Now I am not saying it is always that bad, but frankly, I could have taken this photo in many (if not most) car interiors in any Chinese large city:
Note the lucky charm (top right), but no belt (also note that this is a fancy car that belongs to a very wealthy family).
I also have a lucky charm in my car
But I always make sure to wear the seat belt (its first priority) before starting the car. Over here, the large cities have strict belt laws but outside the city not so much (Manila).
I have been a passenger of a range of different kind of cars in China. It is usually a scary and dangerous experience.
Seat belts, road rules, patience, safe cars, car maintenance, and so on is commonly a afterthought.
My experiences from Chongqing during Chinese new year:
The taxi driver decides the traffic is too slow so he just change to a faster and less trafficked lane. That could be OK, but he changed to the lane of the meeting traffic. That worked out just fine with heavy usage of the car horn.
The private car was standing in a stamped road waiting for the other cars in front to get through. The meeting traffic was driving past us like any normal busy road. We was in the que of cars driving against the clearly marked one way street in the central erea of a large city.
Driving on the highway from the central areas to Chongqing airport. The driver was as normal breaking most rules. The special thing this time was that the police car in front of us was throwing a rather large plastic bag of garbage out of the window of the police car. No one in the car cared or mentioned it at all.
and so on…
Car Safety is always on the top of my head that is my i always use modern gadgets that could enhance the safety of my brand new car.,;;