Cablog

Old mates

Working predominately at night I rarely encounter the generation from war time Australia. So it’s always a surprise and an honour whenever one of these old diggers climbs aboard and puts some perspective into the hustle and bustle of life.

Early on Saturday evening I swung into St Vincent’s Hospital to find an old fella around 80 years old. He hobbled to the door using a walking stick and gingerly got in. “I knew a cab would show up if I waited long enough,” he said. With plenty of taxi work on the streets I guessed he’d been waiting awhile.

We headed off around the block, directly behind the hospital where the families of rural and regional patients stay in self contained units. When I asked how they were the old fella grumbled, “They’re up the shit.” I took this to mean the dislocation of being away from home for the last six weeks whilst his wife battled throat cancer.

He was a farmer on the far South Coast off a sheep and cattle property of 1800 acres. “She kept me going for forty two years whilst we paid it off,” he said, “no matter how tough it got. Sometimes I’d want to chuck it in and get a salary job in town but she wouldn’t hear of it. She kept me going...and now I’m losing her.”

As his voice faded off and I wondered how traumatic it would be moving from the serenity of rural life to downtown Darlinghurst.

I asked who was looking after the farm whilst he was in Sydney. “My two sons do most of the work now.” A glint came into his eye. “They both married sisters,” he offered proudly, “and built a house each on the property. When I suggested that he was lucky to have them there he agreed, “Yes, I’m blessed.”

Then opening the door he paused. “You know, the two sisters are my best mate’s daughters...how about that?” he chuckled. “Bingo!” I laughed...

A'holes

After stating recently that there were no arseholes around to warrant posting stories, up pops two last night to prove me wrong. The first was a passenger and the second, a crazed pedestrian.

The passenger boarded in the city with his missus around midnight. They were both aged around 40, relaxed and well dressed with him wearing a suit. After requesting the northern beaches he duly fell asleep on her lap and the journey proceeded without incidence or conversation.

Upon arrival he awoke and handed over a debit card as they didn’t have enough cash for the $52 fare. Yet when I handed over the EFTPOS terminal for the pin number he queried the fare. “Why is it showing an extra five bucks?”

This surprised me as usually it is only kids who are unaware of the 10% surcharge on EFTPOS payment, which I explained to him.

He snarled, “I’m not paying you a surcharge” “It’s doesn’t go to me,” I told him, “Cabcharge gets it.” “Well, I’m not paying it. Here’s forty five in cash and I’ll go and get some coins.”

As we were outside a three storey unit block experience told me this would take some five minutes. “Okay,” I said, “but the meter’s ticking.” “What!?” “Waiting time,” I said, pointing to the fare label on the window.

This was gruffly rebuffed and he sauntered off into the unit block. I restarted the meter, just to see how long he took and his embarrassed wife waited nervously outside the cab.

After an extra $3.50 had clicked over he reappeared and handed over the coins, for the original fare only. So I challenged him, “How do you feel about short-changing a cabbie?” He leaned in the window, smirked and calmly pronounced, “I_feel_ no_ guilt.” And as he turned away I couldn’t help but retort, “Then you’re an arsehole.”

Yes, it was weak to react to such provocation but it did feel good calling out the thieving prick. Until, that is, when the very next passenger tipped me $3.60. Sheesh, I immediately felt like a mug.

The second a’hole encounter occurred shortly after in Harbord whilst dropping off a fare. Waiting for payment I noticed a young bloke about 20 metres away squatting on the footpath. He was naked except for an open shirt and it looked like he was taking a crap. Just then two young women appeared and started yelling at him.

He rose to reveal a full erection which he started stroking whilst leering at the girls, clearly goading them. Though it was obvious he was not a stranger to them.

I remarked to my passenger how the idiot had probably taken too many pills. “No,” he replied, “that’s more than just pills, that’s got to be ice.”

One of the girls grabbed a rolled-up newspaper off the ground and furiously attacked his genitals and bum, forcing him onto the roadway where passing cars braked and veered around him, narrowly avoiding a collision. A’hole.

Fixed fares

There is talk of flat-rate taxi fares being introduced for standard trips. This is a bid to eliminate disputes over large variations in fares. There is some justification for this talk when drivers take a longer, faster route where a shorter alternative is sometimes just as quick. Equally, though, there are often variables which can neutralise time and cost advantages, not least being peak-hour traffic density.

