The DMV: quite an experience

We decided to take our Driver’s License Knowledge tests in December. Roy studied for it while I was having business meetings. He passed his test the week before Christmas. As the week between Christmas and New Year wasn’t very busy for me, I decided to just give it a try. Roy told me it wasn’t very difficult, and how difficult could it be when you are already on the road for so many years – right?

Wrong! First of all, the traffic rules are different here from the rules we have in the Netherlands. Here you are allowed to take a right turn at a red light. At least if it is not prohibited by a sign, or an arrow in the light. We also have hills and mountains here, so you have to know who has the right of way in specific circumstances and you need to know if you need to point the wheels away or towards the curb when parking uphill or downhill. Also, you can go to jail for driving under the influence. I’ve never heard about that in Holland, maybe only when you cause a major accident because of this. Anyways, I got really difficult questions and I only had 80% correct in stead of the necessary 85%. Bummer. I definitely needed to study the handbook, in stead of quickly reading the content.

So after studying the material for 2 days, I took my second exam. This time I passed as well, with only one wrong answer. To my opinion the second test was much easier than the first, probably much more like Roy’s test. But anyways, those exams were in the pocket.

In order to get your California Driver’s License you have to pass a vision exam, the knowledge exam and a behind-the-wheel test. After successfully completing the knowledge test you have to go to the DMV to get a Driver’s Permit. This gives teenagers the possibility to drive a car during day time as long as an adult is sitting next to them. We’re allowed to drive a car on our Dutch driver’s license for the first six months. So this Permit isn’t really useful to us, but you have to have it in order to apply for a Driver’s license. So off we went to get our Permit at the DMV. How long could that take, right?

Wrong again! You can think of the DMV as a City Hall in the Netherlands where people can apply for identification documents. But the DMV does a whole lot more, like registering cars, driving exams for all kinds of licenses, and also the transfer of ownership for cars and motorbikes. We have three different organizations for this in the Netherlands. The city of Fresno just has one DMV, so it makes sense they are busy.

When you arrive you first go in the line for non-appointments or appointments and they check you in. After one hour my number was called. They need to make photocopies of everything, even though you had to upload all the documents on their website. Then you need to complete the vision exam and then they take a photograph of you. They didn’t count down or anything, so it came out very nice. Uhuh.

Now we both have our Instruction Permits we can now schedule a behind-the-wheel test. Roy is taking his test on Thursday. I think I’ll practice a little longer since I want to be sure to make no critical mistakes like letting your car roll when you have to make a complete stop or the other way around. We’ll keep you posted!