Taxi drivers again...

Previous subjects of this on-going blog have been on the continuing wonderment of the way Korean taxi drivers behave, or rather, don’t on the roads over here. From watching TV while-u-drive, racing through red lights, or break-neck speeds over pot holes and causing bodily harm to parts of passengers anatomies have been note-worthy material. I can now report, that they are saints of the road in comparison to those gentlemen of the road in Shanghai!

Let’s start with the cars themselves:

In Korea, you can usually depend on a typical Hyundai 4 door salon, Samsung SM3 or if lucky, a plush new SM5. Most cars have seen at least ¼ million km’s or so, but are nice and clean inside and out. The owner/drivers take pride in their vehicles; even to the point of pimping them out with blue LED lighting and Chesterfield couch trim. Suspension is very much dependant on how the vehicle has been driven – these wear down very quickly in Korea, due to pot holes and uneven road surfaces (It wont help if a couple of portly Europeans have been in the back either!)

Shanghai has only one taxi type: A grubby old Volkswagen Santana. I don’t know how old this model is, but each one on the road must have clocked up at least 1million km at least! The body work inside and out has seen better days, the interior trim has all but fallen of and replaced with stapled on plastic. I’m sure we ended up in one that had holes in the floor, so we could pretend to be the Flintstones! The driver is surrounded by a Perspex shield to protect him from god only knows what, and it has more gaps and holes than a British MP’s expenses return. Air conditioning is considered extra fare! You want air? Open the window and catch bugs in your teeth!

Driving style in Korea is either on or off! The driver either has genes from a racing thoroughbred, or a snail. In the case of Mr Snail, this is also usually accompanied with a heavy right foot on the brakes, causing severe whiplash as he jolts back and forward with each alternating press on the gas and brake. Mr Schumacer has no idea where the brake is, and has probably had it disconnected to save weight. He barrels around corners with little or no regard for the passengers, or their shopping from Tesco’s in the boot along with the dozen or so, now scrambled eggs. Occasional red lights are noticed but again, with little regards to passenger safety. If the path is clear, they will go.

Shanghai drivers are always full on! Each square millimetre of available road space is considered fair game, and if another car or lorry gets in the way, they lay on the horn and push in. Three marked lanes of traffic CAN hold 6 vehicles abreast – try telling that to the UK road authorities who want to add extra lanes to reduce congestion! Break-down lanes, Slip roads and anything with chevron marking are treated like the fast lane. If a long line of traffic is queued, then hold tight – it’s going to be ride of your life! Be warned! - Shanghainese taxi drivers take no prisoners.

In a nutshell, I shall say no more wrong about the Korean taxi driver, for he is a shining example of how to get from A to B in a most entertaining, but now, not in a scary way!