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C The Michigan Daily - Wednesday, October 17, 2007
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Taxicab driver
confessions
It's easy to forget that when you're having an
intimate conversation or an intimate moment
in the back of a cab, there's a stranger in the
car who can see everything you're doing.
E-mail us at
theStatement@umich.edu
or stop by our offices at 420 Maynard St.
Taxicab driver Daryl Johnson stands in the lot of the Yellow Cab Company.
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hink back on all those nights
when you had a few too
many drinks and the ability
to self-censor was gone. You call a
cab, and you expect that the driv-
er will regard you with the same
indifference that you do them.
"When people get into the car,
they don't know who we are,"
said Linda, an Ann Arbor cab
driver who would only speak
on the condition of anonymity.
"They make this assumption of
what our intellectual capabili-
ties are and what our limitations
are."
But the cab drivers that circu-
late the Ann Arbor area have your
number, University of Michigan
student. And they had a lot to say
about you.
THE BEST AND BRIGHTEST
Daryl Johnson, who moved
to Ann Arbor this year, has been
working for Yellow Cab for about a
month. In that short time he's been
around the block more than once.
So far, he says, he's been impressed
by the academic achievements of
the people he drives around.
"I am just amazed all day long at
the caliber of students at the Uni-
versity of Michigan," he said. "I
have met some amazingly bright
people here. And itmakes me think,
you know what? This world's gonna
be alright."
On the whole, students seem to
make good customers, but there's
more b
than yot
aroundc
doesn't
Loc
d
r
that side
"I tak
I'm read
The e
other, m
Linda
Universi
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She's
versity's
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Carolina
"Ever
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that's no
are a lot
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ass pock
Drivir
bad, thu
ackseat debauchery you "A lot of (the passengers) are
u might think - especially really fun and entertaining, wheth-
closing time. Johnson, who er they know it or not," said Bruce
drive late at night, misses Nielson, a driver for Yellow Cab.
Nielson said he often hears snip-
pets oflocker-room talk while driv-
'al cab drivers ing students around at night. It's
late, it's the weekend, and many of
ish on their the conversations revolve around
the one thing always on the typical
collegiate college-student mind: hooking up.
"You try to pin them down
)assengers. as to what exactly hooking up
means," Nielson said. "I still
don't know."
The common perception may be
of student nightlife. that men are the predatory gender,
e 'em to the club and then with sex constantly on the brain,
y to go home," he said. but cab drivers know this isn't the
experience is different for case.
ore seasoned drivers. "The girls are just as bad as the
says she has seen a side of guys are," said 15-year Yellow Cab
ity students that makes her veteran Alex Persu.
ssimistic. He said that while groups of men
met graduates of the Uni- he drives speak frankly about their
medical and law schools opinions of potential "dance-part-
more like Miss Teen South ners" and their intentions for them,
a than a doctor or a lawyer. the groups of bar-bound women
ybody thinks they're here often divulge even more intimate
r superior intellect, but details.
t true," Linda said. "There And while the single guys may
of students who are here, have a lot to say about how the
ssarily because they're the night will end up on the way there,
d brightest. They're here Persu said the cab conversations
their parents have a big- are much different on the way
etbook." back.
"The girl dictates everything
THE HOOKUP that goes on once they get in the
ng the nightshift isn't all cab," he said. "It's all 'Yes honey.
ugh. Yes baby. Where do you wanna go?
Sure, no problem.' It's definitely a
woman's world after 2 a.m."
Although the TV show "Taxi
Cab Confessions" may suggest oth-
erwise, but Persu said the couples
keep it tame - for the most part.
"There's been some couples
that have gotten to second and
third base," he said. "But they
usually get out before they go all
the way."
DAZED AND CONFUSED
Although he's seen plenty of
wild things in his cab, Persu says
he's never kicked a passenger out
or refused to someone ride. That's
impressive because, judging from
the number of people Persu says
can handle their alcohol, it seems
like it would be wise to start
screening customers.
Persu said a passenger in his cab
vomits about once a shift, and he's
the one who has to clean it up.
"It really ruins your night," he
said.
Johnson said the worst for him
are Football Saturdays.
"That's when I think, some of
these folks ain't gonna make it," he
said.
After a point, the rowdy routine
ceases tobe amusing.
"If I had a snapshot of the idiots
that get in here, it would be that
they're drunk and they need help,"
Linda said. "But do I use that in
conversation and treat them badly?
No. But they do that to me."
BAD BACKSEAT BEHAVIOR
Linda says she has no problem
kickingstudents out of her cab.
At the Sept. 22 Penn State game,
she picked up some students who
started insulting her, calling her a
stupid bitch. So she turned the cab
around. The passengers asked her
what she was doing and if she knew
she was going back to where they
started.
"I'm taking you back to where
I picked you up," she recalled say-
ing. "You're not getting this ride.
Sorry."
While drivers like Alex are fine
with being a fly on the wall, there's
a limit to what Linda will tolerate.
"I've kicked out people who were
talking about other people using
the N-word and stuff," she said.
She said people are entitled to their
opinions, but sometimes they forget
they're not alone in the car.
She has also been solicited for
sex while driving. There's a big
difference, Linda said, between
the experience of male and female
drivers.
"They don't get asked how much
for a little sugar at the end of the
ride," she said.
Linda says she has degrees in
two different fields from Eastern
Mithigan University and Arizona
State University in Temple, Ariz.,
but because she's driving a cab, she
said she encounters endless stereo-
types.
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