A good example would be the Airport to City journey which I've created in the adjoining map, comparing the relative routes/fares/distance/av speed/traffic lights involved on the two most common routes. These details can be viewed in a larger map by clicking on the respective legends.

The approximate fares for each route is based on the current rateplus the $3 Airport toll. The Southern Cross Drive option includes a second fare for the $5 ED tunnel toll.

Media

There wouldn’t be many cabbies who regularly read The Australian’s weekly supplement, Media.This covers a profession I find endlessly fascinating, in particular regarding new media and the massive changes wrought upon the industry by the digital revolution.

In fact I enjoy the caper so much that blogging has largely been an unpaid hobby over the years. Until today, that is, with the introduction of (sidebar) advertising on Cablog. Yes, I’ve sold out!

This interest is also complemented by those closest to me - my son and his girlfriend plus my girlfriend and her daughter, all of whom work in either traditional or new media. Ours is a media mob.

Anyway on Tuesday night I was working my way through last week’s Media – always a week behind - when I read an interesting snippet in the Diary section. This reported how some young fellas created a YouTube video, Beached Az just for fun only to see the clip go viral with nearly 5 million views.

Now Beached Az has been commissioned by the ABC as an 11-part digital animation series and will appear on ABC2 next month, testament to the opportunities available to those with a passion for producing digital content. Start a hobby and who knows where it could lead when new media platforms are crying out for content.

On Wednesday I carried some illustrators working for Animal Logic on their next hit, Guardians of Ga’Hoole. This is being produced at Fox Studios and employs some 300 illustrators. My passengers were relative newcomers to digital animation but Animal Logic provides them with on the job training due to a skills shortage in Australia.

In related news a journalist this week asked how the blogging was going and I had to admit to not being very productive of late. Too many nice passengers, I joked, and who wants to hear about them? Hence this rather lame, substitute post. My apologies.

Disappointment

One of the most enjoyable periods of working night shifts happens every three or four years when Australia plays Test cricket in England. There’s nothing better than listening throughout the night to the BBC’s ball by ball commentary bringing the game to life.

Therefore yesterday I started work with high hopes that the Aussies could pull off the miracle last innings and save the Ashes.

My first job was a a radio booking from a famous couple’s home in Hunters Hill. Whilst I’ve carried him before it’s highly unlikely that she’ll ever catch an LPG taxi due to a reported preference for eco-friendly cabs.

The passengers were luncheon guests with a couple climbing into the rear and a young woman sitting up front. It’s Connie 'what'shername', I thought, with the same dark complexion and distinctive head of hair.

During the long journey I listened to their chat trying to work out how to request an autograph or even better, a photo. Finally, approaching their destination I asked her, “Um, are you famous?” “No.” She’s just saying that, I thought, so I pressed her, “You’re not a musician?” “No.” Oh.

However she was gracious enough to admit that others often made the same connection. Indeed, not only did they share an Afro-Australian heritage but they also knew each other.

This may well have been a metaphor for how the cricket unfolded, starting with high expectations only to end in disappointment.

Another notable passenger, a rough and ready character climbed in at Surry Hills for Kings Cross. “Hey bro, I need some tunes,” he demanded reaching for the radio. After killing the cricket broadcast I checked to see why he was taking so long to find some music. Sure enough, he had gone ‘on the nod’, with a hand frozen on the tuner. That’s heroin for you.

Later in the evening a thirty-something bloke at the Airport boarded after an interminable wait on the taxi queue, and a ninety minute delayed flight. Despite these understandable frustrations he was surprisingly upbeat, relating how he was soon going to live in Israel to study spirituality.

This was a surprise given he was born an orthodox Greek. He explained that after managing his family’s pastry business, he really needed to break away. On arrival at their factory where he’d left the car, I waited whilst he grabbed a box of almond shortbreads. “Beware of Greeks bearing gifts,” he laughed. I’m eating them now and can report that they’re sensational.

After 11 pm I stopped at a cafe for dinner where a television showed the cricket. By then the game was looking most promising for Australia with the captain digging in for a long innings. Two minutes later he was lazily run out and five balls later the vice captain, Michael Clarke was also freakishly run out. Unbelievable.

I had high hopes for Clarke after a passenger last night reported seeing Clarke’s girlfriend in a Kings Cross nightclub. Maybe with her back home, I reasoned, he’ll be totally focused for such an important innings. Not so.

Needless to say the rest is history and accordingly, the shift ended as a damp squib. Well-played England, you were clearly the better team. Bastards.

