Hello Kitty!

One of my tests today was ZiGi who is a Chinese woman attending one of our local colleges.  When she drives up it is 15 degrees with a nice stiff wind.  I ask to see her permit as well as the registration and proof of insurance for her vehicle and she says in a high, baby girl voice, "OK sir, thank you." 

She gets out of her car, pulls out her wallet which is pink with white hearts, and manages to extract from it after about two minutes the permit.  ZiGi, who is dressed in tights covered by a very tight skirt then proceeds to walk like a geisha and takes about 50 baby steps to get to the passenger side of her auto.  She opens the door, finds the documents in her glove box and makes the 50 step journey back to where I am standing (by the driver's door), almost but not quite closing her passenger side door as she leaves.

The vehicle inspection takes awhile because I need to repeat all my requests about three times before she responds by engaging the horn or turn signals or what ever. 

All that done I begin the parking lot portion of the test by giving ZiGi  the instructions to drive forward to the forward stop line.  A teenage boy make the journey from starting line to forward stop line in about 3 seconds.  ZiGi takes three minutes.  She ends about 5 feet from where she needs to begin the next exercise.

I do what I have done for the last 15 years by saying; "Please move forward" while holding my clipboard over the proper line, placing my other hand up while moving those fingers toward me to indicate the direction and distance needed to go forward.  ZiGi moves ahead 1 inch and stops.  I keep instructing her to move forward more, she keeps traveling 1 inch and stopping.  After awhile I notice that my arm is gesturing wildly, my fingers are wiggling three times faster and that my voice has risen a bit.  None of this seems to matter to ZiGi who only will advance 1 inch at a time.

We finally get there and begin the second exercise which is akin to backing up into a driveway.  ZiGi is very deliberate, stopping, thinking, inching but manages to finally make it fine into the space.  All the time watching I am bounding up and down, trying to keep my feet warm and keeping my back to the wind. 

After instructing ZiGi on the parallel park maneuver I decide, forget this, and actually get into my car, turn the heat to high, and think that if she is anywhere close she is going to pass this part because it is still early February with no warm up in sight.  10 minutes later she has finally finished and my feet are toasty warm so I leave my car, get into hers and even though we are running way behind on my schedule we go on our driving trip.

I tell ZiGi to turn right at the next light.  "OK sir, thank you."  I ask ZiGi to turn left at the second street.  "OK sir, thank you."  As this goes on and on I notice how interesting the interior of the car is decorated.  The steering wheel cover is pink with white hearts with a pink and white bunny head sewn on.  The rear view mirror has the same covering with a bigger bunny head hanging off to the side.  My seat belt adjustment is a pink and white bunny.  There are pink and white bunnies sitting on both sides of the dash, the shifter between the seats and the emergency brake lever both are covered with pink cloth with white hearts and little bunny  heads.  Oh, and ZiGi's cell phone cover was pink with white hearts.

You have probably guessed that ZiGi passed her test.  When I tell her she replies, "OK, thank you sir" about 5 times.  I leave her car, greet my next client who is a Hispanic 18 year old male who completes all three parking exercises in a total of about 2 minutes.  It's not getting any warmer but it's getting better.