The Last Adventurer

So, despite the complaints about odd curbs and trashcans, I managed to drive through the country without any trouble. Two weeks after I had returned home, I received an official looking letter from New Zealand. Puzzled about who could be writing me, I slit it open. The top of the page was full of bold, block letterhead that changed any excitement I had possessed into amazement. It said: “NEW ZEALAND POLICE” in authoritative letters. The rest of the letter detailed my crimes: namely, that I had been speeding on a certain date, at a certain time at a certain location. As such, this letter was no friendly correspondence from abroad: it was a speeding ticket.

Surprised, I quickly ransacked my memories of vacation driving. There had been that “trashcan incident”, but I hadn’t hit any plants, animals, rocks, or people. I also hadn’t seen many police cruisers, and I definitely knew I hadn’t been pulled over at any point, because I definitely would have remembered that. Puzzled, I read further, and saw that I had been caught on a “Traffic Camera”. The letter also stated that should I have any questions about my offense, I could read the attached brochure. As a lawyer, I immediately thought that I had a winning legal argument. I was going to get out of this ticket, because where I lived, the ticketing traffic cameras have to be identified by street signs. As I had seen no such signs in New Zealand; I had had no notice, and had therefore been trapped unawares.

However, Page One of the attached document dispelled that notion quickly. It was less an informational brochure and more of a legal brief. It firmly discussed how hidden cameras were legal in New Zealand. I read, and then re-read the paper. There were no loopholes for a person like me. True, I had barely transgressed – 50 kilometers in a 45 kilometer zone, but that was no excuse. There were only two things I could do: pay the fine, or become an international fugitive.

I paid the fine. That part was easy. The difficult part was admitting to my wife that, since I had technically been speeding, a rogue trashcan could have possibly ran in front of the car and killed us both dead. And, after a lot of teeth-gnashing, I conceded the point, while simultaneously cursing the Big Brother network of cameras that had brought me to justice.