My days as a Taxi driver No other group of people hear the most sordid tales than those that have had the opportunity to work as Taxi drivers. I tell you, if taxi drivers were to write a book on their work, it will become a bestseller!I too once drive a taxi. Ok, I did not have the proper documentation like the ‘openbaar’ but I made some good money for the owner back then. I knew just how to handpick the best paying clients.
The problem with driving a taxi is that you get to hear all the gory details of a person’s life when they speak over the phone – and that is downright scary!
A lady once got into my taxi and started arguing over the phone with her man. She yelled and cursed before eventually throwing the phone against the car’s window. Thank God I had Shatterproof glass – at least they did not lie in their advertisements that it is indeed the strongest piece of glass.
Silence soon filled the car as I was too scared to say something that could make her lose it. I mean, I am a man and she had just cursed at one of our species. After having dropped everyone else off, I would then plugged up enough courage and ask my passenger where she would wanted to be dropped off.
With teary eyes, she looked up at me and in a soft whisper say “I do not know. I was just put out of the house by my boyfriend…”
That, my dear friends, is the most difficult thing of being a taxi driver.
Look, if it were in the movies, I would have probably driven her to my place, made her a hot cup of coffee and offered her the guest room to cool down. But this is no Hollywood production, it is real life. Trust me, if I show up with that women at home, my partner Tusnelde would not think it is funny!
I could always lie and tell Tussy that the lady was a cousin of mine from out of town and needed a place for the night. But that too won’t work – she is coloured! I tell you, my dear Tussy will take one look at her and another at my black face and shout “Hell Noooo!”
But there is a lighter side to being a taxi driver too. I am not referring to the ‘small change’ that all taxi drivers are known to chop off the taxi income for the day to buy electricity at their houses. Neither am I referring to those taxi dudes who would offer a lift to any pretty girl in the street free of charge and still end without their numbers!
Come to think of it; I do not know why we do that to ourselves. A woman would be walking down the street and you would stop and offer her a lift. You would in fact be begging her to get in the car. Even if she says she is going to Havana Extension 500 – you would take her there before proceeding to work in the CBD – minus her digits!
Some passengers think taxi drivers are dumb people, so I always made sure my English was proper. Instead of saying “have a good day”, I would say something like “May your day be punctuated with a revanchism whose magniloquence can only be theatropistically be analysed by the use of a reminiscent exacerbation…”
It worked like a bomb every time! I once loaded three fellas at Pioniers Park in Windhoek.
I knew that we would have an argument over payment as they were drunk, so I decided to play a prank on them. After they got on, I simply revved the engine of the vehicle to make it seems like the car is moving.
After five minutes, I stopped revving the engine and announced that we have arrived at their destination. The first dude squeezed N$20.00 note in my hand and got off. The second guy did the same. The third guy was about to do the same when he stopped, gave me a moerse klap to my face before boarding off.
“What was that for?” I asked.
“That is for driving too fast. You almost killed us,” he said.
Eish, I do miss those days indeed.
Until then…