Yerevan’s streets aren’t known to be the safest in the world. This morning, while in a taxi traveling the street near the Genocide Memorial, traffic came to a standstill, the reason being an overturned Nissan jeep, the cab completely smashed. I hate to think of how it happened or what condition the driver and/or passengers might be in, should they have lived through the accident. Our driver, commenting on Yerevan drivers in general, said, “I drive 24 hours a day. Every night I see 4-5 accidents like this, and almost all of them are driving jeeps like this one. They’re often the new rich, driving drunk or under the influence of narcotics. If our police enforced speed limits strictly, these accidents wouldn’t happen.

“And now they’re fining drivers 5,000 dram if they’re not wearing seat belts. A great law, it’s true, but people don’t know the reason they wrote the law in the first place. One of our wealthy businessmen imported a huge number of seat belts, and to make sure they were sold, the law was written. Only in Armenia...”