My life in China, Part 14- Taxi to hell

I had many beautiful experiences in China. My time there was just a smorgasbord of life lessons, wonderful memories, and exciting adventures. However, there were a few events that I would have to chalk up on the “cons” side of the board. One incident in particular comes to mind often while writing these posts. My wife and I joke about it now, but back then, it was quite scary. Yes, I think it is time to talk about the time we were kidnapped. Not what you were expecting, right? You probably think I’m joking or perhaps exaggerating to build my readership. Unfortunately, not. Let me explain.

My wife and I were returning to Baoding from a trip. I don’t remember where we had gone, but it was someplace far as we had a bit of luggage. We arrived at Baoding’s train station and hailed a taxi to take us back home. At the time, the area around the city’s train station was probably Baoding’s unsafest part. There were just so many people coming and going and it was the only place you needed to worry about pick-pocketing and petty theft. It was just a cacophonous mass of people. As soon as you exited the station, taxi drivers would bombard you, all eager for a fare. People would pull on your arm and get in your face. It wasn’t a pleasant place to be, and we were keen to get out of the bustle.

Typically, we would forgo the taxi drivers and take a more leisurely penny cab. These were three-wheeled pedaled (sometimes motorized) rickshaws that were cheaper (like a tenth of the cost) and generally more honest than their car brothers (although often less safe). You negotiated the fare depending on the distance beforehand, which gave you more control. It might sound like a bit of a hassle to haggle price all the time, but that’s China. Every price is negotiable, and everyone expects to do a bit of dickering in most cases. If you were new to an area and didn’t know the costs, you could ask a few drivers and get a sense. After living in the city for a few months, you would get a good idea of the fares to the most visited areas. Hebei University to the grocery store was 2 RMB, to Mcdonalds 5 RMB, to the train station 10 RMB, etc. Sure, you may get cheated once and a while, but it would only be an extra RMB here and there, and if the driver were particularly good, you would generally tip that amount anyway. Typically, the drivers were fun and interesting people. One time, we met a driver that had taught himself to speak fluent English, with a British accent I will add, and another that serenaded us with song the whole way home. We even made friends with particular drivers that hung around the University.

But today, we were tired, hungry, and just wanted to get home. So, we got into one of the many taxicabs that lined the curb. In Baoding, there were four types of cabs. The cheapest were random everyday cars, with the drivers holding sharpie-on-cardboard signs stating they were for let. You never took these unless you didn’t have the money for a real taxi or you needed to travel really long distances, say to the next province. They are unlicensed with no meter- cheat mobiles, I like to call them. The next step up and most numerous were red Toyotas. These were your everyday workhorses. Suitable for getting around the immediate city. They were small and nimble, but with the addition of the driver’s cage, torture for my knees. Teal Volkswagen cabs were a bit more expensive, but were cleaner and had more room (so happy knees). You would take these for longer journeys, like across town or to a neighboring city. And lastly, the cream-of-the-crop were the black luxury sedans, also without meters and were probably just more prestigious cheat mobiles. Being from the west, I put a lot of confidence in the meter.

Like most people, we often just went with red, which is what we did this day. But, just because red taxis are licensed and have meters doesn’t mean they are all the same. Just like in the states, some drivers take pride in their work. Their taxis are clean, smell fresh, and the drivers are friendly and personable. Others, not so much. From the outside, it is a bit hit or miss. You may lean toward shiny new cars, but this could also mean a new and inexperienced driver. Sometimes you felt generous and would take the beat-up taxi with the guy that looked down on his luck. They need to eat too. But sometimes, these taxis are beaten up for a reason. Other times you get into the back and immediately sense you will need to be on your guard with this one. This day was one of those times. I don’t know if it was the look we got in the rear-view when we got in the cab or the state of the car itself (it was dirty and smoky), but something was off about this guy. He started driving, and we had to remind him that the meter wasn’t running- not a good sign. Also, we generally check to make sure the driver displays his license on the dash. In the hustle, we didn’t realize it was missing until we were on our way. This was the second bad sign, which put us even more on edge.

We had taken cabs from the train station many times, so we knew how much the ride would cost, but being a foreigner with luggage, the driver probably assumed that we weren’t locals. The meter started going up faster than usual and reached the typical fare well before we arrived at our destination. Something was fishy. We aren’t talking about a few RMB over the standard fare here- it was more like double. So my wife raised the issue that there was something wrong with his meter.

