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Original poster

Most memorable taxi ride?

82 replies

pigeonorstatue · 01/08/2021 08:57

A friend and I were talking last night about how some of our most emotional times have been spent in a taxi with a stranger!

Trips to hospital, getting out after a break-up, excitement on the way to an airport!

What's been your most memorable taxi ride and why?

OP posts:
hugoagogo · 01/08/2021 08:58

The one when i was 16 and the driver was asking lots of inappropriate questions. I hardly ever get in a taxi now.

obviousanonymous · 01/08/2021 09:02

The taxi driver taking me home from work who asked what I did for a living ... and then for hobbies .. ‘I love yoga, I’m a very anxious person and I find that calms me down,’ I said .

‘Oh . Anxiety is caused by wrongdoing in your previous life . It only comes from guilt . You must have done something really bad, and this is your punishment from God’

I think I just laughed !

Glenthebattleostrich · 01/08/2021 09:08

Hard to say...

The one where the driver was on his phone and almost crashed several times. Yes we did shout at him a few times and reported him.

The one who talked in great detail about flashers using very inappropriate language with 2 7 year old girls in the back of the car. Again reported.

The one who told my friend we would get a free taxi if she said thank you nicely to him

The one who detoured through a dark deserted car park because he liked to scare drunk girls (yes he actually said that and we were on our way home from a meal and sober). We actually called the police on that one and were told we were over reacting.

Our local council now want everyone to give their home address to taxi companies for every journey. and are wondering why women are objecting.

BikeRunSki · 01/08/2021 09:09

Zooming through New York in the middle of the night in a yellow cab from JFK airport. The cab seemingly had no brakes….

Clawdy · 01/08/2021 09:14

Taxi drive back from hospital after collecting my mum and my new baby sister. I was three, and had never been in a car before! I sat next to my dad, looking at the baby in my mum's arms. The baby seemed to be staring at me, and I remember feeling that everything had changed!

eyeblob · 01/08/2021 09:15

Taxi driver inappropriate conversation talking about swinging and would I mind if I was his girlfriend etc, parked by the woods past my house as said it would would be quieter. Never sobered up so quickly! Took his number and reported.

Lessthanaballpark · 01/08/2021 09:17

One in the US with the only female taxi driver I’ve ever met. We had a chat about staying safe and she showed me a taser she kept in case anyone got “fresh” with her.

Another one in the UK where the taxi driver taught me how to say some phrases in his language. I can’t remember the language (I was quite pissed- I think it’s Hindi) but I can remember what he taught me: “Tere nam Kia he?” “Mere nam Lessthan he!” Grin

Saisong · 01/08/2021 09:17

After landing in Lima, Peru quite late at night with the airport rapidly emptying. We took the first taxi guy we could find, seemed nice enough and spoke a little English. Lead us outside to the most dilapidated pile of junk you could imagine - held together by rust and despair, no suspension to speak of and a massive crack in the windscreen. Drove through the heavy traffic along a terrifying coast road as fast as he could while speaking Spanglish at a million miles an hour. I was making peace with my maker the whole way - but we made it safely! Unfortunately to the noisiest hotel in existence - it was located on a busy roundabout and the Peruvians love their car horns - at all hours of the night. Was the start of the most amazing adventure though, and I think back nostaligically to those carefree (childfree) trekking days!

HummingBeeBox · 01/08/2021 09:21

The taxi driver clicked the doors locked and said 'in here nobody can hear you scream.' I said 'what did you say?! Stop the car!' Luckily he did and I walked home. Bleurgh.

Lessthanaballpark · 01/08/2021 09:25

I was three, and had never been in a car before! I sat next to my dad, looking at the baby in my mum's arms. The baby seemed to be staring at me, and I remember feeling that everything had changed!

That reminds me of when I had my hair done at 14 and the taxi driver was openly ogling me. I remember thinking then that everything had changed and I wasn’t sure I liked it.

Violetparis · 01/08/2021 09:27

In St Petersburg where the car was so rusty there were holes in the floor and the driver locking the doors demanding we paid double what we'd agreed.

KurtWilde · 01/08/2021 09:35

Bringing my DD home from hospital a few years ago, we'd been at A&E for hours so it was around 2am. Driver put me on edge the minute we got in, he started praying out loud. I said nothing, let him do his thing. But he kept catching my eye in the rear view mirror and then he said 'you're frightened I can tell by your eyes, you should be, I'm praying for you.' Then he drove at breakneck speed through the (thankfully) deserted city. He told me he wasn't afraid of death and neither should we be. Then he said it had been a long day and he was tired.

If we could've just jumped out of the car we would've done! We were clinging to each other by the time he got to our street and I told him to drop us off there. Never used that taxi firm again!!

TorchesTorches · 01/08/2021 09:45

An early morning one to the airport. I was by myself and broadly knew the route. He took me on a very obscure route through a load of backstreets. It made no sense, so I got on my phone and pretended to have a conversation with a Male work colleague who I was meeting at the airport, said I would stay on the phone till I saw him at the terminal etc. We moved from wierd backstreets to a normal route. I kept up the pretence the whole way.

Of course i will never know if this was paranoia or not, but I have had many taxi journeys where I didn't feel the need for this pretence. Something was off and I trusted my senses. Its dispiriting that there are other tales of inappropriate taxi drivers above.

