The news this month that New York City cab drivers could soon be fined for "conversations of a sexual nature" with passengers, will please young female travellers, who have endured suggestive banter from Big Apple cabbies. The regulations, still to be passed, also cover "unwelcome touching and ejaculation". Hurrah for that.
As an older woman, my conversations with cab drivers are more likely to be related to the weather (London), politics (Italy) and the All Blacks (anywhere in the world). No hazards there. But the risks of jumping in a strange car with a strange man in a strange land don't stop at flirting. Some of my best experiences have been with cab drivers who know the best places to eat and shop, but I have had my share of doozies and downright dangerous drives, which have heightened my antennae when hailing a cab.
One was in Noto, a beautiful city in Sicily, famous for its baroque buildings. I arrived from Taormina by bus at twilight. The terminal was deserted apart from one car and two men. "Taxi?" I asked tentatively, hoping for a steer to the nearest rank. "Si," they said, popping the boot of their beat-up Fiat and reaching for my bag. The boot was littered with tools, and there was no beacon above the car that indicated it was for hire. All my instincts told me to walk away. But I was tired, plus Noto is a long way from the Badlands of Palermo.
Noto is a small city, about the same size as Timaru. You could circumnavigate it in 30 minutes. In the 20 minutes it took to reach my B&B, I uttered fatuous phrases like, "Questa e una bellissima citta [This is a beautiful city]," to build a relationship. They eventually dropped me off and charged €35 ($57). The next day, I walked the five minutes to the bus station.
