China's traffic feels more dangerous because it is: they have 50% more auto accident related deaths than the USA does (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_traffic-r...). My Hunanese wife's dad was killed by one of those loosely regulated and very dangerous blue trucks (if you live in China, you know what I mean). I've seen someone die in a traffic accident before in Beijing (this person was biking across the street (dongzhimen wai) against a red light, and got hit by a taxi cab trying to beat the light before it turned red the other way). You can never really get that image/sound out of your head (and things slow down when you see it, to be fair, the cyclist was clearly at fault, but the taxi driver was also speeding).