I'm with Crow Sister on this one. Sometimes you have to make a gap in the traffic by forcing it to stop - once you have made that eye contact which hopefully clues-up the driver that you are going for it and which tells you the driver is not either blind or in some way discernably murderous. Alternative: Spend a lifetime on the pavement waiting.

I get the sense that Yoofs fall into two categories; stupid/invincible or full of testosterone-fuelled bravado. The latter secretly check out oncoming drivers in the same way as Crow Sister, then having made the risk assessment they saunter across slowly and with a John Wayne swagger, so as to make the world slow down at their whim.

Now as for orthodox jewry, it has been my experience of working with Haredim (black frock-coats, dress-hats, ringlet hair) in East London, that because they are utterly immersed in their religion, to the exclusion of almost all worldly concerns, they can appear either a)totally pre-occupied with observing the tiniest detail of every religious law and practice that they would be oblivious to a charging elephant in Newington Church Street and b)that they are always running late for something, in the style of Alice's white rabbit. Some of the most naively charming people I have known have been Haredim, I just hope not too many get run over 'cos they are in a rush and assume that goodwill alone will save them!