Taxicab English

“Right now this taxicab is the loneliest place in the world.”

Raining again. I’m waiting for it to pass, standing with a bag of groceries in the revolving door of a bank. Another dozen people are waiting with me. I pass time by watching the neons flicker to life through the rain; in the dark, the signs glow in flashing reds and greens and blues and hang there like paper lanterns.

After twenty minutes my patience evaporates and for several blocks I walk in search of a cab, though they’re all engaged. Leaving behind downtown’s European facades, I drift into unfamiliar neighborhoods of red brick and dripping scaffolding, streets where lights are scant and shadows huge, where alleys spiral into blackness, and where sullen, shirtless men sit under crooked shop awnings, drinking beer and giving me sorrowful looks as I pass.

Finally a cab, but it’s a Pyrrhic victory: I’m soaked to the skin and my groceries are all but ruined.

I assess the driver, a nervous-looking boy who looks scarcely old enough to drive. I give him my address and try to sound friendlier than I feel.

He nods, hits a button on his tape deck, and we’re off. The tape is an English lesson for cab drivers. A phrase in the local language, an English translation, a small silence where the driver repeats. Except the driver here is too shy to practice in front of a foreigner, so he only mouths the words. Sometimes, though, I hear him whisper.

I’ve given up trying to make out the city’s details through the rainy windscreen, and soon I’m mumbling along with the driver. “Let me help you with your bags, sir.” He hasn’t relaxed at all. How long has he been riding around listening to these tapes? How long had he been preparing for a passenger like me?

I’m no help. Covered in water, carrying a grocery bag of rainy mush, and staring narrow-eyed out the passenger window, I hardly look like I’m up for small talk. I have, after all, only spoken a few words, and spoken them badly.

We ride on in near silence – no sound from without but a wash of water, no sound from within but the mobile language lesson. “You can put your luggage in the trunk.” We both mumble the sentence but it’s a social red herring – like two strangers who stare at their feet to avoid eye contact. Right now this taxicab is the loneliest place in the world.

I don’t know whether I should try initiating conversation or not. “What is the address of your hotel?” We move our lips to the phrase but neither of us makes a sound.

Once in a while he looks at me like he wants to say something, shoring up the courage, but every time he just looks back at the deserted street and frowns. His driving is careful and precise, rare among cabdrivers here. I want to compliment him but that will only make him more uncomfortable. Instead: “Sir, you’ve forgotten your bag.”

When we finally reach my block I pay and thank him. I try to convey a certain mixture of politeness and apology in my goodbye, but it’s probably lost in my bad accent.

The light in my elevator is broken and I feel for the floor button like a blind man. A thought occurs: I should have left my grocery bag in the cab. Sir, you’ve forgotten your bag. But it’s too late for any of that.

On my floor, I toss the grocery bag in a stairwell dustbin, thinking vaguely of my driver. My apartment is even quieter than the cab – no English lesson to liven up the dark. I wonder if the driver is still playing his cassette. Maybe he’s repeating the phrases more loudly now that I’m gone. Still, I can’t help picturing the lad yanking the tape out of the deck and throwing it away like I have my groceries. Surely he must regret running into me as much as I regret the rain.