Luck

Like most jobs taxi driving has its moments of luck, usually the result of preparation and perserverance rather than simply slacking around.

At midnight last night I stopped for dinner reasonably happy with the shift till then. As you can imagine Tuesdays in winter are usually the quietest nights of the year but I’d jagged a meaty fare to the North Shore just after 10pm, the start of the night rate.

The passenger, a young office woman sat up front and talked like a threshing machine. She’d been out celebrating a business deal and launched into a tale involving sex, drugs, affairs and betrayal.

At regular intervals she grabbed my forearm to emphasise a point, but I didn’t worry about it, she was a demonstrative girl. When a phone call to her married lover failed to entice him out, I was ordered on to her house. There, a bloke stood on the verandah smoking. “That’s my boyfriend,” she squealed, “wave to him. Want to come in for a drink, other drivers do.” Pass.

After dinner I camped on a favourite rank waiting for the evening shift. During the late afternoon I’d spotted an employee who lived in the Shire and figured there was an outside chance of scoring a $60 fare. This would make my night and allow for an early mark home. As luck would have it, I got him.

However rather than turn for home after dropping him, I decided to head back to the city for another hour or so. Maybe it was the sight of empty cabs leaving the city which inspired me but I just felt lucky.

Sure enough, arriving in Redfern around 1:30am I was offered a radio job to Fairfield, out in the western suburbs. The only trouble being the pick-up on Bourke Street, Waterloo was questionable. It would be either heaven or hell and after nearly rejecting it as too risky my intuition took over and I accepted the job.

When the details showed two passengers in a male name I started to panic until arriving at the address to find two businessmen in suits hailing a passing cab. I quickly put a stop to that, they were mine!

Two lamb kebabs and $100 later I rolled into Fairfield well pleased, especially after doing a hard speed limit past a concealed police car on Parramatta Road.

Call me lucky, it was that sort of night.

Respect

For some years now I’ve been joking to passengers, by paraphrasing a famous line, “I’m the only taxi blogger in the village!” No more, toots, for I’m getting competition.

Last night at the taxi lost property office, whilst handing-in the camera memory card, (yet electing to ditch the unused sanitary pad, also found in the cab), I picked up the latest edition of the industry operators magazine, Meter (current issue not yet online).

The publisher, and CEO of the NSW Taxi Council, Howard Harrision has announced a forthcoming blog to be called, Howie's Blog. Actually, this was heralded three months ago but nevertheless such an exciting development in the taxi blogsphere is worth waiting for.

Howie currently pens editorials for Meter and has lately been advocating improved customer service...

We must make people want to ride with us. And what do people want? Reliability!...and so on, before closing with this curious statement,

“But passengers are rude to me, they should treat me with respect!” I often hear from drivers. Of course they should...but this is 2009! Respect for each other went out the door years ago. We earn money supplying a transport service to the general public, many of whom, especially on afternoon(night) shift, are affected by alcohol. Now let me think...general public...alcohol...rudeness...disrespect...ummmm, am I missing something?

At 1:30 this morning I came upon a cab blocking my lane on Riley Street, just off Oxford. A female pedestrian and a passing motorist were comforting an old wino who had collapsed, or been attacked, and was lying semi-conscious in the gutter.

The other cabbie notified our base of the situation yet was uncertain if an emergency call was made. So I got out and rang 000 to expedite the process. We established the bloke was breathing, had a pulse and that a bleeding head wound was superficial.

Whilst waiting for the ambulance a young fella around 25yo accosted me, claiming, ”I'm stressing out”. This was code for, got a spare ciggie? “I missed my train,” he explained, “and I don’t want to be raped tonight whilst sleeping on the street.”

This, whilst loitering outside The Tool Shed, from which the clerk had emerged to also offer assistance. I gave the kid a smoke and agreed with his request to hang with me until the paramedics arrived.

Respect.

Lost

In the cab last night I found a camera memory card containing nearly 2GB of holiday images and video taken in Egypt. These four characters below feature prominately in the content which is five weeks old. It's a long shot but I thought maybe someone might recognise them. If so, the card can be recovered from Lost and Found...soon. We'll see how good this Interwebby thingo is, six degrees of separation and all that.

UPDATE: Some great suggestions in comments re these lost images. I Found Your Camera is a dedicated site for locating camera owners with an interview here. Another worthy idea is for The Daily Telegraph to publish the images. Given the online edition has previously adopted a few Cablog formatting tricks maybe they'll give the images a run.  

