Should I stop or should I go?! / Mam zastavit, nebo ne?!

There is a big difference between the Czech police versus the ones in the United States. I just wish I would have known it earlier – much earlier. That way I wouldn’t have to go through yet another embarrassing experience. Let me explain. About 2 years after I had come to the US I finely got my driving license and purchased a used Ford Tempo from about 1912 – I mean,a really old car. But I was happy as a clam, aimlessly driving around the block for days, feeling like a queen. One of the main reasons why I bought the car was so I could get myself to school every day. One of my classes during that time was held in the evening so I had to drive home after dark. As I was leaving the school campus one of those days all of a sudden a campus police car appeared in my rear-view mirror.

He had his siren turned on and looked really important and everything so I just thought to to myself: “Man, he must be looking for someone really important!”. The thought of him going after me actually didn’t even cross my mind because in Czech police car stops you by getting in front of your car. So with that in mind I peacefully submerged myself back in my thoughts again. A while later I realized that the cop is still behind me! I thought that he may just have a difficult time passing me and I decided to slow down even more and even drove over to the side a bit to make the whole passing maneuver easier on him. As I drove over to the curb the police proceeded to followed me, opened his window and started to “talk” to me though his fancy loud-speaker. To be honest, it was so loud that I couldn’t hear anything that the poor guy was saying but I just assumed that it would be a good idea to stop. Used to another Czech police custom, after I stopped, I began to get out of the car but that was a bad idea. The already disturbed police officer become even more upset, screaming through the speaker for me to get back into the vehicle and put my hands on the wheel. Shaking, I followed his orders, hands tightly wrapped around the steering wheel, not knowing what was going to happen next. The police officer finally managed to get close enough so that he didn’t need his “trumpet” anymore and started blabbering something about registration, insurance,…blah, blah,blah….Suddenly, a great idea hit me: “If I talk in a thick accent I may be just able to survive this.” So I laid it on heavy: “Sorry, me foreigner from East Europe – I doesn’t know what is you say…I sorry…”.

Turned out the whole reason why he stopped me was that my license plate light was off! Of course, I pretended like I didn’t know what the “license plate light” was. After quite a while of him trying to explain me why and how I disturbed the law the poor guy gave up trying and exhausted, wished me a good night and let me go. Probably muttering, “Stupid foreigners…” as he got in his car.

Lesson learned? When you see a cop with their sirens and lights on in America- slow down, pull over, and hope he is not after you! And most important- don’t get out of the car unless he says to!!! I have since learned the first thing they learn in police academy is when someone gets out of a car -there is a good chance they have a gun and they just may shoot! (Ever watch “Wildest Police Videos”?)