When I arrived in China four years ago I was told, "You'll witness or be in a crash in a taxi almost every week." I am almost disappointed that until this week I had been in only one small accident in all that time.

Then when I started driving my own car earlier this year back came the comments: "You don't drive yourself, do you?" "How do you handle the traffic?" "If you are in a crash they always blame the foreigner," or "You will get stopped every five minutes because you are not Chinese." That last statement, which I heard more than once, smacked more than just a little of a fear of racism and I would just like to mention that some lao wai here in Shanghai are so terribly misinformed.

To be honest, I have found the traffic no worse than many other large cities and once you get used to the general flow of things, driving here isn't so bad and the almost total absence of road rage is really quite refreshing.

On the occasions where I have been stopped, I have always been treated courteously and yes it was my fault for misreading a sign or not being able to read "Bus Lane Only" in Chinese.

But then the other evening, what I suppose was inevitable happened, I was hit fair and square on the rear, notice rear, passenger door by, you've guessed it, a taxi.

I suppose there were grounds for blaming me - I had driven straight on through a green light on the busy Luban Lu/Xujiahui Lu junction.

How could he have missed me (funny language English), I was driving an SUV and a white one at that. He bent in the running board 10 centimetres, dented and twisted the door and burst the rear tyre. So he didn't miss me after all.

Police were on the scene almost immediately, a bit different from Britain when there is never a policeman around when you need one, and it appeared they had perhaps even witnessed the impact.

Would the rumours be true? "Totally your fault" was translated for me but that was what they had said to the taxi driver. The police were extremely helpful, even to the point where, when the car wouldn't start because I had left it "all lights blazing" for over an hour they gave me a quick push to jump start it.

Off to the police station for my statement to be translated into Chinese and signed. As I walked to the station from my car shock kicked in a bit. This was spotted by a policeman who reached into the back of his vehicle and produced a bottle of water. No sign of unfair treatment there.

Next morning off to the insurance assessment centre spelled "repair shop" to assess the damage and once that was agreed my car was moved into a workshop bay. While we were still talking I heard the sound of metal on metal coming from my car. I wandered over and they were using a hammer and dolly on the car instead of replacing the door as we would in the West. Nothing strange in that really, my grandfather had a very well respected panel beating business in Scotland when I was a child even working on the cars of the British Royal Family from time to time so it brought back old memories. It is just that now it is seen as easier and cheaper there to just put on a new panel instead of repairing the old one.

I was told to come back between 5 pm and 5:30 pm that day and the car would be ready. No way I thought, I have to wait days to get the work started back home. Sure enough at 5:30 pm the car backed down the ramp from the paint oven and after very careful inspection all I could see were one or two minor paint blemishes that I have to go back in a couple of days and get compounded out.

A car accident can never truly be a pleasant experience but to all the doubting Thomases out there I would like to publicly state that at no time during the whole incident was I treated any less than 100 per cent courteously and with good manners.

And to have the whole thing dealt with and the car back on the road in less than 24 hours of the incident does have to say something for the efficiency of what many foreigners assume is chaos and while I am not exactly looking forward to the next time, the feeling of trepidation should it ever happen again will have had the edge taken off.

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