It was as if we pushed a button to full nuclear. The driver just exploded as if we damned his mother. Clearly, it was a reaction from someone who knew we were right and was just waiting for an argument. Of course, the typical insults addressed at me and my wife’s relationship were the first things from his mouth, things I will not repeat here, but needless to say, they were nasty. We were tired and not in a particularly good mood, so we argued back. In hindsight, it probably wasn’t a good idea.

We reach our destination, still arguing. The driver starts to make statements that he’ll drive us to the taxi station and prove that his meter is correct. We aren’t interested in all that and just want to get home. I gave my wife the huge fare money to pay the driver and opened the door to step out to get our luggage. Before I can get out, the driver just guns it sending me back into the seat. The door slams against my leg, and my foot drags against the curb. There is a panic moment as my little tootsie inches dangerously close to going under the wheel. I struggle and pull it back into the car before I get seriously hurt.

What the hell is going on? We start banging on the cage telling the driver to stop the car and let us out, but he’s not listening as we speed off. He’s decided to take us against our will, and at this point, we don’t know where he’s taking us or what he’s going to do when we get there. We start to drive outside the city to the dusty surrounding villages, and now we’re no longer angry. We’re scared.

We pull into a parking lot of a derelict building. Is this happening? Are we about to get murdered? At this point, it felt like a real possibility. The driver has stopped communicating with us, and we don’t know his intentions. As soon as he stops, we get out of the car, and I’m preparing for a fight. Then I see some other taxis in the lot, and my guard drops, but just slightly. He gets out and makes his way to the office without talking to us. We look to the street to make a run for it, but we are now more than an hour’s walk away from the University and our luggage is still in the trunk. The driver comes out with his Lǎobǎn (boss) and they coax us inside. With our suitcases being held for random, all we can do is follow them.

From this point, the Chinese discussion is well beyond my comprehension at the time, but we enter the “boss’s” office, and my wife continues to argue with the driver and now the kingpin of this charade, the boss. Basically, the driver wants to put the taxi up on a lift and check the meter. It’s a process that takes hours. You may be thinking at this point that perhaps we were in the wrong here. The driver is obviously confident in his meter, and maybe he was just protecting his honor. Ah, but the catch is that during this process, we would be responsible for compensating for the driver’s time, amounting to hundreds of RMB. The scam is obvious. We either pay the incorrect meter price that is 50% above the usual fare or pay for the driver’s time while they check the meter (so 60 RMB vs. hundreds). Sure, they may find a problem with the driver’s meter and waive the original fare (likely not, they’re all in on the scam), but we would still need to pay for the driver’s time while we wait. Either way, the driver makes out in the situation—no apology for the kidnapping and insults, no restitution in any way. Actually, they had the gall to threaten us with calling the police if we didn’t pay the fare. They assured us that this was the standard process. In other words, if you disagree with the meter, they test it, but we would be responsible for paying the driver’s time. Seem ridiculous? Welcome to China’s legal system. At this point, we already decided that we just want to get out of this place and fast.

So, we paid the extra 50%, retrieved our suitcase, and got the hell out of there. Being incredibly wary of taxis now, we walked the full hour home, dragging our suitcase behind us, shaken and defeated. When we got back to the University, we told the administrators and asked them to call the police, not believing what the taxi company claimed about the law. Why would we? It seemed ridiculous. But, to our surprise, we found out that this was a common scam and the University had brought this to the police’s attention before. The taxi company was indeed right. This was the standard process when there was a disagreement over the fare. Likely, some taxi union in the city bribed someone in Baoding’s government to put the law down on the books. I imagine it started off with the justification that the drivers shouldn’t have to pay for their company’s faulty equipment, but of course, it wasn’t a big jump to taking advantage of this law for personal gain.

As a side note. Baoding’s police chief at the time was incredibly shady. He was actually arrested a few years after we left when his son hit and killed a pedestrian, and the chief tried to “smooth things out” with the law. It made China’s national news and the chief was eventually executed for corruption.

I think you are starting to see from these posts that the two years I was in China were pretty eventful. I almost starved, was forced to eat fish eyeballs, learned to teach on the fly, rally raced through dusty fields in a minivan, got married, was bullied by a gaggle of kindergartners, and was kidnapped by a taxi driver. All this before the end of my first year in the country. And you wonder why I call these two years the most impactful of my life? There is more to come, so check back soon as I continue my adventure!

Cheers!