Wisdom of taxi drivers – Dubai

Bismillah, alhamdulillah.

 

I usually try and avoid taking a taxi in Dubai, as they are quite expensive but due to unforeseen circumstances I had the opportunity to try out the Dubai public transport services.

First step was a large taxi from the airport to Sharjah (شارقة), the meter starts running at 20 dirhams. As I seetled into the spacious interior of the car I ask the driver the name of the car. He replies saying that it is a Kia Carnival. We settle back as the car turns right under a construction site in the middle of the road. A tall pillar extends into the night sky with a carefully balanced train line extending overhead. 

I ask the driver how the downturn in Dubai has affected things. He says the traffic levels have gone down but it still takes an hour to go from Dubai to Sharjah at peak times, but the traffic is flowing.  I note the time it’s almost 4 am. I would have expected the road to have the odd car or two and am mildly surprised by the number of cars. There are at least 5-6 cars ahead of us and the road is far from empty.

The next day starts early after a short rest. Crawling out of bed, a quick shower and then the search for a taxi starts. From what I remember in the past getting a taxi can be difficult and going from Sharjah to Dubai centre (The trade centre) would take over an hour probably and hour and a half to two hours. Within a few minutes we have found a taxi and are speeding on our way down Ittihad road. We soon meet traffic but unlike before it is flowing, I ask the same question, how has the downturn affected business. The taxi drivers says it seems to have affected Dubai a lot but Sharjah and other states are not affected. The traffic situation is better but that seems to be a combination of new routes and a doubling of the tunnel capacity between Dubai and Sharjah. We shortly arrive at our destination, definitely quicker than before – 30 minutes.

40 minutes later we need to take another taxi ride to the airport and we find a young man aged 26 years. He is from Punjab and has been here for six years. He shrugs his shoulders when asked about the downturn. I ask him him what has happened to rents. His answer is surprising. The RTA employ him and give him a salary of 1800 AED per month, from this they deduct 400 AED for his accommodation per month, four people to a room. His rent has actually gone slightly up! I ask him about the downturn. We have turned right onto the road leading to the airport, he points to the uncovered car park on the opposite side of the airport terminals. It is full of cars, he says people just left their cars and left on the pretext of holidays abandoning their cars. They all had high debt burdens and they had just decided to run away. I look at the car park as it whizzes past, it does look full.

Soon we have to take another taxi back to where we came from, this time the man is even younger and driving a Volvo estate. The extra leg space is noted and we sit mostly in silence. The conversation switches to the stricter driving rules that have now been imposed. According to him a single accident equals a 400 AED fine, and the police are now fining people when they catch them breaking the rules, without informing them. They just find out when a computer print out is given to them. e-government in action.

The next stop is yet again fruitless and we need to catch another taxi, this time the man is more talkative and he describes how traffic has gone down quite significantly. Would he be going back to Pakistan as a result of the recession I ask? He shakes his head saying no.

‘I have no qualifications. People from Pakistan with qualifications do not want to come here, but people like me have no where. I have to feed my family and this is the only way. at least I am earning more here than home.’ He pauses as we change lanes turning of Shaykh Zaid road. He continues, ‘ I used to keep my door locked a year ago. Whenever a customer wanted to hire a taxi I would first speak to them and see where they wanted to go, if it was a long journey I would let them in otherwise I would turn down customers. Now ask any driver, we keep the doors open and if a person wants to go just a single block we will say yes, times are tight.’ The ease with which we have found taxis certainly seems to bear this out.

We get a degree of success at our current stop and then find out we are too far away to get a taxi, alhamdulillah we find a helpful soul who gives us a lift back to central Dubai and drops us of at a petrol station. It’s five o’clock and the traffic is definitely present but at least 50% of what it was compared to a year ago. I stand on the main road waiving to taxi after taxi – this time I am surprised they all keep refusing my attempts to hire a taxi. I reflect back to what the last taxi driver said and wonder what is going on.

Having lost hope of hiring a taxi I walk back to the petrol station and knowck on the door of a taxi driver and plead my case. Alhamdulillah, he is feeling in a helpful mode of mind, he says the reason the taxi drivers are refusing work is because it is changeover time, they will hand their cars over to their taxi partner who will drive it throughout the night. Handover is around 6 pm and he does not want to be late. We thank him and get in.

The hourney is short and arrive back at our first stop this time hopeful our problem is about to be resolved. Alhamdulillah our final stop meets with success and its time to catch a final taxi home, but we still seem to be at handover time, and the taxi driver convinces us that we should catch a public transport bus from the WTC round about. Taxis will get stuck in traffic if we want to go to Sharjah and will cost us a lot in waiting time. Sitting in a bus in traffic is porbbaly nicer than a bus we decide. Agreeing with his suggestion we get off at the nearest bus stop on the banks of the WTC round about and stand waiting for our bus.

