I have a pedicab colleague named Christian who splits his time between riding the trike and community organizing. He's one of the kindest and most conscientious people I've ever met. I don't think I've ever heard anyone say a bad word about him... On second thought, I take that back. I might have heard people make fun of him for his argyle socks. I, uh... might have even participated a time or two. Also, I think I heard someone mention once or twice that Christian has a bad habit of undercharging customers.
Whenever I'm driving the mule carriage I enjoy engaging in teasing banter with my fellow pedicabbies. For example, one of them rides by with a fare, and I call out to him, "Hey, I wouldn't go that way if I were you! I think I saw your parole officer down there." Or I offer my whip to the passengers: "Do y'all need to borrow this?" That one usually gets a big laugh. Often when I'm on a tour and I pass a pedicab, I point out the driver to my riders and say, "See that folks? That's the second best pedicabbie in the city of New Orleans!"
Some of my colleagues have heard this enough that they have a ready response. One of them likes to say, "Yeah, and that's Mark, the third worst carriage driver in the city!" Christian also has a comeback ready. He smiles, waves and says, "Second only to you, sir!" And he says this sweetly and sincerely without the slightest touch of sarcasm, which ends up embarrassing me and ruining the joke. But his intention is not to embarrass me or ruin my joke. He's just being his sweet, sincere self.
It would seem that he's truly living up to the teachings of the one whose name he bears: "Bless those who curse you." The funny thing is that Christian isn't a Christian. He's an avowed atheist. Next time I hear someone questioning whether it's possible to be good without God, I'm going to say, "Can I introduce you to my friend Christian?" You can define "good" in such a way as to exclude Christian if you want to, but only at the price of robbing the word of any real meaning.
Lately, when Christian and I pass one another -- he on the pedicab and I on the carriage -- I've taken to using a different line. "Look there, folks!" I tell my tourists. "Do you see that? That right there, folks, is a rolling oxymoron! That's Christian the atheist."
A few weeks ago I had the horrifying experience of riding by just in time to see an airport shuttle bus hit Christian's pedicab. His passengers managed to stay seated somehow, but Christian was ejected and landed hard in the street. There were plenty of people around to help, and there was no way I could abandon a 1,500 pound mule and a wagon load of tourists, so I had to keep going. As soon as I got to a stopping place I called the owner of the pedicab company to inform him of what I had seen and tried to call Christian to ask if he was OK. He got back to me later that day. He had been to the emergency room, he said. He was a bit banged up and sore, but there didn't seem to be anything broken.
Christian was back on the pedicab within a couple of days, but he kept having trouble with his wrist. Last week he went back to the doctor and discovered that the wrist had been broken all along. Now it's all bandaged up, and he's not going to be able to work for the next couple weeks.
Day before yesterday we had a big crawfish boil benefit for Christian to help him pay medical bills and make up for missed income. There must have been nearly a hundred of us who turned out -- pedicabbies and a few other friends. We all stuffed bills into a big jar. You hear the word "community" thrown around a lot these days, but I saw for myself that the pedicab community in New Orleans is a community in the truest sense of the word, and I'm proud to be part of it.
The event was held high atop the roof of the parking garage that serves as the headquarters for Bike Taxi Unlimited. The weather was perfect. As the afternoon waned, the rooftops and steeples below us were bathed in golden light. Even the infamous Iberville Housing, Project which is overdue for demolition, took on a transcendent beauty at that moment. Then I watched as the the sun set over the city, and the lights came on along Canal St.
Someone commented that the whole rooftop scene looked like a Bud Light commercial. This was a bit ironic because Christian is actually a teetotaler. (Vegetarian and vegan pedicabbies are a dime a dozen, but those who totally abstain from alcohol are exceedingly rare.) Irony notwithstanding, the observation was on target. Attractive young people dancing, laughing, and flirting. Music. Food. A beautiful and slightly edgy urban setting. If Bud Light had been there to record this scene, they probably could have used the footage to sell boatloads of beer.
There would have only been two issues: Number one, there was a lot more Abita Amber than Bud Light in evidence. And secondly, there was that one 47-year-old guy bent over with a bad back. It was like the old Sesame Street game: "One of These Things Is not Like the Others". I pictured the director of the beer commercial yelling: "Hey, who the *&^@ let that guy get in here? Can we get the *^&$@& hunchback out of the shot, please?" And I was happy that there wasn't any director or anybody else saying that. Maybe I didn't belong, but nobody seemed to be noticing. I was sharing a good time with good friends in a beautiful place -- and all for a good cause. Life has far too few moments like these.
