I think you give them too much credit lah...
Hv driven to all corners (except langkawi) up north many times
in the last 20 yrs.
It's not etiquette but a sense of reality. You could be beaten
up, slashed with a parang and left for dead!
To their credit, there are 2 sides of the coin:
My car skidded and overturned in kedah many years back. Car roof
was a total wreck.
At the accident site, villagers were ransacking my car for
useful and valuable stuff.
But...the help rendered by others and the hospital to my wife
who was hurt was really heartwarming.
sometimes there r bad ppl around also.............. my last few
incidents up north
hav been very heart warming........