A chat about vices

Kingston to home last Wednesday

I’m running late and I’ve kept my driver waiting. As I get in the cab, I catch him finishing a sneaky smoke. This puts him flustered and apologetic, he knows he shouldn’t be smoking in the cab, but it’s a time-killing habit he finds hard to break. It’s a hard-wired association, if he’s hanging around he automatically lights up.

He used to be in the building trade, in the days when you could smoke on site. So for him any kind of DIY or manual labour is also associated with smoking. At the weekend he was doing some painting at home and although he didn’t smoke, it felt wrong not to have a fag in his mouth.

He asks me what I’ve been working on and I tell him confectionery – sweets, chocolate that kind of thing. He says “Ahh, now if you’re talking about addictions, that’s just another one. My wife is completely addicted to chocolate. I think most women are”. He can take or leave the sweet stuff but his wife is a fiend for it.

“Chewing gum’s a different matter. I can go through packets of it in the cab. I have gum after a cigarette, or instead of a cigarette. It’s probably a nervous thing, or a concentration thing”

He tells me about the time he tried to give up smoking. He went on the patches and lasted about 4 weeks. The problem was he found himself getting angry and irritable and that’s not a good thing when you’re a cab driver. You need to be able to keep your cool, no matter what. As a night driver, it’s not the traffic that’s an issue, it’s the people in the back of a cab. Particularly those that have had a few.

He goes on to regale me with some of his worst drunken-passenger experiences. From there we start musing over the different effects of booze. He feels that some people just have a nasty streak in them that is brought out by alcohol. We chat about people we know who are lovely when sober but dreadful drunk. He tells me that that he finds the floppy drunks the scariest because it’s horrible to see people so out of it.

The worst type of cab-driver conversation

In Manchester from Irlam to my hotel

Among the worst things that can happen to me during a cab conversation is when a driver starts spouting bigoted, racist or intolerant views. It’s not in my nature to argue or put them straight, but I hate feeling complicit. I usually try to subtly show disproval whilst deftly steering the conversation into safer territory. I didn’t have much luck with this one:

- so you come from London do you? Do you live right in the centre like?
- yes, South of the river, but pretty central
- how do you find it living with all those foreigners? Last time I was in London I couldn’t believe it when I was the only English-speaking white face on the tube
- errr, I quite like that it’s so multicultural
- do you? I wouldn’t, dunno if I would feel safe. Full of arabs it was…

He goes on, I won’t dignify it by typing up the rest. In the end I gave up, opened my book and pointedly ignored him for the rest of the journey.

A Turk’s take on proper English

an evening last week. Fulham to home

My driver has a thick Turkish accent. He barely stops talking throughout the journey. My end of the conversation comprises mostly laughter, and short bursts of interested-sounding noises. His hands fly around augmenting his expression as he rapidly jumps subject and I struggle to keep up.

“I have been ice skating for 20 years. I had a gap of 12 years and then I put my skates back on. It was like I learnt only yesterday. The only thing I’m no good at is the single rollerskates, you know the single ones. Blades. It’s no good, I can’t balance on them. I think I’ve spent too many years on the ice. Ice skating is better I think, more professional”.

“When I was young I used to go to the sports centre in Finsbury Park. I loved it there. Once though I had a very bad fall and then I stopped for years. It’s a dangerous sport. Especially when they allow the young kids to skate. You have to be careful of the fingers and the kneecaps, you know. I’ll be quiet now, I’m boring you”.

I try to reassure him that I’m not bored

“Some people they say I talk to much. The thing is I don’t like it when people don’t talk. Some people they talk like a machine gun, you know prrp prrp prrp. I think this is when they don’t talk at home. I talk all the time at home, all my family does. It’s nice to talk, you know. I don’t bore people. If I see your face has changed I will go quiet. But you look interested”. I like people butting in. At home we’re like “I know more than you”, “no, you shut up and listen” it’s fun!”

“I’ve been doing this no for 11 years. Your old prime minister – the one with the eyebrows. I picked him up one day by the river by Vauxhall. We were chatting and he said, I’ve been a politician all my life and I’ve never heard an accent as good as yours. I don’t put it on. I’ve been here 28 years of my life, I can speak cockney if I want”.

“I had a wonderful teacher when I came here. She taught me English, her English was perfect. She had been to Turkey, to Istanbul and she loved Turkey very much. She taught me to speak English. You should see my son, he’s 9 years old and he started primary school in Kingston and when we go back to my mum and her friends they say “here comes the posh child!”.

“I don’t say things like d’ya-no-wha-I-mean. It’s disgusting. I’m serious, I’m not posh or anything but I don’t like to talk like that”.

“I got a slap once from a very beautiful Irish girl in Mexico. This was in 97. We were kissing and cuddling, she was a lawyer. We were kissing and everything and she had a very strong Irish accent and I ended up speaking like her and she slapped me and said “you’re taking the piss out of my accent”. I was like, please don’t go, I really want to make love. She said “you’re disgusting aren’t ya” with that beautiful Irish accent. so I try not to make any accents, because you can upset people”.

“London English is brilliant because it’s multinational. Sometimes when I go back to Turkey, they’re all speaking English like northerners. It’s because the people are serving the tourists that come from the north. I can’t believe it, these Turkish waiters are speaking in a yorkshire accent! What the hell is going on. These imbiciles are now telling me I’m not speaking English properly. Can you believe it? I’m like, I’m from London, you come over to London and speak your English with a Geordie accent and we’ll see who speaks it properly. These bouncers and these barmen are speaking in a yorkshire accent and a birmingham accent. I’m like, you learn your English from me – I’ll teach you to speak it properly!”

“I’ve lived here 36 years. I’m not English, I cannot call myself English, because I wasn’t born into this race. But I can proudly say I’m part of this society, I’m British. If people don’t accept it – they can kiss my arse. I’m here for good, if they don’t like it they know where they can go. I will not allow anyone to say anything about England or Turkey. I admire both countries. These two countries both have a huge, huge place in my heart. Because I was born in Turkey I am pure Turkish, I can’t say I’m English though my sons are. My son supports England and I hate him for that.”