I only regret that Christian's misfortune had to be the occasion of our festivities. Speedy recovery, Christian. Hope to see you back on the bike soon!
Wednesday, May 15, 2013
Wednesday, May 1, 2013
Boston pedicabbie tells a powerful story
I wanted to share this link to a post written by a fellow member of the pedicab tribe who had a unique perspective on the Boston bombings.
http://thenextlevel.me/no-straight-answers-xns-blog/dads-death-and-marathon-bomb
http://thenextlevel.me/no-straight-answers-xns-blog/dads-death-and-marathon-bomb
Wednesday, April 10, 2013
Horses, honkys, mules and asses
Out on the carriage line I often overhear heated discussions concerning the taxonomy of our animals.
"Lookit that horse!" says one fellow.
"That ain't no horse," retorts his companion. "That's a donkey!"
Sometimes I'm called upon to referee the debate. Or more often, I jump in uninvited. In either case I explain that both parties are half-right. "This is a mule. A mule is a cross between a male donkey and a female horse."*
My colleagues and I generally explain to our passengers as a matter of course what a mule is and why we use only mules. We tell people that mules take the heat better than horses and that we are required by city law to use mules. The part about it being city law is only partly true. The law actually specifies the use of mules only during the summer months and then only during daylight. But given that we have to use mules for three months of the year, there's no good reason not to use them year round. Maintaining and moving two different types of animals would mean extra expense and logistical headaches for the carriage companies. Besides, a lot of my co-workers who have experience with both horses and mules insist that mules are stronger, smarter and superior in pretty much every way.
Not everyone who takes the tour needs to be educated about mules. There are plenty of people who have experience with equines and who consider it an insult to their intelligence if you try to explain to them what a mule is. With a carriage full of strangers, it's hard to know whether to aim high or low. If there's a child on board, then it makes it easier to educate the ignorant without offending the expert.
"You see Rock there?" I say addressing myself to the child while everyone else listens in. "See his ears? He's got his daddy's ears. His daddy was a donkey, and his mama was a horse. Do you know what that makes him?"
There was one little girl who quickly did the mental calculation and came back at me with a brilliant answer, though not the one I was expecting: "A honky!"
As you can well imagine, we carriage drivers hear (and tell) all kinds of ass jokes, over and over, day in and day out. Here's a sampling:
* Just in case you're wondering, the offspring of a male horse and a female donkey is called a hinny. Hinnies are harder to produce and are generally considered less desirable than mules.
"Lookit that horse!" says one fellow.
"That ain't no horse," retorts his companion. "That's a donkey!"
Sometimes I'm called upon to referee the debate. Or more often, I jump in uninvited. In either case I explain that both parties are half-right. "This is a mule. A mule is a cross between a male donkey and a female horse."*
My colleagues and I generally explain to our passengers as a matter of course what a mule is and why we use only mules. We tell people that mules take the heat better than horses and that we are required by city law to use mules. The part about it being city law is only partly true. The law actually specifies the use of mules only during the summer months and then only during daylight. But given that we have to use mules for three months of the year, there's no good reason not to use them year round. Maintaining and moving two different types of animals would mean extra expense and logistical headaches for the carriage companies. Besides, a lot of my co-workers who have experience with both horses and mules insist that mules are stronger, smarter and superior in pretty much every way.
Not everyone who takes the tour needs to be educated about mules. There are plenty of people who have experience with equines and who consider it an insult to their intelligence if you try to explain to them what a mule is. With a carriage full of strangers, it's hard to know whether to aim high or low. If there's a child on board, then it makes it easier to educate the ignorant without offending the expert.
"You see Rock there?" I say addressing myself to the child while everyone else listens in. "See his ears? He's got his daddy's ears. His daddy was a donkey, and his mama was a horse. Do you know what that makes him?"
There was one little girl who quickly did the mental calculation and came back at me with a brilliant answer, though not the one I was expecting: "A honky!"
As you can well imagine, we carriage drivers hear (and tell) all kinds of ass jokes, over and over, day in and day out. Here's a sampling:
- One carriage driver colleague, in the course of educating her passengers, likes to tell them that a mule is a "half-assed horse." While this may not be the most hilarious of the ass jokes, it's the only one that is wholly accurate. (An ass is another name for a donkey. Actually, if you want to get really technical, donkeys are one of several subspecies that fall into the category of "ass".)
