Markus and Brian's Excellent European Adventure

Top 5 European Warning Signs

One big difference between Europe and North America, besides the access to naked women on TV any time of day, is that in North America, public warning signs are generally dull and actionless:

This sign warns you that you're in a school zone with briefcase-toting children crossing when you'll least suspect it, so you'd better slow your car down. But who's going to notice that snooze-fest? Nothing motivates you to pay attention.

In Europe, however, signs come to life with action. If a danger is being brought to your attention, you'll know it, because the sign will clearly show what'll happen if you ignore it. For example, the boring, easily-ignored North American school crossing sign above would look like this in Europe:

There's no ignoring that! Looking at the sign, you know there are serious consequences if you don't pay attention. In some eastern European countries, there'd probably be a follow-up sign of the little silhouetted car behind bars for life.

Anyway, I ran across quite a few of these types of signs in Europe, and thought I'd share my five favourite. Actually, they're the only five I got around to taking pictures of, but whatever.

My Top 5 Crazy European Warning Signs

5)

This was above a fire exit at a museum in France. This is an excellent sign; it makes it unmistakably clear that when fire is licking at your heels, or the building is in the process of exploding, this is the door to sprint through. Isn't that much more clear than this?

4)

I came across this at a train station in Ireland. Besides being overly huge and unnecessary (the ground was concrete), the falling man looks like he was in the middle of an ancient tribal dance when he slipped and fell on a passing wave. That, and his body is also completely straight and rigid with fear as he falls. I love it.

3)

My train was about to leave, so I got a little excited and accidently blocked part of the picture, with no time for a retake. Anyway, it left little doubt in my mind that if I opened the electrical box on the wall, I'd be zapped into a very painful looking posture.

2)

From a small southern German town. The sign reads, literally, "Attention! Children shoot hadoken fireballs!"

And now, for number one...

1)

Similar to number 5, this sign hung over the door that handicapped people should escape from when flames are licking at their, uh, wheels. I'm not sure what's moving the wheelchair, actually -- the guy isn't pushing anything. Maybe the flames are pushing him. Or maybe it's a flaming rocket wheelchair. That'd be cool.

That's it. In closing, watch out; Europe's a dangerous place.

Posted by Brian at February 26, 2004 04:50 AM