First day at new work

Today was my first day at my new work place. As I had written in my earlier post, I have always had long commutes to work. This office was no different either. In fact, it beat the race by more 30miles ... yep.... my current commute back and forth is approximately 130miles. Phew ! It tires me even to think of the distance and it is still the first day :(
I could hardly sleep last night except the wee hours of the morning. Of course it was the time I set the alarm and was supposed to wake up. I convinced myself to catch up the few more minutes of the divine sleep pleasure and finally woke up 15 minutes later than decided. I got ready on time and left home by 6:45am. I was warned by a few experienced commuters that my drive time to work would be atleast 90mins. I had already spoken to the team of my early work schedule, so that nobody would give me weird looks when I started early from work. I was hoping to reach office by around 8:15am. I was told that my manager would be at work by 8:00am. I gave 15mins window, in case he did not show up on time. His presence was critical since, I had to be signed in to get into the building. You see my badge was not processed yet.
So my surprise, I found the drive not very bad .... touch wood. I reached office 8:00am. Not a bad start at all .... I said to myself. I called up my manager on his cell, only to hear a harsh voice (sounding as though he had just gotten up from bed) answering the phone. To my luck, another colleague of mine was at work and he helped me get into the building. I had no clue how to access the office parking space and so I parked the car in front of Wells Fargo bank. There was clearly a note that read "Parking for Wells Fargo Customers Only". But I didn't have a choice, since the place was new to me. I had no clue about the area and the Wells Fargo bank was right across my office. I feared, I would get lost, if I looked for other parking spaces and went ahead, parked my car there.
After the usual introduction and some project overview, I politely reminded my colleague that my car was parked in Wells Fargo Bank parking space and that it was not the best option. He gave me instructions on the office parking spaces and also showed me direction using google maps. I thanked him and went to my car. The driving direction given to me were fairly simple so I did not find the need to write the same. I was to make a right turn from Wells Fargo and would hit the desired road. Within .2miles of the road, I would find the office parking lot on my right. My present office is in the downtown and as with most downtowns I have seen, there are too many one way roads. Its very confusing and I have always hated driving in the downtown.
I drove my car out of the Wells Fargo parking lot and promptly made a right turn. I went straight for less than .1miles when I hit the signal. It was red and I patiently waited. I saw that that the car from the perpendicular road was making a left turn and was coming in the same road as mine.... oh wait ... it was coming almost in the same lane as mine. What a bad driver ... doesn't know to make a neat left turn, I thought. A few secs later another driver did the same mistake. Now I lost my cool and just looked at the surprised driver. Soon, our signal light turned green and since I had not located the road I was supposed to go to, I made a left and started going straight. At this time, I also cribbed about my colleague who had given me wrong directions. I drove atleast a mile and still was not able to locate the road I was looking for. I decided to make a U turn. On my way back, I easily found the road I had missed. Not just that ... I also discovered why the drivers were making a wide left turn. It was because I was in their lane !!!! Yes.... for some reason, I had got confused and had driven in the wrong lane .... my Indian driving skills shadowed my American driving knowledge and I convinietly made a free left turn !!! It could have been disatrous ... thankfully there was no cop or large vehicles approaching... if not I am not sure what would have happened. The expression on my face had to seen to be believed ... I had turned pale .... I couldn't believe myself and for a second could not think.
I got a convinient parking space in the office lot and the rest of the day went by smoothly. But my driving disastor haunted all day long !