- A pedicab colleague is fond of pointing me out to his riders and telling them: "That's Mark. He has the best ass in town!" This one is wrong on so many levels, that I hardly know where to start. Apart from the aforementioned fact that Rock is only half ass on his sire's side, he's far from the best mule in town. They say that back in his heyday he really was one of the best mules in the Royal Carriages stable. Nowadays, I love him to death, and he really loves to get out there and work. But he's almost 30 years old, and truth be told he's a plug. (See number 9.) As to the flip side of the double entendre... Well, let's just say that Rock's pushing 30, and I'm sneaking up on 50.
- A carriage driver colleague, trying to load up his buggy, shouts at passers-by: "Come on, people. Put my ass to work!"
- One African-American carriage driver points to another and says: "Look there folks. That's something you don't see every day: A black man with a white ass!" I love this one, but as an honest-to-goodness honky, I don't think I could get away with using it.
- And finally, my very own ass joke. When discussing my two jobs I like to tell people, "When I'm working the carriage, and someone wants to feed my ass a carrot, I don't have a problem with that. But when I'm on the pedicab, it's another matter." Call it a double standard if you will, but that's just the way I am.
* Just in case you're wondering, the offspring of a male horse and a female donkey is called a hinny. Hinnies are harder to produce and are generally considered less desirable than mules.
Monday, April 1, 2013
A real American hero?
A hero's serenade
So I'm hanging out in front of Lafitte's Blacksmith Shop last night waiting for a fare, and there are three college kids hanging out there as well. One male and two female. Good-looking kids, from Alabama if I remember right. Not wasted, but drunk enough to be pretty happy.
We start chatting, and they mention the name of a pedicab colleague and ask if I know him, and I say, "Yeah, I know who he is but don't really know him very well."
And they say, "Well, he's a real American hero! And so are you. So are all you pedicab guys."
And I say, "Really? What makes us heroes?"
And they say, "Because you save lives!... That and your calves."
And I ask, "How do we save lives?"
And they say, "Because you take drunk people home so they don't have to drive."
They ask me if I know the real American heroes song from the Bud Light commercial, and I say, "No, not really. I was out of the country for a long time, so I probably missed it.
One of the girls says, "Well Nate here can sing it for you. Can't you, Nate?" (I'm calling him "Nate" here, but I don't really remember the dude's name.)
And Nate says, "Sure!" And he serenades me with the advertising jingle -- cheerfully and badly.
And I say, "Well sometimes I don't feel so heroic because a lot of times I get drunk people on the pedicab who want me to take them to their car, and I really don't know what to do. Because the right thing to do is probably to take their car keys from them and throw them as far as I can, but I don't really have the balls to do that. So I always end up taking them to their car, and I worry about it. What do you think I should do in those situations?"
And they say, "Wow, we hadn't thought about that! That's a tough one. We don't know what you should do in a situation like that."
And I say, "Well, I write a blog about this job, so maybe I'll write a post about this and see if my readers have any wisdom to offer me." So here it is, dear readers. Jump in.
Playing the hero
Later that night I'm back in front of Lafitte's, and this drunk guy walks up. He can barely keep his feet.
"Where's Ursa...Ursa..." he stumbles, trying to pronounce "Ursulines."
"Ursulines Street?" I prompt. "It's just one block over."
"What about Bourbon Street?" he asks.
"You're on Bourbon Street," I answer. "This is Bourbon Street right here!"
"Oh," he says. "Life's a bitch", and he wanders off while I stand there wondering what the connection might be between Bourbon Street and "Life's a bitch." Who knows? Anyway, I'm not sorry to see him go.
Then he apparently changes his mind and wanders back in my direction. "How much to take me to Ursa...Ursa...?" He still can't get his tongue around the word.
"Which block of Ursulines do you need to get to?" I ask.
"The Empress Hotel," he replies, his speech so slurred that I can barely understand him. The Empress is a notoriously nasty place in a sketchy neighborhood. Actually, it's so bad that the reviews make really entertaining reading!
I'm counting up the blocks in my head to quote him a price, when he plops down in the seat of the pedicab and says, "OK, how much just to ride around?"
It makes me nervous whenever drunk people sit down on the pedicab before we've worked out where we're going and how much they're going to pay. But I answer him respectfully. "Well that would be a dollar a minute. Twenty dollars for a twenty minute ride, for example."
"OK, I'll give you twenty dollars just to ride me around." He takes his wallet out and fumbles with it for a couple of minutes. Finally he turns it upside down and shakes the entire contents out on the seat of the pedicab: a couple of business cards and a single dollar bill.
