Malaysian Taxies....

Do you shake your head at the title? I think some might especially those that have bad experiences or have feeling of being cheated when trying to go from one place to another in Selangor area. I being a frequent visitor to KL knows exactly how you feel. I mean, here we are a metropoliton city that is suppose to be more civilised have unscrupulous taxi drivers that decided they would take advantage of the unfortunate and tired travellers by cutting their throats!

Even as recent as last month, it was mentioned by our prime minister himself that the taxi drivers need to act appropriately as they are the indirect ambassador to our tourist to Malaysia. Is it a wonder that we keep on reading in the newspaper on and off that our government is concerned with this and warned the taxies' driver over and over again to use the meter. But it seems that nothing is working. All taxies have stickers that says if you have any complaint, please call such and such number. And yet, if you are like me, you wont be bothered to call anyone eventhough the taxi charge you a fixed rate instead of turning on the meter.

I am not sure about others but I know why I didn't make any complains. For one thing, I feel kind of stupid. After all, there are all this article warning us and yet I still AGREED to go into a cab with driver that tells me RM30 to drive me from The Submit, Subang to Crystal Crown Hotel in PJ. The excuse they gave me, bad traffic jam and it will take at least one hour to get there. I did hear about the notorious jam that people in Subang and PJ faced every working days. After a few taxies all saying the same thing to me, I finally had no choice but to get into one or risk being late (or worst, missing) the training. And I got there in abput 30-45 minutes!

Not only is it a cut throat in the monetary sense but I am literaly risking my life using the taxi. OK, so I am complaining about one particular taxi here but I have been in a few and basically, they all felt the same, just the smell in the taxies are different! This driver zipping in and out, cutting lanes here and there as if his sedan car is actually a big truck or something. We almost hit a merz on the way there and yet, instead of being apological, he was even more aggresive in his steering wheel turnings. I think my life must have shorten by a few months if not years!

I can understand the reason why the driver need to charge me 3 times more than what a normal taxi with meter would. After all, you never know how bad the jam would be along the way. A car might died in the middle of the road and no one can move anywhere. But for goodness sake, is there a need to show-off the stunt driver abilities?? I can even understand the fact that you do not want repeat business from me because I might not be in the area again. But is it necesary to show impatience verbally and gesture???

Of course, not all taxies are like that. I was lucky that I was able to meet a very nice taxi driver to drive me back from Crystal Crown Hotel back to Submit. A nice uncle that is very kind, courteous and knowledgable. On top of that he was dependable and very friendly. We basically chatted all the way back and I just couldn't let up such a luck and not ask him to pick me to and from my training again today. Noticed that I used the word luck because like luck, the taxi uncle only comes once in a blue moon. (Ya, of course I kept his number and name. So, if you are interested to have the number, let me know:) )

No wonder we Malaysian are not considered a developed country yet. How can we be when we can even keep our 'house' clean and become the civilised society? Is it a wonder that we have the lowest rating in terms of politeness? We used to be the most liked country because of our friendliness and polite culture! What in the world happen to those? Have we become so proud that we cannot or would not be humble?