Mammma91 · 01/08/2021 09:59

My most memorable taxi was lush!
I was in the taxi with DP (newly together) the taxi driver was amazing, so funny, down to earth, told us about games nights, about his wife & children, recommend restaurants local, he made our day. It was near Christmas and it was exceptionally hard to get a taxi as they had all been pre-booked and could be waiting up to 2 hours. He gave us his mobile no for collecting when we were done, we gave him a £30 tip because he really made our day. His wife works in the nursery our DS goes to and we see him often, lovely couple! We laughed the whole journey there and back.

Shallwegoforawalk · 01/08/2021 10:05

Long time ago. I was very young and naive (teenage) and had travelled for the first time to a big city to stay for a weekend with a friend who had just started college there.

Some bastard at the railway station walloped me from behind and ran off with my bag, containing my purse with all my weekend money, clothes etc. I didn't even see them, it was so fast.

I was in tears (this was pre mobile phones being common and I had no way to contact my friend) and a taxi driver waiting at the station saw my distress. He gave me a free lift to my friends address and stopped on the way to buy me a sandwich and a can of fizzy juice to help with the shock of being mugged.

I was so grateful but he just brushed off my thanks and promises of paying him when i could and said he hoped someone would do the same for his daughter if she was ever stuck. Bless his good Scottish heart.

SquirryTheSquirrel · 01/08/2021 10:10

The taxi driver started smoking a joint! This was in the days when smoking itself wouldn't have been illegal although obviously drugs were. It was an icy day and I was terrified he'd lose control of the car; but I didn't want to say anything for obvious reasons.

Fortunately everything was OK but it was a very scary 15 minutes.

TheAwfuITruth · 01/08/2021 10:15

Marrakesh.

Husband in the front, me and the kids in the back. I've never seen my DH go as white, it was genuinely terrifying.

littlebilliie · 01/08/2021 10:16

The one where he was nearly abducted by a child serial killer and who they took instead. Surprisingly soccer when I got home

Dontjudgeme101 · 01/08/2021 10:34

The one, when l was on holiday in Ghana with my boyfriend and family. We were chatting in the taxi and admiring the views outside the window. We were in the middle of nowhere. We were surrounded by trees and bushes on this long empty dusty road.

The car seems to be getting slower and slower. We just carry on talking. Then the car stops. We say, what’s going on. The driver then says, l have run out of petrol! So we say, have you got any spare. No he replies.

So here we are in the middle of nowhere with no petrol. My mum went mad and said to the driver. You have learnt a lesson today!

We all just cracked up with laughter!
We had to walk a few miles to find someone to help us, get petrol and continue our journey.

squashyhat · 01/08/2021 10:36

A nice one. First trip to New York. Flew into JFK and got a taxi to the hotel. We came out of the Midtown tunnel straight into (what looked like to me) a movie set. The start of a love affair with a city which I can't wait to visit again.

SometimesIFeedTheSparrows · 01/08/2021 10:57

Very rainy day, in Belgium, taxi back to airport. He turned up late, he didn't speak English, he was on the phone so only driving one handed and speeding, lots of overtaking where no sane person would. He also did a couple of U turns when he got lost. One of these was on the exit sliproad to the motorway which he had entered and he only slammed on the brakes as cars came towards us - still one handed, still on the phone. I thought I was going to die. He wouldn't stop and let me out, and even if he had I didn't know where I was, or have another taxi number or a phone to call another taxi nor any way or paying for it. I'd gone out to evaluate a supplier - they didn't get the contract Grin

StepAwayFromTheEcclesCakes · 01/08/2021 11:08

Booked a conference near Manchester, sorted a hotel on the road where it was or at least i thought so, got a taxi from the venue expecting to be taken a short trip up the very long road to my hotel, the driver spoke no english so i showed him the address and off we went, on and on and on…. Got onto the moors and i honestly thought i was going to end up a victim of a murder or something, very scared but actually he pulled up at an out of the way hotel and i realised that the street name was the same but in a completely different village ! At breakfast the next morning i overheard two women discussing the same experience, got chatting and we shared a taxi to the venue for day two.

SatsumasRock · 01/08/2021 11:14

Living in New York and in an early morning cab to the airport. The cab driver was telling me how he was nearly finished his 12 hour shift - worked overnight. Then we went over a bridge on the freeway and he crashed into the back of a car that had broken down. Thankfully not at speed because my seat belt was broken.

I think he had been winded by the airbag and was struggling to breathe. He must have been about 20 stone though so I couldn't get him out of the cab. Only time I've ever had to dial 911 (999) and only time I've been in the back of a police car as they drove me off the freeway.

Zarene · 01/08/2021 11:19

Sri Lanka, having just landed in the middle of the night.

The taxi crashed into a rickshaw, resulting in a looooooong argument between the two drivers and seemingly everyone else in Colombo.

I just sat in the back and waited, surreally the radio was on the World Service live-streaming Margaret Thatcher's funeral.

Original poster
pigeonorstatue · 01/08/2021 13:49

Gosh! Thanks for all the replies.

Sorry to hear so many of them are so negative, and in many cases really harrowing.

Had hoped to create more of a positive vibe like me and my friend had last night. Maybe that was the wine...!

OP posts: