Araf!

Perhaps the first word of Welsh any visitor to Wales learns is Araf. Nowhere can you drive more than a few hundred yards without the white lettering of Araf floating up at you from the road. Arafs must rival sheep for the most abundant blob of white in the country. Araf, of course, means "slow", and although you might think it's warning you of what to expect should you meet the locals, it's actually asking you to drive more slowly.

I can't vouch for the rest of the UK, but here in Wales - North Wales specifically, and Anglesey even more specifically than that - there's an insidious campaign to s...l...o...w u...s a...l...l d...o...w...n. Arafs are no longer enough. Neither are the more serious Arafwch Nawrs, which usually gang-up with Arafs to leave you in no uncertain terms that you're to take your foot off the gas. Now we have speed camera signs every few hundred yards or so. On entering any 30 mph zone - helpfully denoted by signs that say 30 - you also get a lighty-up sign that tells you you're entering a 30 mph zone. This is just in case the other 30 signs were ambiguous in any way, or you simply respond better to flashing lights. Then there are speed-triggered lighty-up signs that say "slow" (though usually not Araf) if you're doing more than 30 within the 30 mph zone, perhaps because you didn't see the large painted signs, don't respond to lighty-up signs, or think Araf refers to the locals. If you're lucky, there'll be no speed ramps, speed bumps, or speed guns. Then, two hundred yards, three empty holiday homes and a boarded-up chapel later, you leave the 30 zone, safely having not run anyone over.

But if this isn't slow enough, now they're slowing us down on the country roads in-between. For one thing, the 30 mph zones are getting bigger. They take an extra field or two now before they bugger off. Get past those fields and just when you think you can floor it - aghhhhhh! - what's this? 40? Why? Yet worse is to come. Reach the end of the 40 zone - and behold - you're now allowed to drive at the G-force-inducing velocity of 50!

Gone are the days when you could take a leisurely drive in Wales, enjoy the wind in your hair and watch the trees and the sheep and the fields go whizzing by. Now the trees and the sheep and the fields are whizzing by you. You know there is something really wrong with the world when caravans can keep up with the speed limit.

But, alas, this is the case. Cars are getting faster, but roads are getting slower. The world is truly bonkers. And Wales especially.