The last two days were spent travelling to Sydney and Melbourne for work.
Tuesday night we stayed at Shellie's parents house as it is closer to the airport and I didn't want to spend too much of the companies money on cab fare (Didn't stop me doing so while coming back from the airport though).
The most interesting parts of the trip were the taxi rides. This is something that I find fascinating in Australia. When you get in a cab (and you always get in the front seat with the driver if you are the only one travelling), you don't leave the cab without having a conversation with the driver. The diversity of the taxi drivers makes for some interesting combination as Australia still has a large proportion of non Indian sub continent drivers (this is changing fast though) especially in Melbourne.
So let me see:
Ride from Shellie's parents home to Brisbane Airport: Local Lady, nice to talk to and been driving for some time. Didn't talk much about anything except the curse that is the new shopping centre near the Airport that has caused innumerable people to miss their flights because of traffic snarls.
Ride from Sydney Airport to Randwick Race Course: Slightly old fella who didn't talk much and listened to John Laws program all the way.
Ride from Randwick to Airport: The most energetic driver I have ever met. Greek and full of energy. Talked passionately about Greek food and the way to cook and eat it, complained about the lack of good Greek restaurants. We also had some discussion on the difference in food flavors between country of origin and Australia in general.
Ride from Melbourne Airport to City: Didn't take a cab but rode the bus.
Ride from City to Airport: I got in a cab thinking the driver was Indian, as I wanted to go to an Indian sweet shop and was hoping that he would know where one was. He was instead Iraqi and couldn't say too much in English. I got a call almost as soon as I got in the cab which lasted the rest of the trip anyway.
Ride from Brisbane Airport to Home: The most interesting conversation of the trip. The driver was a Maori from New Zealand. The conversation started awkwardly, as when I entered the cab, I said that it was humid here in Brisbane. He replied that he didn't think so and thought it was quite pleasant instead after which we rode in silence for a little bit. He must have sensed the discomfort because he asked an ice breaker question from me about the state of the world. We then got into a decent conversation about the Bird Flu problem and how the Mad Cow disease affected mostly the Western nations and the farmers there got a good deal, while the Bird Flu was causing distress to the poor chicken farmers in the not so developed countries. We then moved to origins (me from India and him from New Zealand) and I told him that one of my earliest memories is reading about springs and Maoris in New Zealand from a school textbook. He said his earliest memories were of growing up in New Zealand in an area which had a big population of Indians and going with them to see old Indian movies that had a decent story. He of course didn't understand any of them but was fascinated by the characters.
Finally we moved to the caste system in India and why it was still prevalent and he really wanted to understand why a person from lower caste could not move up the ladder. He explained that they had a rudimentary form of Maori caste system where there is a 'Queen' of the tribe but according to him, ordinary people could move up to her status.
Needless to say, the longest ride seemed to take the smallest time because of the interesting conversation.
Besides the taxi rides, other interesting tidbits:
-- I had in front of my seat a minister in the Queensland Government travelling with me. I was travelling in Economy and so was he. Oh... What a great place this Country is.
-- I was absolutely gob smacked by the number of Indian students that are working the simple jobs in Melbourne. I am assuming that this must be the case in Sydney as well but man they were everywhere!
Security Guards, Cleaners, Cab callers, Cabbies, ALL 7-11's. Absolutely everywhere.
-- The Qantas in flight book had an advertisement from GD Goenka World School in Gurgaon, India. Strange place for them to advertise! I can't see people in Australia sending their kids to India to study but who knows?