The worst city in the world for driving must surely be India's capital, Delhi.
Amid a black haze of car fumes and the constant honking, drivers routinely ignore traffic signs and must dodge people, cows and even elephants that idle out onto four-lane highways.
As straddling lanes is the norm, just about every car has bodywork or paint missing. The white Toyota of my taxi driver, 21-year-old Rahul, is no different.
Rahul has been assigned to ferry me to and from meetings. He's upwardly mobile, has spiked hair and three cellphones, including an 18,000 rupee (about R3,600) one, which he says his lover bought him ("because I am poor"), and a second-hand iPhone.
After a short meeting, it's time to head back to my hotel in the suburb of Karol Burgh.
But today, instead of proceeding down Pusa Road, which runs beneath the city's elevated metro line, Rahul opts for an altogether different route. He slips down a side road and winds through the entangled rat's nest of a Delhi neighbourhood.
Shops and small businesses are all jumbled together in a disorganised riot and pedestrians pour down a dusty tar road, barely wide enough for a single car, but which now takes two-way traffic.
We approach what looks like a circle. Perhaps two decades ago this would have been a quiet neighbourhood roundabout. Today it's as if the peak-hour traffic from Joburg's M1 has been diverted down a side road. As he gets to the circle, Rahul edges in.
Then it happens. Cars from all sides are jammed around the road exiting the circle. Rahul - with a small car directly facing him - can't move. With his head out of the window, Rahul yells for the other driver to get out of the way. The driver, a youngish, bearded man, climbs out of his beat-up car and begins shouting back with wide, angry eyes.
Rahul, now outside the car, takes off his designer glasses and slams them on top of the dashboard.
He then gets on his 18,000 rupee phone, while simultaneously conducting a slanging match with this man.
The argument seems to involve who got to that particular corner first - as if anyone can tell in this thick tangle of steel, rubber and sweat. The other man finally relents, and edges his car back a little.
People around us stop hooting as we edge out and into one of the roads leaving the circle.
Rahul has calmed down, but my heart is still racing. What was his plan?
He laughs. "I was going to call my friend. He lives just around the corner." He points up to the third floor of a block just near the circle, as we pass below it.
He says he's been in one accident before. In fact the body work of the white Toyota bears the evidence of a small amount of hammering and touch-ups. When you look around, his isn't the only one. It seems everything from the smallest vehicle to a fancy BMW or SUV has either a few knocks, scrapes or dents on it.
Rahul is smiling to himself as if the events of only a few minutes ago are already a distant memory.
Nothing here seems to hold anyone back, even if it means taking the odd scrape or knock every now and then.
• Do you have a funny or quirky story about your travels? Send 600 words to travelmag@sundaytimes.co.za and include a recent photograph of yourself for publication with the column...