Taxi For Sure

                                     The other day I chanced upon an awesomely awesome blog post where they were discussing about the many benefits of being a man.Though I agree with most of their points,I believe the most important perk of being one is the freedom to  roam around in the city even during the wee hours of night without actually bothering about the pits of moral turpitude that the country has fallen into.Well,before you guys start dismissing this post as pointless rants, let me make a small confession.This write up is neither going to be an essay on gender inequality nor a commentary on the socio-political implications of the rising manliness in Indian Men.On the other hand,this post is about Raja  Cheta(obviously name ‘changed’),my childhood friend.During the mid-summer vacations,I used to go and stay in my grandparent’s place(since in that pre-FB/PS/Whatzapp/MMS/era,there weren’t much options to kill boredom), and it was during one of those stays that I first met him. 

           I was reminded of Raja cheta and my grandpa when I stumbled across this website a couple of days earlier.(I will talk more about that site by the end of this post,but  I must admit that it was of great help for me last Saturday when I succesfully made use of it in finding a commute back to my place from Churchstreet in the middle of  the night.In addition to Cabs in Bangalore,these 'taxi for sure' guys also offer cabs in Hyderabad and New Delhi and Call taxis in Chennai,I believe)

           My Grandfather was colour blind which made him ‘driving challenged’.So whenever he wanted to go on a trip with his family (which mostly happened during my once-in a-year mid summer visits to his place),he used to call RajaCheta.He had his own Taxi (an ’88 model white coloured Amby) and would turn up in front of our house within a couple of minutes like a dutiful girlfriend who had been anxiously waiting for her boyfriend.It was quite surprising that RajaCheta had actually managed to get into my grandpa’s good books for my muthacha was never known for his amiability(RajaCheta was the 17 th driver whom he had employed in a span of 5 years!).He used to tell me- “Beta,You have many things to learn from Raja.He is such a well manneredboy,has no bad habits or greed for money and at such a young age(the ‘boy’ was somewhere in his early 20 s at that time), he has even managed to have his own Car”. A conversation like this wouldinvariably would end in him showering some more praises on the young taxi ‘ówner’not before me getting a lecture on why he always preferred Raja’s Cab Service to a random ‘Taxi’ .Muthacha always ‘knew’ Raja’s was the cheapest one which was available in the town.Thoughhe had never directly told muthacha about the cost effectiveness of his service,he always managed to get his point conveyed through his carefully crafted ‘neighbourhood stories’.(like, how his colleague and fellow taxi driver ‘Vadivel’ lost a regular client when his customer came to know that he had been overcharging him for quite long).

         Grandpa might have liked Raja for his lack of greed and good manners’ but I adored him for something else.He had an uncanny knack for telling humorous stories(mostly laced with innuendo).One of the many traits of Raja cheta which I distinctly remember even today was his peculiar trait for crappy English songs which accomodated more than legitimate number of ‘baby’ s,’ooohhhhh’ s and ‘love me…’ s in their lyrics.I still don’t know whether it was his genuine love for gibberish lines or his desperate need to impress his lady love (cheta had a crush on his neighbour’s daughter Renu at that point of time.Once he had even enlightened me about his well thought out plan to elope with his majnu to an Archipelago island) that made him play them in a loop in his ‘Pioneer’ Car stereo all the time.

       Things were going well between Raja and Muthacha and my fears of him getting adopted to our family were slowly but surely coming dangerously closer to reality with each passing day.It was around that time,Vasu one of our distant relatives decided to get married.More than the diplomatic necessity of attending a relative’s wedding,it was the potentiality of a family outing that made muthacha seek forcheta’sservices.Asusual,hedialled Raja’s number and was waiting for the arrival of his white Amby on our door step.The car arrived precisely ten minutes later but  instead of a white Amby it was a  brown Fiatthis time.Just as grandpa was trying to make sense of the weird situation,the short-stout Cab driver walked towards us and spilled the beans.

The Driver-“Sir,I know you are waiting for Raja...”

Muthacha(still struggling to hide that ‘betrayed girl friend’ look)- “….?”

The Driver-“Sir,I am sorry to say that he won’t be able to make it today as he had been taken into police custody five minutes back for misbehaving with a woman client”

      Before he could complete the sentence,muthacha fainted breaking my grandma’s beloved potted money plant during the course of his fall.

To this date,I am not sure whether it was a genuine hypoglycemic attack(as my diabetic grandpa claimed later)or the mental shock of realizing the true side of his ‘good mannered boy’ which resulted in my muthacha’sfall.But one thing is sure and crystal clear,neither he nor his family members (including me) have met Raja cheta again.

And these days,when you ask him whether he prefers Raja Cheta or a dedicated random taxi service for his commutation,he will promptly reply-

                                       “A Taxi for Sure”

    Having been in Bangalore for more than a year now and having fully understood the unpredictability of the auto wallas of the garden city within this short period of time,I prefer taking cab services for travels these days.I used to have a regular cabbie but decided to terminate availing his services after having a bad experience with him.Though I had heard about this 'taxiforsure' website before,the thought of utilizing their services never struck me until I was stranded in Church Street in the middle of night.Thankfully,my mobile still had charge and I could use it to log into this website to hire a taxi,else I would have had to walk all the way to Indira Nagar which would have taken atleast 5-6 hours!).The booking experience was quite nice for me and the website loaded pretty fast without getting crashed/hung in between the transaction.The car came a couple of minutes after me hiring it through the website and dropped me at my destination without asking for any extra money or additional 'tip'. I’m quite satisfied with their services and I would recommend them if you are my type who prefers a safe,reliable taxi ride to a crowded,sweaty bus travel.

-nikhimenon