We catch a 32C within minutes of arriving, the ticket is 2 AED. Getting on board, 70% of the seats are empty and finding a place is not a problem. The excitement of getting onto a bus for the first time in Dubai assuages our thirst, hunger and fatigue. A fellow passenger notes our boarding and takes an interest in our story as we ask for help on how to get to Sharjah. He is a young Bangladeshi stock broker. he has been working in the Dubai stock exchange for 2 years. I asked him how the Dubai downturn has affected him. He remarks the Dubai index last year was at around 5000 points and now had sunk to 1000, but the last week or so had seen an increase by 300 points.

He continues, ‘ This bus would have been packed a year ago, now as you can see it is virtually empty. 75% of the contruction workers have gone back home.’

At one of the stops the smartly dressed ladies sitting on the raised seats leave giving us an opportunity to move into this vantage points. Here the Sri Lankan conductor gets a chance to talk to us. We exchange greetings and he asks us where we are going. I tell him we would like to catch a taxi to Sharjah but we were told to first catch a bus as the traffic is quite bad and it would cost less.

He agrees and tells us we should continue to ‘Sonapur’. The Indian sounding name comes up a bit later when a man dressed in a simple shirt and trouser, with the look of one who works in a manual labour field inquires whether or not the bus goes to Sonapur. Sonapur or The Gold  City sounds like a very strange name for a place in Dubai, so I turn to the conductor and ask him where is Sonapur and why it is called Sonapur.

He smiles and says this is the labour camp, a vast area that has the capacity to house half a million labour workers. It is known by its inhabitants as Sonapur but is Qusais or what the local foreigners pronounce as ‘Guesses‘.  The traffic between Shrajah and Dubai is moving as we take the airport tunnel route back, all fourlanes are full of cars stretching away into the distance. Not quite sure where we are we stay firmly planted on our seats until we arrive at the fabled Sonapur. Perhaps like the Camelot of old it is full of drab looking buildings with walkways lined with balconies adorned with washing drying in the rapidly setting sun. Welcome to Sonapur.

The bus stops and the conductor advises us to catch a taxi from here, we are at the Dubai Sharjah border and there are always taxis going from here to Sharjah.

We get off and spot a taxi on the corner. A man is shouting, ‘Sharjah’ plying for cutomers to fill his car up. I was told the rate was 5 riyals per person. The thought of sitting in the taxi until it was full packed was unenviable. Our little party felt quite out of place and a wily private taxi driver quickly spots us and makes his way over.

‘Sharjah?’

‘Yes. How much?’, the conversation is limited by fatigue and aching leg muscles.

‘40 dirhams.’ he replies.

I am relieved a car home, I forget that I could have bargained and feebly ask for 30 AED, but the man has already turned around and walking to his car. We follow behind as he offers us a ready reason for the cost. I am too tired to argue it has been a long and emotionally exhausting day.

He gets into his car and hesitate for a moment wondering where the taxi is, he doesn’t pause and just says get in. Making sure one of us is in the front we get in. The car is driven quickly with lots of changin lanes as we gradually but quickly pull out of Sonapur, right onto Emirates highway and soon are zooming down the road leading to Sharjah.

A year ago, from Emirates road to Buhairah police station would have taken an hour, this time we make it in 20 minutes. The taxi driver dressed in all black has heavily tinted windows on three sides and the front tint extends a third of the way down. His mobile phone is plugged via headphones into his ears blaring out the latest Indian music. I tried to get a word in edgeways and ask himm about the recession. he eventually unplugs himself from the headphones and switches off his mp3 Nokia phone. he has three children back at home in Gujarat, Pakistan. he has been in the country a few years. I ask him how the downturn has affected him.

He replies, ‘A year ago I could earn 1000 dirhams on a Friday with my provate taxi service, now I earn 900 on a Friday.’

He further says that the car is his own and if he worked harder he could earn the same amount. he hasn’t felt much of  a downturn in his job. His main job seems to be ferrying people around in his car. According to him the main impact has been on Dubai rather than on any of the surrounding emirates.

We arrive at our final journey just as the adhan for Magrib salah is coming to an end. Our final stop is the welcome sight of our local masjid. We have arrived just in time for Maghrib prayer. As say good bye and pay our 40 dirhams to the taxi driver I mull over the mixed picture that the taxi drivers and fellow passengers have painted over the last nine hours. So is Dubai going to sink into the sand from which it rose, unlikely. Is it going to rise once again? Probably, yes but not in the immediate future. It will take a bit of time. As we wandered around in one of the departments during the last nine hours I partially remember a quote from the old ruler Shaykh Zaid which seems quite apt as an ending commentary on the current economic situation in Dubai and the emirates in general:

‘The desert has taught us to be patient for greenery takes a long time to come.’

Technorati Tags: Dubai recession,taxi drivers,dubai taxi drivers,sunapur Dubai,labour camps Dubai,cost of taxi fares Dubai,sharjah,Shariqah