Taxing

So, look, cabbies of the world, knock it off, huh? It's bad for your karma. 

I omit here the cabbies in Dubai who -- other than, in brief observation, deliberately uninterested in groups of Pakistani men -- run fair, clean, metered operations. The cabs in Kabul were negotiable, though we found twice that the price had changed from what was agreed up front (and really, is it worth my time to haggle over a dollar? but still, principle).

Amman, which was to have been an easy overnight before the flight home, became an episode of Crass Cab.

Guy was assigned to us at the airport, then stopped to talk to some friends on the walk to his taxi. Another cabbie yelled at him, gesturing at us, and Our Driver laughed and waved him off. Eventually got to the cab, where he made a great show of trying to lift one of the bags -- Emily's, the lightest, and the one (not be be utterly sexist) that MY 22-YEAR-OLD DAUGHTER HAULED AROUND A WAR ZONE -- and failed, groaning dramatically. 

OK, I'm a 'Murican, I can lift my own damn bags.

The ride downtown was filled with complaints about our chosen hotel - "is very down, very down" -and a pitch for another, a litany of shops we should 'just visit' first, and then a long, loud cell-phone conversation that resulted in his missing our hotel by a half-block. He stopped in traffic when I grabbed his arm and pointed - stopped, right in traffic, which, OK, it's Jordan, but still.

He charged us 50 dinar for the pleasure of his company.

We began hauling our bags out to the curb, trying to ignore a legion of stink-eye, when Emily realized she didn't have her passport. We searched the back seat, the trunk, and the street around the cab. Then Our Driver grabbed my arm and said something that ended in '20 dinar.' I honestly couldn't follow a word of it beyond that, so he repeated it, louder (note: not just something Americans do with foreigners). Finally, he produced Emily's passport and repeated '20 dinar.' I snatched it with a 'shukran' and we humped it to the curb, then up three flights of stairs from the street to the hotel entrance. A shopkeeper dashed over to carry up Karen's bag for her.

The hotel manager told us the cab ride from the airport is a fixed, 20-dinar price.

Other than that, lovely city. We drifted through the souk - I'm guessing the 'trinket souk,' given that the offerings reminded me of York Beach and Emily of the Jersey Shore - think cheap knives and goofy lighters - and nabbed some baklava for a late dinner. Emily set up her tripod in the rooftop resto and shot night scenes; the sane, old ones went to bed.

And now it's 0500 and I'm showered, dressed, neat, clean, shaved and sober, wondering what do to with the three hours til I have to wrestle with another taxi. New York tonight-ish, whatever time means any more, and Boston a four-hour ride later. 

Things I've been missing: Maggie; my humidor (which Maggie had damned well better have kept well-watered if she knows what's good for her …), the downstairs library (the Afghan section of which is going to have to expand, given the books I picked up in Lahore), driving my own goddamn car, not straining to understand other people's English (does not apply to New York).