Taxis

I take a taxi to work every day, and in fact whenever I move around the city. Taking a taxi by yourself is known as a 'drop', and although there are shared taxis and buses here, staff in my organisation have been advised not to use them for security reasons. 

Every time I take a taxi I have to negotiate the price. This felt like a bit of a chore when I first arrived but has become more natural to me now that I know rough prices and more about what I expect to pay. The distance between home and office is really not far - less than 5 minutes drive. I have gotten into the habit of paying 200 naira for this each way (making my daily transport to work and back about £1.40 - much better than Transport for London prices!). 

It's interesting to see the different approach drivers take, and at what price they start at. I know that 200 is a fair price for two reasons - 1) my colleague lives very close to me and negotiates down to 150* and 2) more reasonable drivers will open negotiation at 250 - showing me that 200 is fine. 

However, some drivers start at 500 for the 200 journey and are very difficult to negotiate with. Once, in my first week here a driver openly said to me that he would never give me the price I was asking for because I was a foreigner. I refuse to pay more than 200 so the grumpy ones either drive away (doesn't happen very often) or they take me and grumble - getting about three quarters of the way home usually before they start muttering 'this is far' (it's not!). 

On the other hand, some drivers are overly helpful and accommodating. On my way home last night the driver and I were scrabbling around for change (small notes go fast leaving you with 500s or 1000s so 'change is always a problem' is a frequent refrain in taxis). The driver managed to get together about 295 (he owed me 300) but was so concerned about giving me a bunch of crappy notes and shorting me 5 naira he decided the journey should be free. I insisted he took 100 from me - all I had in change - but I appreciated his kindness. 

And yesterday morning my driver asked me if I would always be needing a taxi from that point at that time. I didn't think it would be too long before an enterprising driver realised that I was going to be making the same journey every day, and yesterday it happened. When we got to the office he told me not to pay and that he would pick me today at 8:30. Sure enough, he was waiting for me at the end of the road at exactly 8:30 and will do the same again tomorrow. Although the negotiations on fare have almost become second nature to me now, it will be nice to have a regular driver who I can pay by the week, and not to have the 'how much?' discussion every morning. 

* My colleague suggested I should try for 150 as well, but this is where I start converting naira to pound and thinking that I really don't mind paying 15p extra and giving a slightly more decent fare with less negotiation hassle!