"OK, take me to an ATM," He says.
Against my better judgment I agree to do the ride. Along the way he blurts out, apropos of nothing, "You gotta pay the piper!"
"Um, yeah," I say to be agreeable. "You've definitely got to pay the piper."
He mumbles something else, the only part of which I catch is "I just want to be left alone."
I'm sure that this is not directed at me, so once again I decide just to go along. "Yeah, we all want to be left alone, don't we?" I say.
I take him to a little daiquiri shop on Decatur Street with an ATM just inside the front door. I sit outside and watch as he stumbles up to the machine, pulls his wallet out, and fumbles with it again, this time dropping the contents onto the floor. He shuffles through them, unable to find the ATM card. Finally he chooses one of the business cards and stands there stabbing at the ATM slot, so drunk that he lacks the dexterity to actually insert the card.
By this time, it's clear to me that there's no way I'm not going to get paid for this ride. I consider riding away. I don't owe this guy anything, do I? To the contrary, he owes me! I'm supposed to pay $155 to lease the bike tonight, and I can't afford to be wasting time like this. On the other hand, this guy is now several blocks farther from his hotel than when we started our little ride. And if I don't take him, how's he ever going to get back?
I watch as he finally gives up on the ATM and walks up to the counter to talk to the bartender. I sit there stewing while they converse for a couple of minutes. It's obvious that this isn't going anywhere. What was he expecting the bartender to do for him?
Still tempted to cut my losses and run, I'm remembering those college kids earlier who said that I was a hero because I take drunk people home. So I decide to live up to their estimation of me and be a hero. I'm going to get this guy back to his hotel. As I walk up I hear the bartender telling him, "You need to leave. You're so drunk that you don't know what you're doing. I'm sorry, I can't help you."
"Get on the bike," I order the drunk guy. "I'm taking you back to your hotel for free." Looking defeated, he stumbles along behind me and collapses into the passenger seat.
Along the way he suddenly blurts out with some new-found (and completely unfounded) resolve, "I'm going to pay you! I'm not going to let you take me for free."
"Well I would love to get paid," I admit. "But I don't see how you're going to do that. Anyway, don't worry about it. I'm going to get you there one way or the other."
When we arrive at the Empress, he instructs me to wait. "I'm going to pay you! You can't leave. Wait right here."
I really don't want to waste any more time. I hand him my business card and say, "If you think about it later and want to get in touch with me and pay me, that would be great. But it's no big deal. Anyway, have a great night. I need to get moving."
"No, no" he says shouting. "Please, I can't let you leave without paying you. I'm going to pay you. Just wait two seconds! Just two seconds!"
"OK, I say. Two seconds." I watch as he walks up to the counter and begins talking to the clerk, apparently a replay of the conversation with the guy at the daiquiri shop. It's been two seconds. I start pedaling away. He runs out after me yelling, "No, no I've got to pay you!"
And just then he reaches in his back pocket and pulls out his wallet again, and this time he pulls out an ATM card, which apparently had been in the pocket but not in the wallet. "Look!" he exclaims waving the card in my face.
"Glad you found it!" I say, riding away as fast as I can pump the pedals. There's no way in the world I'm letting that guy back on my bike to go searching for an ATM. If it were possible to peel out on a pedicab I would have done it.
Aiding and abetting
Later that night the hypothetical dilemma that I had discussed with the college kids presents itself. Two forlorn-looking young ladies are sitting on a dark sidewalk. I ask them if they need a ride, and they say, "We need to know where St. Louis Street is. We're parked on St. Louis, and we can't find it. Everybody keeps telling us different stuff, and we're totally lost!"
"I don't know where exactly on St. Louis you're parked, but St. Louis Street is just two blocks that way," I say, pointing.
"Are you sure?" they ask. "Because every time someone tells us somewhere to go we just end up more lost."
"Get on the bike," I tell them. "I'll take you there."
They protest that they don't have any money, but I'm in hero mode now. And anyway, St. Louis really is very close. "It's free," I say. "Hop on!" They obey.
Along the way, they offer me booze, Adderall, and cigarettes in lieu of cash. I turn all of these down. It soon becomes apparent that, while they're not nearly as drunk as that other guy, they're clearly not in any condition to be behind the wheel. Nevertheless, I deliver them safely to their car, hoping fervently that they won't hurt themselves or anyone else on their way home.
