How to make chats with cabbies less taxing … for both parties

Flagging down a cab, either with an app or the old-fashioned way by waving an arm at a passing taxi, may seem like a quaint undertaking from a bygone era, given the pesky tenacity of the contagion. But things will improve, hopefully sooner rather than later. So, with the holiday season fast approaching, people will have to start taking cabs once again, because not all destinations in big Chinese cities are walking distance apart.

I want to talk about talking. Specifically, what is the level and depth of conversation you are comfortable having with taxi drivers, as the meter is running. First of all, let's just assume we're in a post-contagion world and mask-wearing is "so 2022", therefore there's no cloth or paper squares covering drivers' and passengers' mouths alike, muzzling any possibility for crisp ungarbled speech.

Another assumption — and this is a bit of a stretch — let's just assume that all ferrymen and their fares have no linguistic barrier. I know, it's hard to get past this, but please work with me, dear reader!

For our purposes here, a fare flags down a cab and settles into the back seat, opposite corner to the driver, perhaps in a subconscious attempt to distribute the human weight more evenly, or perhaps in China because this is the most convenient spot for passengers to plop themselves down, as traffic rides on the right side of the road here. So, our passenger announces his destination and then flips open a newspaper and begins checking the sports scores.

So from the driver's vantage point, your face is buried in, say, today's China Daily, suggesting that you're not up for idle chitchat. But laughing in the face of social niceties, the perhaps equally bored and curious driver breaks out with: "Where are you from?" At first, perhaps, you, the passenger, think the driver has turned on the radio and the question was posed by a DJ during a morning call-in show. But the cabbie, who perhaps would choose the English name "Jeeves" if he were plying London's streets, persists. So, not to be rude, you reply: "Costa Rica" — I mean, who doesn't like Costa Rica? And maybe the driver will take some fare-shaving shortcuts, or at least leave you to your Spanish and sports section. But instead, the driver excitedly replies: "Guau! Mi tia tiene una casa de playa alli!" (Wow, my aunt's got a beach house there!"). Now you realize your friendly fib, your polite prevarication, has some repairs to be made.

Well, I don't recommend getting into these rush-hour retractions just to enjoy China Daily in the back seat of a cab. I will say that I will welcome back the time when we will even consider whether chatty or stony silent taxi drivers are preferable on long crosstown journeys, hopefully as soon as possible. Though, it seems the ancients did enjoy a good silent spell at times, even before the horse and buggy were a thing.

Two bygone Chinese bards had some high praise for the strong silent type, though not necessarily from dawn to dusk.

Li Yu's (937-978) I Climb the Western Tower in Silence expresses appreciation for a solitary stroll in nature.

"I climb the western tower in silence, the moon like a sickle.

Clear autumn is locked in the deep courtyard, where a wutong tree stands lonely.

Sorrowful parting has cut, but not severed our ties; my mind is still wild.

Separation is just like a taste in head and heart."

And what many might consider the most well-known poem ever penned in Chinese also expresses the notion that sometimes, regarding chitchat, less is more when one is deep in thought.

Li Bai's (701-762) Thoughts on a Quiet Night (Jing Ye Si) is deeply nostalgic, and if read with great feeling, might even give the rear-seat fare a rearview mirror vision of a single tear on the cabbie's cheek.

"There is moonlight shining before my bed,

I suspect that there is frost on the ground,

Raising my head, I gaze at the moonlight,

Lowering my head, I think of my home village."