10/24/23
Newsletter #496
The Crack of Dawn
Given half a chance, I think that most people are interesting, at least for a short time – like the length of an Uber ride.
This morning I rode with Wei, an elderly-looking Chinese man in his 70s who didn’t speak a word of English. I have encountered this quite a few times and it seems crazy to me. If I drove an Uber or a taxi in another country, I would certainly learn at least a few words of the language of the country where I both worked and resided. Hello, goodbye, thank you, blow job; the necessary words to get by. I recently had a Chaldean Uber driver in Detroit who spoke Iraqi into his phone the entire trip without ever acknowledging me: not when I got in, the whole trip, and not when I got out. He didn’t get a tip.
So, seeing right away that Wei spoke very little English, I said, “Music?” That meant nothing to him. I pointed and said, “Radio?” He gave me a look of sheer skepticism, like he gravely doubted that the car had a radio, and even if it did, how on earth would he ever find it? Since I don’t need music, and I’ve gotten into trouble over this issue, I gave up. However, a few minutes later, Wei’s bony old fingers began exploring the dashboard, turning every single knob a little bit. Out of sheer persistence he blundered upon the radio knob. He turned the radio on and startled himself – he'd clearly never even tried to turn on the radio before. It was a talk show that I didn’t care about, but I felt proud of Wei for trying and actually succeeding in locating the radio, so I didn’t say anything. But his curiosity now had the better of him. Every couple of minutes he would turn the tuning knob one click, now receiving another talk show, then static, then another talk show, then static. After possibly eight tries he mistakenly hit some music. He smiled widely, extremely pleased, turning to me and nodded. I smiled and nodded back. He’d done it. Persistence had paid off. He got the full, 25% tip, for his unbridled fortitude.
My most recent Uber driver was Reza from Iran. A good-looking older man, also in his 70s, but with thick, wavy, mostly black, hair. Reza spoke perfect English. However, he was in such a state of fear for the Middle East, America, Ukraine, Gaza, Israel, and pretty much the whole world, that he had difficulty speaking because he was so emotionally choked up. He seemed like he was working himself up into a state of tears and would soon be sobbing. The best I could come up with was, “The only thing to fear is fear itself.” Even though that’s a prime FDR quote, it didn’t seem to quell poor Reza’s fears. I finally said, “It’s OK. The Earth hates humans and is trying its best to get rid of us. Pandemics, wars, tsunamis, earthquakes, anything it can think of. Soon it will have exactly what it wants – mushrooms and cockroaches – and we won’t even be a memory. The Earth will shake us off like a case of fleas.” Now this was what Reza needed to hear, some good old doomsday talk. He nodded and smiled, saying, “Yes, yes, I think that’s it.” And by the time we got here to the hotel Reza had settled down. He too got a 25% tip. He’ll need it to build a bomb shelter.
Good day.