An allegedly widespread phenomenon in Perth, or throughout Australia, is the so-called road rage. Road rage means that a driver gets so steamed up about another driver that he stops his car because he is so furious that he can not think clearly anymore and his only intension is to bash or even kill the other driver. You hear and read quite a lot of road rage in the Australian media.

I by myself got acquainted with the easily excitable character of Australian drivers. I wanted to cross the street by one of these pedestrian crossings where the pedestrian has to give way to the cars.
I tried to be a good girl and waited there at the crossing. There were quite a lot of cars which were caught up in a traffic jam. The last car came along and instead of stopping a meter in front of the crossing and letting the pedestrians cross the street, the car stopped accurately on the pedestrian crossing.
I mumbled something in German about this not particularly nice driver and I shook softly my head. Thereupon the Australian driver wound the window down and shouted at me that I shouldn’t shake my head, because he has the right on his side and he needs not to stop for me because there is no official crossway. He wildly gesticulated and rolled his eyes. I was really scared, so I ran pretty quickly into the next shop. Since this episode I do believe that road rage is an issue in Australia.

In case that somenone is exposed to road rage, the following advice is given:
If another driver gesticulates and roars at you, you should ignore this furious driver - pretend that you don’t see him.
If this doesn’t help, because the driver gets out of his car and strikes at your car, take visibly a pen and write down the number of his number plate.
In addition call visibly the police with your mobile phone. In case your battery is low, pretend you’re speaking.
It is said that these things help to bring the attacker to terms, because he sees that his actions may have consequences.