Taxi Politics

First published on March 18, 2009

On Monday and Wednesday mornings, we send the girls to the subway station with our regular, reliable taxi driver, Tarek. He knows the way and presents no stress for them. John and I will then secure a passing taxi and this always proves interesting.

Some days we get in, the driver gets an Arabic greeting from us and he just drives. Other times, he'll engage us (John) in conversation and ask polite questions, "Why are we here?" "What is your name?" "Where are you from?"

The last question is always iffy. When we say we're from America, we get the following responses:

1. Nothing

2. Oh, America good. Good.

3. Obama! Very, very nice. Bush? No good, but Obama? Very, very good.

We always take the apolitical stance in the car because you never know which way a conversation will really end up and we just want to get where we're going.

Most of the time, the driver will make his comments and then change subjects. Other times, he might begin to wait for us to add to the conversation. This is when we have to remember that we do not speak fluent Arabic and to even try to get into anything deeper than "I live at..." and "I like to eat..." is beyond us and dangerous.

So John smiles and just looks out the window until the driver gives up or moves on to other things.

Once the discussion of politics has opened up (one-sided), sometimes the driver will start talking about his own government. He'll mention the former president and the present president and ramble on in his native tongue while we check out the skyline.

So far, it's never been a problem. We've managed to tread these waters and not cause any international incidents. The girls even had an encounter like this except at our local banana stand... They were making a purchase and when the vendor found out they were from America he said, "Obama?! YOU get a discount!"

Yes, the dynamics of learning a culture are invariably throwing us curves, but each day I ask the Lord to "put His arm around my shoulder and His hand over my mouth until just the right time."