When we were working at Sun in Beijing last April, my husband John and I often
used taxicabs to get across town. We took the subway and buses too but
usually taxis. There were ranks and orders of taxis, some obvious and
some subtle. The little red taxis with the cage for the driver were
at the bottom (and cheaper) rank. The fancy cabs with seat covers and curtains
were at the top (and more expensive). The most expensive was the hotel limo.
John and I ended up taking any cab that would stop for us and could figure out
where we wanted to go despite our lack of Mandarin. Since John
is very tall (6′ 3″, or about 2 meters), the drivers of the little red
cabs would laugh to watch him fold himself up like an origami crane trying
to fit inside.
On my visit to Sun Prague this week and last, it seemed that there was again
a hierarchy among the cabs. First, it seems that the locals all prefer to ride
the excellent public transport system. Unfortunately, my hotel was a very
long way from the office and I was there until after dark so I took cabs
instead.
The first cab I hired in Prague was friendly and clean and got me to work
quickly. I asked for his card so that I could hire him again. But that
night when (speaking no Czech) I gave his card to the receptionist and asked
her to call for me, she said “Oh, we can do better than this!” and she called
someone else. I ended up taking a variety of cabs during my time in Prague,
including one very expensive and inadvertent ride in the hotel limo. (When
I questioned why the limo cost me double for the same ride, I was told
“It’s a Mercedes!”.) Like the cabs in Beijing, the Prague taxis are decorated
in little ways. One had a small soccer ball hanging from the rear view
mirror, another had a wooden rosary. Two had white fuzzy bobble head dogs
on the dashboards.
Last night, for the first time I got a cabbie who had no English at all.
It took quite a bit of cross purposed communication in his Czech and my
English to figure out that he had been called for someone next
door and that a second cab from the same company was coming to pick me up.
He was still determinedly waiting by the time my taxi showed up to take me
to the hotel.
This morning’s cab ride to the airport ended up being in the same taxi that
I had taken on my first trip. The cabbie was still just as pleasant and the
little bobble head dog nodded to me all the way there through the cold fog of
late autumn in Prague.
KatysBlog 