Have you ever noticed the effect of a piece of paper in your hand when you take a taxi?
If you jump in a taxi empty-handed, the driver will turn around and ask you where you’re going, listen attentively, perhaps ask a question or two to clarify, and then you’re off.
If you have a little piece of paper in your hand, however, it’s a different story. No matter how clearly you tell the driver your destination, he will fixate …
The starting fare for taxis in Shanghai is 11 RMB, or, as the locals say, 11 kuai. This amount increases as a function of both distance traveled and time. This is all well and good.
What is not well and good, however, is a trick the taxi drivers frequently pull which I will dub “the one-kuai roll.” The typical one-kuai roll scenario is something like this:
Scene: in a taxi on the streets of Shanghai, in light
…
There are so many ads for cosmetic surgery in Shanghai taxis these days. Ken reports this grim discovery:
Now, it can be annoying when you’re sitting in a taxi and you cannot turn off the TV screen 18 inches from your face, but I can live with it. However, what I saw in the taxi today today was perhaps a new low. There was a print ad, mounted on the back of the head rest in front of me, advertising
…
The other day I got in a taxi to discover that my driver was a pleasant middle-aged woman. Female taxi drivers are not exceedingly rare in Shanghai, but they’re not common, either. I was feeling gregarious, so I started chatting her up. (That’s one of the things I love about China… barring language barriers or extreme psychological blocks, foreigners can talk to pretty much any Chinese person about anything, and that person will be happy to respond.)
First I …
Yesterday as I rode in a taxi through Xujiahui I was glad that I was not one of the many people trying in vain to hail a cab. It can be extremely hard to find a taxi when it rains. Sometimes it’s completely impossible.
A thought struck me, so I asked the driver:
Me: Master*, do you like rainy days better or non-rainy days better? On rainy days you get more business, right?
Driver: With traffic like this, the rain
…
When I ride in taxis, the drivers frequently ask me if I’m American. I confirm it, of course. I guess I look very American. The “casual look” and all. When I met Todd here in Shanghai recently, his comment was that I was “even more American than [he] expected.”
Well, I yam what I yam.
The other day I had an audition for a commercial, and I was told to come somewhat dressed up. So I did. The cab driver …
Since I personally verify every blog that is added to the China Blog List, I see a lot of blogs. Unfortunately, I have very little time these days to read blogs, and I’m not really looking for new ones to add to my reading list. One that nevertheless caught my attention, though, was Talk Talk China. I especially like DD’s entries.
There are not a lot of entries up yet, but these are the ones I liked:
My Christmas this year has been an event partially shrouded in mystery since the summer. It was then that the idea to surprise my whole family with a Christmas visit home began to formulate.
Saturday, December 21st. I had meant to get on a bus to Shanghai as early as 3pm, but it wasn’t until 5:30pm that I finally make it out the door. I have been buying lots of Christmas presents and otherwise just preparing for my two weeks’ …
I don’t want to get stuck on the whole taxi thing, but I’ve got another little story. And it begins with me riding in a taxi. This time the driver was a woman.
Female taxi drivers are not so common. This driver, however, was top-notch. I mean that in the Chinese sense. When she takes you somewhere, she takes you in a hurry. That means not only serious speed, but also lots of passing and swerving — above all, not …
Not long ago I got pissed off about a little episode involving a Chinese man and a taxi and I made a little entry about it.
I got one response on it from one John B. He’s a guy who taught in China for a short time, and I happened to get in contact with him through some really odd coincidences.
John B. suggested in his e-mail that “the ‘me first’ attitude comes from simple competition for …
John has lived in China for
11.5
years. He is a linguist focused on SLA and tech.
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