I’ve become accustomed to not driving anywhere anymore.  Now I ride.  I wonder how many taxis I’ve been in, in this one year.  Half the time I don’t even really realize that there is someone driving the car, well, that is until they start slamming on the horn like there’s a prize in the steering column.  Most of the time I’m I feel like I’m in my little bubble of safety that is anything but safe.  They always remind you to put your safety belts on, but there aren’t any safety belts.
What gets overlooked are those people that are taking where I want to go after short bit of broken Mandarin is exchanged.  One driver in particular driver showed me that I should pay attention to the cabbies a bit more.
I was coming back home around midnight after a night with some friends.  I was sitting in the back of a nondescript cab just like any other staring off into my own thoughts somewhere.  We were about half way over the Lupu bridge when a familiar tune came on the radio.  Usually the sounds coming from the speakers are the Chinese version of “Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me” (at least that’s what it sounds like) or Chinese pop music, which if you thought pop music wasn’t aggravating enough, listen to that for an hour and a half coming home from the airport after a 19 hour flight.  This tune cut through pollution of noise and carbon monoxide that constantly swirls around.  It was a breath of fresh air and I couldn’t quite peg it down.  Then as the chorus came up and Lionel Richie’s face popped into my head I was so out of my element that I forgot the nameless person in front of me was still behind the steering wheel and began singing.  At the exact same time the man, who I had all but written off as being human, sang along with Lionel and I;

“Say You.
Say Me.
Say it for always.
That’s the way it should be.”

Our eyes meet in the rearview mirror and neither of us can keep it together.  We both start laughing, though it only lasts a moment for we both get back to singing the song.  I’ve had a lot of bad experiences in a cabs and a few memorable ones, but this has been the best to date and I think I’ll be hard pressed to top it.  Lionel Richie has achieved god status in my book.Lionel Richie \’Say You, Say Me\’