The helmeted family was riding three people on a scooter

What is taken for granted as absolute common sense in one country can completely evaporate the moment it crosses an ocean. Social norms are fragile, fickle things, shifting effortlessly across borders and eras. To be suddenly confronted on a foreign street by a spectacle that would be unthinkable back home—this, surely, is the ultimate thrill of wandering the world. Standing on a bustling street corner in Taiwan, the first cultural whiplash to strike me was the constellation of scooters blanketing the city, and the wonderfully reckless philosophy behind how they are ridden.

At a glance, the swarms of two-wheelers clogging the avenues look just like the modest 50cc moped scooters one sees buzzing around Japan. In reality, however, most of these are beefy machines exceeding 100cc. Thanks to Taiwan’s flat urban terrain and narrow alleys, these high-powered scooters underwent a unique evolutionary track to become the indispensable legs of daily life. In Japan, packing two people onto a standard moped is strictly forbidden by law. Here, it is practically a default setting. In fact, if you watch the traffic closely, you will routinely spot daring souls packed tight, pulling off the seemingly impossible feat of riding three-deep on a single, compact chassis, gliding nonchalantly down public thoroughfares.

Curious about this casual defiance of physics, I decided to analyze the mechanics of these three-person crews. As it turns out, Taiwanese traffic law explicitly forbids riding three to a scooter as well. Yet, the locals treat this bureaucratic detail like a gentle breeze, breezing right past traffic police without batting an eye. The tight-knit family I caught in my viewfinder was a perfect example of this fearless, resilient trinity. A young boy in a blue shirt clung tightly to his father’s broad back, while a woman—presumably his wife—sat deftly balanced on the remaining sliver of the seat behind them. Looking closer at their feet, a massive plastic bag stuffed with vegetables dangled from the front floorboard. They were clearly on their way back from a full-family mission to gather ingredients for the evening meal.

As I watched this domestic caravan navigate the urban jungle, my eyes drifted up to their heads. No matter how absurdly overloaded their vehicle was, and regardless of how many occupancy laws they were shattering, all three members of the family wore sturdy, heavy-duty helmets, fastened without a millimeter of slack. In Taiwan, enforcement against riding helmetless is notoriously ruthless, carrying hefty fines that far outstrip Japan’s penalties. It seems that when cash, rather than abstract notions of safety, enters the equation, humanity suddenly becomes remarkably law-abiding.