Perhaps because of this, not only the physical experience, but the conversational experience with the drivers has found a new level. I have shared Taxi stories before (including the one that featured Muhammad Ali's trainer).
This is a cut of that - these are UBER stories.
Hope you enjoy them!
Egyptian Cook
How did you become an UBER driver and what did you do before, are my two opening questions with UBER drivers.
In this case the driver said he was from Alexandria in Egypt. I asked what he did for a living. And he said he was an Egyptian cook. That intrigued me a whole bit!
He tried to flatter me by saying he really liked Indian cooking and went on to describe a couple of dishes. I would have none of that. I firmly guided him back to Egyptian cooking!
I made him describe different kinds of dishes and the one that was most complicated that he could pull off with confidence. I finally asked him who was the better cook, he or his wife. He sportingly conceded that he was good in some and she in others. He was proudest of a dish that involved stuffing. I could not get its name inspite of making him repeat it and surreptitiously googling it.
We compared Lebanese food with Egyptian. And at this point his polite demeanor slipped a tad. He insisted that when Egyptians visited Lebanon, they would help Lebanese improve their cuisine with suggestions. And when the Lebanese visited Egypt, they would concede that the hosts had the better version of Middle Eastern food.
Survey sample, n = 1.
Jeffersonian Happiness
It was very early in the morning, as I was being picked up to go to the airport. I decided to launch into my 2 question UBER interview anyway.
It turned out that this driver ran two substance abuse centers in Jamaica Plains in Boston.
Aha, I said to myself, this is going to be a terrific conversation. So I brought up the topic of 'happiness' and asked what might have Jefferson meant, by life, liberty and pursuit of happiness when the country was founded?
His answer was so profound, that I desired to have him drive me to NYC from Boston, rather than drop me off at Logan airport.
He talked about how he has seen dozens of kids with substance abuse issues. And many many adults with the same problem. Except in extreme cases where medical intervention was required, that perhaps loading ourselves with Ritalin and Prozac was not the answer.
We lose touch with ourselves he said Perhaps we need to go through suffering, before we understand happiness.
Jefferson did not mean, be happy through pleasure, and avoid pain through medicine and chemicals. He meant, live life to its fullest, he concluded as he wished me a happy journey and dropped me off at the airport.
Lost Moroccan
I put in 100 Federal street in the UBER app, to head to my office and jumped on a conference call. When I hung up on my conference call, I noticed we were not down town in the financial district.
I said why were we not at 100 Federal Street.
And he replied we are on our way to 100 Federal Street.
I said, can't be right - can you check?
It turns out that I had picked 100 Federal Street, Salem MA and not 100 Federal Street, Boston MA.
Ah!
He turned around and looked at me worried that I would be mad....
Instead, I gleamed my teeth at him in a wide smile and said, 'So... why did you choose to become an UBER driver?'
So as he turned the car around, he explained he was from Morocco.
We chatted about Casablanca, how many days one needs to set aside to visit Morocco on vacation, cuisine (of course), Humphrey Bogart, the Moroccan restaurant in Disney World and so on.
Presently we arrived at 100 Federal in the correct city.
As I got off the car, I shook his hands warmly and said, '5 stars!'
Ethiopian Lottery
My family's favorite food is Ethiopian, I said to my driver after the initial interview questions were sorted out.
After chatting a little bit about Injeera, I asked him how he got to the US.
He said that the U.S. runs a lottery in Ethiopia every year. Every year they pick 400 families by lottery.
He had applied for 10 years straight to this lottery. And two years ago he got in on his 10th try. His wife was a nurse. And his four kids are doing exceptionally well in their school in Cambridge.
Turkish by half
This driver was only half Turkish. I was very curious to hear what his other half was. I was picturing a pie-chat on a power point page.
He said the other half was Syrian.
Never mind, I thought, I did not want to know about the Syrian bit.
He was very pleased and we chatted about various things Turkish.
The best Dominican restaurant in New York
This driver did not look Dominican, by golly. But I rolled with it. He was a farmer in the Dominican Republic. But there was not profit to be made in farming. Just subsistence. So a few years ago he made it to NYC and brought along his father. Recently he went back to get married and is waiting for his wife to join him.
He said there was a fairly substantial Dominican Republic community in the Washington Heights section of NYC.
Of course, the topic got to cuisine. I was using Cuban, Carribean and even Peruvian as reference, but between his bad English and my ignorance, we had a tough time understanding what Dominican Cuisine actually was.
Finally, he said, there was terrific Dominican restaurant on 97th and Amsterdam that I must visit.
I dutifully noted it in my Evernote app.
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This last story, I have shared before, but I am including it here as part of the UBER set of stories...
Chasing Planes
During my trip from Washington DC to New York City, an Uber Taxi driver saw from afar my us air shuttle landing at LaGuardia airport. He decided to drive into the airport to see if he can get a passenger from that flight. I used the uber app on my iphone to order a car.
And he got the order!
6 comments:
Cool! I love that company and often use it as well.
Surprised about the Ethiopian food comment - I never knew that. There is a surprisingly high number of Ethiopian immigrants in Charlotte, and several great restaurants.
We should check out sometime when you are here!
Yeah, I especially enjoyed your Jeffersonian Happiness interviewee. It would be interesting to have the opportunity to have him expand on his statements that, “We lose touch with ourselves he said,” and “perhaps we need to go through suffering, before we understand happiness.”
If we took them one at a time we might in find that a contributor to our chronic substance abuse problem is in fact the result of living in the land of seemingly endless opportunity. We expect to find happiness through these material aspirations available here like no other place. And should we not reach the heights of material success that we set for ourselves, or that of our neighbors and friends, we think of it as having failed. Why can’t I have it all?
In this way, surrounded by all that we think we could be, we lose touch with who we are and thereby who we truly can be – simply by being fully who we are.
On the other hand, this difficult lesson can be the suffering that brings us the perennial wisdom that happiness does not come from getting what you want, but from wanting what you get – that is, by being fully who we are.
Not many get the chance to go through that whole cycle like we American’s can.
All too many of us, however, lose ourselves on our trip to what we think will bring us happiness
Fantastic, specially that Jefferson story ! Your writing has become very crisp !
What a nice jambalaya of conversations. I put aside my Wall Street Journal thus morning to read your blog.
Thoroughly enjoyed!
I heard about the US lottery system some time back, thought it wasn't true. Moroccan driver's interview tells otherwise.
Regarding Egyptian cook's hands on Indian dishes.................... he may be right. We lived in Cairo for about 2.5 years. There was a famous Indian restaurant in Lebanon St., called 'Taj Mahal'. To tell you the truth, the cook(s) there were Egyptians. But the poor Indians living there (most of them) did not know that truth.
Great stories! Egyptians in general are chatty. In Cairo, don’t be surprised if the driver plays a Dum Maro Dum in the Taxi audio.
Arch, the Kandahar restaurant and an outlet in Oberoi Mina House were the only two other Indian restaurants those days! Now there are many curry outlets in Cairo.
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