Hopeless

Often I’ve wondered if there’s anything more pointless than playing poker machines. Even compared to other forms of gambling like horses and cards where one can at least calculate the risk based on knowledge and odds, and bet accordingly, pokies have got to be the worst game of all.

And then to be addicted to that useless pastime is surely wrist-slashing stuff. This was the feeling conveyed to me early this morning after a fare in the suburbs.

A middle-aged guy had lost $500 then caught the train from the City. He’d arrived at the station with only twenty bucks which he needed for a taxi to save a marathon walk.

Yet instead of cutting his losses and hailing a cab he went into the pub and gambled the twenty bucks! ”But you won’t believe it,” he said, “I pulled $500 bucks out of the machine.”

When I congratulated him for the amazing save, his response was anything but upbeat. “Yeah, but I finished work at 7:30pm and now it’s 2 o'clock,” he moaned. ”What am I going to tell my wife? I promised her and the kids there would be no more gambling.”

In fact he’d been making this promise to her for the entire ten years they had been together and revealed he’d been playing the pokies for nearly twenty years.

It was easy to feel some pity for the bloke as he sat slumped in the seat, utterly dejected by the damage his addiction was doing to the family.  

Yes, he’d tried all the gambling services. “They’re all bullshit,” he mumbled, “they don’t work. There should be a license for playing pokies, they're really evil. I just can’t get away from them.”

I suggested his wife must be incredibly devoted to tolerate his profligate spending for so long. He agreed and related how the hardest thing was confessing to her that the weekly wages were gone, in one night.

Given his hopeless situation it was hard to be positive. “Well,” I offered, “you’ll just have to be totally honest with her and ask her to help you. Maybe she can take control of your wages and bank account, cut off the money supply.”

With a weary shake of the head he said, “Nup, we’ve already done that.” If that was so, I asked, where did he get the money to gamble tonight. He then laughed sardonically, “The bank sent us a new credit card, even though I’m a total credit risk. The bastards.”

Fridays

Most drivers consider Friday night the best shift of the week. I absolutely loathe it. If it’s not the endless peak hour traffic and it’s frenetic ratbag drivers, it’s the difficult office jerks who lose any semblance of courtesy after a few drinks.

Unfortunately I’m driving Friday nights at the moment whilst another driver is on leave, hence this rant. The shift has it’s own peculiarities and rules with which I'm unfamiliar. Like never work around city north in the late afternoon where it seems every other desk jockey wants to head over the Bridge.

Three times I explained to them, “It’s total gridlock, you’re better off catching the train.” But of course being the end of the week they want to travel home in comfort rather than stand on a crowded train. Even after offering to run them to the station they still refused, preferring to pay extra to sit in crawling traffic.

As for the drunks last night I forfeited three different fares totalling around $20. It was more expedient than wasting time with their antics - a lost wallet; forgotten pin number; short on cash. Then they want to love you for saying, "No charge" when, "Just piss off" applied.

Although these conditions made for much frustration it was nothing compared to an incident around 9pm. Travelling through Waterloo along Elizabeth Street I had the sort of luck which occurs every two or three years. In fact, in over ten years of hacking I’ve cheated serious injury just four times.

Approaching the notorious McEvoy Street intersection with a green light I noted a line of approaching cars waiting for me before turning right. Cars also waited on McEvoy with the red light.

So I was almost at the intersection when a dark blue Subaru WRX suddenly darted from the rear of the oncoming queue, flew down the inside lane and inexplicably swung 90° straight across my lane.

Instantly I slammed on the brakes and violently reefed the wheel to the left as the WRX barrelled on, seemingly oblivious to the danger. Then sliding sideways with squealing tyres toward the waiting vehicles on McEvoy I made another furious wheel correction in the opposite direction.

Even though I braced for impact into my door, this last action missed the WRX by a spider’s dick, which had finally propped, then veered off erratically at speed. It was all pure good fortune involving mere millimetres and milliseconds.

Whilst I’m still in disbelief at escaping a serious collision, I knew right away that a sic WRX with an out of control, lunatic driver in Waterloo could only mean one thing – it was stolen by kids.

No wonder I’m back on the fags.

UPDATE: In a spooky coincidence at the above location, an idiot in this silver car is doing exactly what the WRX did, except it came from the inside lane, suddenly, at night.(image rotatable)