Cab cultures, not to mention the cabbies themselves, vary widely around the world. The Australian habit of hopping into the front seat with the hack and exchanging a cheery word is not generally welcome in Paris, for example, where frigid silence and glacial waves of disapproval are likely to follow such imprudence. In any case, Parisian cabbies often pre-empt that manoeuvre by having their front passenger seat occupied by paperwork, folders, or, in one admittedly unusual case, a toothy little poodle stropping its paws on the upholstery.
So when I had to get a cab in the nearby provincial town to take me back to my mountain village, I wasn’t sure how best to behave. For a start, I couldn’t see any cabs on the streets and I couldn’t see anything that resembled a taxi rank. Resigned to asking directions, I was suddenly almost run over by a cab as I hesitated at the curb. With great patience and gentleness, the driver helped a very old lady out of the back seat and then waited while she sorted through what appeared to be every euro cent coin ever minted to put together his fare and a tip. Hovering respectfully, I managed at last to communicate, as he farewelled the old woman.
Yes, he could take me to ‘my’ village—he knew it well because his daughter often worked in a restaurant there; no, it wasn’t too far and it would cost ‘à peu près vingt trois, vingt quatre euros ... ’ (About 24 euros at the most). So, before you can say, ‘Oop-la’ or ‘Zut alors’ I’m sitting beside him, having first established that protocol would allow for this matey Australian custom.
We rip round the fountain in the centre of town, head for the open country and soon we’re barrelling along those narrow, tree-lined French roads so familiar in photograph and painting. Designed—or more accurately evolved—for the slow, medieval plod of horses and carts, these anciens chemins have been forcibly adapted to the high speed needs of Renaults, Citroëns, Peugeots and, increasingly, four-wheel drives as wide and as high as the armoured tanks that once fought over these undulating fields. There are, without doubt, some cautious and sedate Gallic drivers. It’s just that you don’t often come across them in your part of the country, and cabbies, regardless of geography, are not among them.
So Monsieur Marc Lagrange, my cab driver, and I