It's cool, Hemingway is my DD

Coming from a campus with a four lane street directly in the middle of the campus, I'm no stranger to taking my life into my own hands when crossing the street. In Madrid, it's completely different. Here the pedestrians really do have the right of way and everyone follows through unlike somewhere else...
I've seen cars that were doing at least 30mph come to a dead stop for one person crossing the street. The other day I even had a public bus stop as I walked across the street. Mind you, the driver was talking on the cell phone while driving a bus that was about two times bigger then the street it was driving on and was still mindful enough to let me cross the street. They're better drivers, no contest. What freaks me out about all this though, is that these rules only apply to the crosswalk. As soon as you cross somewhere else you gamble with your life. This I discovered after an angry mother almost ran me over twice because I was trying to cross the street to get to class.
Lesson learned.