Taxi, Taxi

Rugby.  The South African male's nirvana which for most of winter keeps them glued to the telly, beer in a vice-like grip while they give the ref, coach and team the benefit of their expert advice naturally (to their great frustration) ignored by the guys playing the game.

Being in the city when the Springboks face France at Ellis Park guaranteed that we'd make a plan to attend the match live, and Him Outdoors decided that the fiendish stadium traffic would best be tackled via the Gautrain.  That was a good call as our memories of post match gridlock are not happy ones.

Clutching Gautrain cards we arrived at Rosebank station and asked to top up the balances to cover the cost from Rosebank to Ellis Park (about 10 kms as the crow flies).  R85 (phew!).  Plus an additional R101 for new cards as ours had expired.  A solid R186 each for a quick train ride - outrageous! Uber here we come.

I'd deleted the Uber app to declog my bulging phone memory so it took a few minutes to reload it.  In which time, Him Outdoors had hailed down a taxi and was beckoning me to hurry up and get in.

Taxi.  Yes, a real live, Oxford Road, 16 seater Toyota Hi Ace special. A battered veteran of the daily crush to move over 1 000 000 South Africans to and from work and shops.  And me dressed like a teddy bear, a bulging Michelin Man figure prepared for freezing stadium conditions.

                                  

In I roll, squeezing into the back seat corner and watching in complete fascination as our R20 is passed forward to the driver and off we stutter.  The taxi was everything you'd expect - the interior light smashed, no panel on the side door, an engine making the choking noise of an overworked espresso machine.  When it was running, of course.  Frequent shudders threw the passengers forward in their seats as stall after stall brought us to a halt.     

                                

The taxi stopped to pick up a glamorous young woman.  Cautiously, she opened the door and stared at the occupants.  "Oh, men only" she said, beginning to step back.  "My wife is with me," piped up HO.  Giving us a level look, she climbed over two empty seats and sat next to us.  As did the lady picked up at the next stop. HO did what he always does and got chatting.  "These guys pay a woman to sit in the taxi, but she works with them," our companion explained."I never get into a taxi full of men, even if there is one woman in the taxi.  It's too dangerous."  A sobering reality check about the dangers on our roads, which don't only come from vehicles. 

"Why is the driver doing that?" I whisper to HO.

"What?"  

"Holding a R100 note at arms length out of the window." 

Within minutes, it became clear.  As we putt-putted up Jan Smuts Avenue, another taxi drew alongside and the passenger handed five R20 notes to our driver in exchange.  Aha, smaller notes required!

This process was repeated as we drove through Hillbrow.  This time we stopped across the road from a fish and chip shop and our driver summoned a passerby to take the R100 note into the shop and get more change.  

"How do we tell the driver where to drop us?" my husband asked his neighbour. 

"You don't," she replied.  "He stops where he wants to."

Indeed.  Within four blocks we were ejected into the middle of a busy intersection.

"Ellis Park is over there, let's walk until we find a metered taxi," suggested HO. Fat chance of that in the lower end of Bree and Smit streets, which were pretty much stationery Hi Ace taxi ranks.

It was quicker and less obstructed to simply walk along on the road because the pavements overflowed with hairdressers, pedestrians, salesmen, on-the-hoof eateries and barbecues, rubbish and displaced cement pavers making the going underfoot tricky.  All we had to negotiate on the tarmac were piles of weird rubbish on the edge of the road - broken chairs, curtains, odd shoes...household type of garbage which we assume came from some of the adjacent abandoned buildings.  

Even at my brisk pace, there was plenty of opportunity to survey the surroundings.  Neatly dressed women lugging shopping bags, one mother impatiently pulling along her little girl, proudly wearing her fairy princess dress over a warm cardigan; an elderly grandfather in his Sunday best jacket and hat, carrying his toddler grandson over a wet morass of garbage and running water. 

All normal, slightly old fashioned Saturday-afternoon-shopping-in-town scenes that large suburban malls have rendered history for most of us.

I loved it.  Every single minute of it.  Decrepit warehouses, showrooms and flats, one dated 1910 and others which looked even older.  In places, renovated buildings stood out proudly, glowing with colourful paint and neat fascias.  The blare of 50 genres of music competing above hooting vehicles and a Babylon of voices.  The whiff of diesel and other less savoury aromas. The people, intent on their business even if it was just relaxing, having a beer or a bite to eat, twitching their hips in tune with the music.  Smiling.  Everyone was smiling. Living in the moment, getting on with Saturday in time honoured tradition.

I'm so glad we didn't take the train.