cycling in São Paulo

I had a lot of noise from neighbours the other night so I have taken the time to write a couple of notes that I have stuck on a lamp post in the road, one to remind the folks in the road of the anti noise law that exists here and in most countries world wide and also how a road that is kept free of litter is a road more pleasant to live in, I have no idea if it will change the attitudes at all but it shows that there is opposition to their attitudes and acknowledges that If others feel the same they are not alone.......

yesterday in Sao Paulo there was a road accident that although typical and not so unsual was shocking in the attitude of the driver, a student of psychology. He and his friend had been drinking and then driving, in a new Honda Fit, I am not clear about the accident but the driver hit a cyclist so hard that the arm of the cyclist was removed and forced into the window of the car.....the driver left his friend in the car and left the scene, at the point of leaving he pulled out the arm of the cyclist and through it into a river drain at the side of the road and then went to his house, later, much later, he went to the police. In the mean time he did not phone for help or an ambulance ....so when the ambulance and police arrived they could not find the arm for the cyclist and it took hours for them to eventually find it in the foul water of the drain, so the cyclist had been left ages and with no chance of having his arm reattached.....The sad thing in Brazil is that this sort of accident is common and the attitude is common, this driver will pay a fine and go free within hours and is unlikely to suffer a prison sentence . The law allows for a person, with money, to pay a fine that is the equivalent of the penalty, normally it is five times the minimum salary, for many that is just about one months salary.....