“It’s good, probably the best in this region. A superb place to unwind. You’ll love it,” he said, as he put his foot hard on the pedal, and the car started off with an amateur-like lurch.
“Great,” I said, as a sudden burst of curiosity prompted me to dig deep into the licensed drivers’ behavior. “Can I ask you a question please?”
“You just did!”
“Why did they ignore me? Do I look like a beggar or something?” I leaned in until I was in between the two front seats and asked.
“Wrong guess. It isn’t your fault, my friend. They just don’t want to pick up random customers who are trying to flag them down in the streets. Here’s the point. The licensed cab drivers’ wages are fixed. They earn the same amount of money wages regardless of how many customers they have picked up in that month, they just don’t have a decent motivational incentive to work, but, to me it’s actually a good thing. Their lack of motive gives people like me a chance to earn a living,” he said, resting his right elbow on the lowered window, brisk wind ruffling his trimmed brownish hair.
“But if their wages are fixed, who—”
“They’re hired by the government, and yes, the policy of fixed wages doesn’t make any sense, but the government’s reluctance to admit their own fault is hampering it from being abolished.”
Then I felt that how things worked in this place was decidedly quirky, first the document I was compelled to sign, then the staff, who couldn’t speak English, at the information counter, then the app, the headband man, the emotional young woman, and the licensed cabs now. Everything was just vastly distinct from what I’d imagined. But I thought I would just have to get used to it if I was going to stay here for a long period. After all, I knew no one would be coming after me since I wasn’t a freedom-purser, and more essentially, there wouldn’t be hypocritical and inconsiderate people singing and dancing in the middle of the road during rush hour or any farcical news, and that’s more than enough for me.
As my pondering came to an end, the particular word he had used floated up in my mind, and I stared at him through the rear view mirror, drawing my left brow down, and drawled, as I wondered if it was legal to say that, “Reluctance? Are you criticizing?”
From the mirror, I could see him smiling vividly, and he said after quite a few minutes – this few minutes were hard for me as the hushed environment was kind of awkward and I wouldn’t be too surprised if he then pulled out a gun from nowhere and blew my head off, “You’re one of them? Now they recruit foreigners as well?”
Having a desperate feeling of not wanting to be misunderstood again, “No, I’m not. Trust me. It’s just that I have witnessed what they’d do to people who criticize them,” I said, as the car turned right into a boulevard, which ran over sweeping meanders.
He stayed silent, yet I could see his sharp eyes roving furtively over me in the mirror, and I continued, “Trust me. I’m not what you think I am.”
“Out of my car,” he said in a horribly flat tone that didn’t quite match his smiley face and stopped the car abruptly when blaring police sirens could be heard. “Out!”
Realizing the high-pitched sirens had just ruined my only chance to prove myself, I fought against my willingness to explain and left the car hastily as a lethal car chase was the last thing I would like to get involved. At the second I sealed the car door, he immediately drove off like he stole it, with three police cars trailing along behind – I had actually doubted if it was a stolen car or not – and I truly hoped he would somehow manage to elude the police even the whole thing happened like it was me who called in the police. But then a mild choke brought me back to reality, and I coughed when a sour taste in my mouth made me retch. Without a doubt, the cause was the slightly better air quality that contributed to a thin layer of seemingly poisonous murk.
Pressing my nose into the palm of my hand, I scampered along the brick paved street, where there was a prominent fountain that looked dazzling but somewhat unattractive at the far end, while keeping an eye out for the hotel he mentioned, however, instead of the hotel, the first thing that absorbed my attention was the hostile peeps I was bestowed with from the local people around, and as I walked, the people all sidestepped away from my path in a hysterical way like I was infected with some kind of a highly contagious disease and glared at me with simmering contempt shimmering in their eyeballs; some middle-aged men even spat on the street when they saw me.
I was terrified by their hints of menace that weren’t as intimidating as the police officer’s but was already good enough to strike terror into me. I felt like I was a limping lamb wrongly caged in a tiger zone occupied by tens of thousands ravenous lions, and it made my blood curdle. Fortunately, I then spotted a golden-framed and elaborately carved signboard saying “Golden Hotel” right across the street, so I hurried forward and descended down a flight of stairs that led to a dingy tunnel, which would probably take me to the opposite side of the street.
It only occurred to me that finding that hotel right across the street wasn’t something purely by luck after I have first met Kaylen in the house a day before I met Alvin – it’s also the same day when he asked me to go on that road trip to that pond with him on a particular afternoon some days later. And on that day, when at a point we chatted about our first encounter, he admitted he was well aware of the location of the hotel when he asked me to get out of his car back then, and that he was just too disinclined to tell me about it. Perhaps it’s because he had been sidetracked by the sirens and had forgotten to tell me about it, but who knows?
So, after I had hurried through the straight rocky tunnel that looked like an air-raid shelter, I then walked up the staircase toward the street outside, headed directly to the main entrance of the hotel right underneath the shining signboard, pushed open the bulky golden-painted door, went in with my head down to avoid revealing my identity as a foreigner, which I considered to be the cause of people’s detestation, and proceeded to the check-in counter that was set right under a lavish golden chandelier with oriental ornamentation on the corner of a spacious foyer, which was even larger than the excessively sizable office I had worked in, though I have to say that, no matter how showy the decoration there was, it’s never comparable to the warm and shiny house, which is constructed behind a pearly gate and is surrounded by walls made of precious jewels, I am in right now. I don’t mean to brag, but I am sure you will love this place more than that hotel when you get to catch a glimpse of it. Okay, maybe I am really bragging now.
Anyway, the whole foyer had so much things that I could feast my eyes on and was delicately brightened up by merely golden things such as golden plastic flowers, golden armed chairs, and various golden ornaments. The least golden thing I could spot was actually a sumptuous piece of fine gold lying in a gilt plastic box set in the middle of the foyer protected by two guards.
“Good afternoon, what can I do for you?” a courteous-looking young staff, wearing a plain black suit and a star-shaped golden watch, asked with an indifferent smile that reminded me of the woman in the elevator, standing behind a well-crafted mahogany desk with a sleek computer monitor atop it.
“Good afternoon, I need a single room with a shower and a radio, for – a week.” I wasn’t sure about how long I should stay in this hotel, but I thought a week was enough for me to find an affordable flat.
“Do you have a reservation?” he asked while busy jabbing a keyboard concealed under the surface of the desk.
“No, I don’t.”
“So, I’m glad to inform you that we do have a single room available on the third floor, room 301,” he said. “Could you please show me your passport?”