Hey all, I hope everyone’s alright.

I’m visiting the Netherlands and I almost died while riding a bike.

I’m at a town with a university, and this is my 3rd day in the town; so I don’t know all the streets by heart.

I was riding a bicycle, through a cross road, and wanted to make a left turn, from the right side of the road. I crossed the road first, before crossing to the left, when I saw that there wasn’t any bike lane ahead, so the bike lane is only on one side of the road; two directions in one big bike lane.

So I turned around to go back to the initial point, and I saw no traffic light in this direction.

I crossed the road while the traffic lights for the cars ahead turned green, and there was a car turning at a moderately high speed straight to my direction. The car had to brake hard and stopped just 20cm before crashing into me, and I could see the panicked-angry face of this dude, cussing at me with two middle fingers violently waved in my direction.

I’m sure it was my fault and I feel awful… I shouldn’t have turned around directly, and should’ve done 3 crossings instead.

Lesson learned and all, but facing the possibility of death is awful. And I’m pretty sure I made one extra Dutch to hate visitors/immigrants (especially on a bike). I hope he can forgive me, and I wish safety to all the students.