One of my occasional Guam rants

There are so many things about Guam that make me scratch my head. Yesterday I heard the Guam Police Department's Public Information Officer on talk radio say that the GPD doesn't give speeding tickets unless the violation is at least 15 mph over the posted limit. Dumb thing to say -- even if true. And it's actually the second time I've heard the guy make similar statements on the radio.

On Guam the default speed limit (unless otherwise posted) is 35 mph. And since most of the speed signs have blown over, rusted away, or otherwise mysteriously vanished, he is giving people permission to assume that the real speed limit on pretty much every Guam road is 50 mph. The cops will not bother you unless you're going faster than that.

Of course, going 50 mph on Guam is extremely dangerous. Drivers swerve from lane to lane in order to avoid the ubiquitous potholes. So the lane definitions are pretty fluid. Then when people are making those "lane adjustments" at higher speeds on roads with inadequate shoulders it can get really crazy. I have a close driving encounter on the Backroad to Andersen at least once a week.

There are so many things about Guam that don't add up -- things that people just accept as unchangeable and therefore normal. Guam is as much a mentality as it is an island.