Chatty Drivers

So there is this one category of cab drivers - the Chatty Drivers.

These guys come across as the most friendly and helpful sorts. They will happily take you where you want to go. They will suggest shorter routes and generally smile a lot.

How to spot a Chatty Driver:

• He will agree to go where you ask him to but not before he tells you, "Chalo baith jao... Main customer ko kabhi na nahi kehta hoon" ("ok sit, I never refuse a customer)
• 5 minutes into the drive, he will discuss the weather / the potholes / traffic in the city
• Will nod his head disapprovingly at the traffic, at other cabbies, at the pot holes and will seem to talk to himself
• Some more points that I can think of, but then I dont think they are common across the category.

Anyway, so the thing about the chatty drivers - The more they chat - the higher chances of them cheating you!

80% of the times these cabbies will give you a bloated figure of the cab fare on reaching the destination. Because he thinks he has already floored you with his sweet talk and that you feel that he is a nice guy.

I hope you meet a chatty driver soon and come back to tell me that I was right. And if I wasn't, well I did say 80% of the times... right?!

:)

The One Good Thing

Btw... The one good thing about most cabbies in Bombay, you dont have to worry if you are a single girl travelling post midnight in one of these... You can tell your destination and go off to sleep. They are mostly nice and at most may try and cheat you off a few additional bucks.. But yes, the Mumbai cabbies are much much better than their counterparts in other parts of the country.

And no matter how much I crib about them, I can't do without them.

Beginners Guide...

As a beginners guide, let me give you a basic background on the cabs and cabbies:

The Worst kind:

• Fiats
• Fiats with cloth seat covers
• Fiats with cloth seat covers which have turned yellowish / brown over a period of time.
• Fiats with those ugly covers and a very dirty, unshaven, unkempt driver, chewing paan / tobacco and the cab smelling of his sweat!!! *Puke*
• Cabs with mirrors on the cieling, a silver colour shiney pole in the center, and blue / red / green lights inside!! (I dont know why the pole is there but I totally enjoy the cab rides in these types because they mostly have a music system with some very cheesy item numbers playing... plus the mirrors on top make for some nice time pass)
• These cabs, the ones I just mentioned, with shiney interiors and mirrors etc, though they look very nice and all that, I am quite sure they are used for all wrong things (read drivers making out in the cars with Prosts... ). So needless to say I avoid them as much as possible... but prefer them over the regular fiats.

The not so bad kind:

• New age cabs - santros / zens etc. Though these are also getting somewhat disappointing with the drivers putting ugly cloth seat covers on the nice leather seats! Why? why?? why???
• some well kept fiats with leather seats.

The Good ones:

• The new cabs with leather seats
• Meru Cabs - Private AC Cabs (green in colour). You have to call and book them but they are almost always unavailable because clearly, like me, the entire Bombay city is fighting for those few 1000 merus for a comfortable ride to work. (I can go on and on about the pros & cons of Meru cabs... but some other day maybe. for now, they are definitely listed under the good ones)
• New cabs (the santros & zens) with leather seats, nicely done interiors, a music system, and a good clean driver (its definitely your lucky day if you find one of these)

Seasonal Woes:

• Monsoons are just around the corner and if you think I am finicky about the cabs right now, monsoons will make me wanna kill all the drivers and crib and crib and crib some more!!
• With 75% cabbies having cloth seat covers (i HATE those covers), they get wet in the rains and cloth being cloth doesnt dry soon. Then you, looking pretty and pleased with yourself, take one of these cabs and before you realise, you have a wet BUM!!!! I swear I have to stop myself from reaching out to the drivers head and banging it real hard again and again on the steering wheel!!!
• Thinking of that right now is giving me goose bumps!!!

So anyway... now you have an idea about my pet peeves... My following posts will be more about the experiences.

'Taxi'ing Times

I live in Bombay and travel around the city in the Black & Yellow fiats they call taxis. Thankfully, due to some govt regulation, we now have santros, Zens, Indicas on road sporting the colour too... so ya.. lately there has been some minimal improvement in the cab scene in Bombay.

But the blog is mostly about the not so good things about these cabs... its about my fights and arguments with the cabbies (the drivers), strange experiences, shocks, surprises, poor service, predictable behavior, and much more.

:)