
I read shock, disbelief, then embarassment and regret, then anger and resentment.
He got out of his car.
The woman. Poor lady, laid there for a few seconds.
Thankfully, there was no blood. She just had a bad fall, and a very bad shock.
Pushing herself from the ground, she examined and tested her ankle, managed to stand up with the help of her bike, and began deploring the increduous nature of events, in a fluent shower of china-accent chinese.

"How can you do this?"
"What did you think you were doing?!"
At this point, I realised that the green man had been flashing for a long time, and hurried across the rest of the road.
Behind me, the woman was still reprimanding the man, and I could hear indistinct murmurs of contrived apology.
Then the red man came on. The guy got back into his vehicle, and drove speedily away while the poor lady hobbled away.


Then it all register, like something clicked, and I could think once more.
The lady's angry rebuke rang in my ears and resonated with my reasoning.
How could the man do that? What was he thinking?
Surely he saw the red lights, and even if he didn't,
surely he could make out, in his peripheral vision, the mass of stationary vehicles that would tell him so.
Was he asleep? Lost in his own world? just day-dreaming?
How could he? Whatever provisionary excuse he can give, it would scarcely be able to account for the severity of his folly.
Why, he almost took a human life!
When his vehicle finally managed to come to a stop, he was well over the first 3 pedestrain crossing lines.
And I was barely 2 metres away from it.
It could so easily had been me, if I weren't strolling along.
How fragile life is!
How far would I have flown if it had been me the van hit instead? Just flesh and bones, without the shield of the bike's metal frame?
It scares me just to think about it.

So what of my penchant for road-crossing safety?
This goes to show just how important it is, to cross the roads safely, or for that matter, adhere to any other safety restrictions. It's always in our best interests.
Unfortunately, this example is a double-edged sword.
The fact that the incident occurred even when we were crossing under the providence of the green man, is clear vindication that following road-crossing safety rules won't guarantee our safety.
Will the arguement of danger-probabilities come to the rescue of our high-minded safety virtues then?
All I know is that, we are some really fragile lives living in a very dangerous world.


However, the thing that disgusted me first, and most of all, was my own response to the event.
Why did I not go up to the poor lady, help her up, and asked if she was okay?
How could I have just stopped, starred, starred more, and then walk away?
I had the sudden impulse
to cross the road again, to catch up with the woman, and ask if she was alright.
But what was the use in that?
Wouldn't this compensatory act be more in the selfish interest of soothing my own conscience, and displaying approriate civic-mindedness; whoose chance I had already disappointingly missed?
It's that, "Oh no, I should have done this, then" kind of feeling all over again.
The key-word here, however, is "then."
So I've failed a surprise test in my life.

Yea, I can say I was probably too shocked to do anything, to think properly.
But next time it happens, though I pray it never will, I'll know better.