Yield to the right?

I realize I haven't said much about driving in this great country. Yes, there's been the occasional mention of dirt road, two lane highways, and small cars. But I haven't really talked about my experience with driving here, on the opposite side of the road. I guess after six months I've just grown accustom to the experience and don't see it as a novelty.

I will admit that when I first started driving on the left, it took every ounce of my mental capacity every time I stepped into the car. That's saying I remembered to step into the right side of the car in the first place. There were several occasions when I plopped myself into the passenger seat, looking for my steering wheel. Humbly, I would step out and walk around to the other side, hoping no local in the immediate vicinity noticed my faux pas.

Once I was on the road, I generally had no problems. Getting onto the road was a different story. For about the first month, I attempted to thwart the left side road rules, consistently feeling the urge to turn into the right hand lane. I quickly rid myself of this oppositional defiance after the second time I mistakenly began driving down the right side of the road, only realizing my mistake when a pair of bright headlights approached me head on. Don't worry, no one was harmed in the making of this story.

Overall, left lane driving has become quite natural and I don't have to give it a second thought. I get in the right side of the car, drive on the left side of the road, and yield to those cars coming from the right when stopped at a round-about. There is still one traffic law that baffles me and requires my mental attention at each encounter: yielding to the right hand turner. Let me explain.

I am driving down the left lane and want to turn left into the intersecting street. Another car coming from the opposite direction (hence right hand land), also wants to turn into the same street as me, thus making a right hand turn into the intersecting street. As the law stands now, I (driving in the left hand lane) must yield to the car in the right hand lane who wants to turn right across traffic (ie, me) into the intersecting street. As you can imagine, this creates a lot of traffic confusion and mishaps. Will the person in the left hand lane actually yield? Will they just go for it, hoping the right hand car doesn't hit them? Will the cars traveling behind the left lane car realize he's stopped and not rear-end him/her? Or will they simple go around the left lane car, thus potentially being hit by the right lane car that's turning across traffic? There are just too many questions and bad outcomes that could come of this scenario. Probably why New Zealand is now the only country that still abides by this law. Everyone else who drives on the left has realized its idiocracy. Not to say New Zealand isn't trying. Just today on the news there was a story addressing this very issue. AA, the New Zealand Automobile Association, is lobbying government to change the traffic law. Unfortunately, the law makers are not coming to the party. They apparently feel that the hundreds of accidents that could be averted are not enough justification to change a 30 year old law that has worked "pretty well" up to this point.

Who am I to comment? I grew up driving on the wrong side of the road.