What really happens
Thinking back on the sweet college kids and their flattering assessment of my colleagues and me, it occurs to me just how wrong they are. The scenario they described -- driving drunks home so that they don't have to drive -- rarely if ever happens with a pedicab. When it comes to taking intoxicated people places, here are the actual scenarios that we regularly encounter in our work:
1. Transporting drunks tourist back to their hotel rooms, e.g., the guy at the Empress. In this case, I'm preventing drunk walking, not drunk driving. I heard a guy on the radio one time arguing that, statistically, drunk walking is more dangerous than drunk driving. So maybe in this scenario we really are saving lives. But saving the life of an irresponsible person (the drunk pedestrian) seems much less heroic than saving the life of an innocent person (the drunk driver's victim).
2. Transporting drunken locals home. This would almost always apply to those locals who live within the relatively small radius in which pedicabs commonly operate: the French Quarter, the Marigny, the Central Business District, and the Warehouse District. In other words, these are people who haven't driven anywhere in the first place. Once again, we may be preventing drunk walking, but not drunk driving. New Orleanians who live in more far-flung parts of the city would invariably take a taxi home rather than a pedicab. As much as it pains me to admit it, taxi drivers are the ones who are doing the heroic work of keeping drunk drivers off the streets.
3. Transporting drunks (locals or tourists) between bars, strip clubs, the casino, restaurants, etc. This is a big part of what we do, but not much heroic here.
4. Transporting drunken locals to their parked cars, e.g, the two young ladies. This is the troubling scenario in which we may actually be enabling drunk driving. Whatever hero status we might legitimately claim for numbers 1 and 2 is canceled out by this. But how can we avoid it? Once again, I'd love to hear from my readers.
Back to those three college kids at the beginning. I think that they were right about at least one thing. We pedicabbies do have some heroic calves!
So I'm hanging out in front of Lafitte's Blacksmith Shop last night waiting for a fare, and there are three college kids hanging out there as well. One male and two female. Good-looking kids, from Alabama if I remember right. Not wasted, but drunk enough to be pretty happy.
We start chatting, and they mention the name of a pedicab colleague and ask if I know him, and I say, "Yeah, I know who he is but don't really know him very well."
And they say, "Well, he's a real American hero! And so are you. So are all you pedicab guys."
And I say, "Really? What makes us heroes?"
And they say, "Because you save lives!... That and your calves."
And I ask, "How do we save lives?"
And they say, "Because you take drunk people home so they don't have to drive."
They ask me if I know the real American heroes song from the Bud Light commercial, and I say, "No, not really. I was out of the country for a long time, so I probably missed it.
One of the girls says, "Well Nate here can sing it for you. Can't you, Nate?" (I'm calling him "Nate" here, but I don't really remember the dude's name.)
And Nate says, "Sure!" And he serenades me with the advertising jingle -- cheerfully and badly.
And I say, "Well sometimes I don't feel so heroic because a lot of times I get drunk people on the pedicab who want me to take them to their car, and I really don't know what to do. Because the right thing to do is probably to take their car keys from them and throw them as far as I can, but I don't really have the balls to do that. So I always end up taking them to their car, and I worry about it. What do you think I should do in those situations?"
And they say, "Wow, we hadn't thought about that! That's a tough one. We don't know what you should do in a situation like that."
And I say, "Well, I write a blog about this job, so maybe I'll write a post about this and see if my readers have any wisdom to offer me." So here it is, dear readers. Jump in.
Playing the hero
Later that night I'm back in front of Lafitte's, and this drunk guy walks up. He can barely keep his feet.
"Where's Ursa...Ursa..." he stumbles, trying to pronounce "Ursulines."
"Ursulines Street?" I prompt. "It's just one block over."
"What about Bourbon Street?" he asks.
"You're on Bourbon Street," I answer. "This is Bourbon Street right here!"
"Oh," he says. "Life's a bitch", and he wanders off while I stand there wondering what the connection might be between Bourbon Street and "Life's a bitch." Who knows? Anyway, I'm not sorry to see him go.
Then he apparently changes his mind and wanders back in my direction. "How much to take me to Ursa...Ursa...?" He still can't get his tongue around the word.
"Which block of Ursulines do you need to get to?" I ask.
"The Empress Hotel," he replies, his speech so slurred that I can barely understand him. The Empress is a notoriously nasty place in a sketchy neighborhood. Actually, it's so bad that the reviews make really entertaining reading!
I'm counting up the blocks in my head to quote him a price, when he plops down in the seat of the pedicab and says, "OK, how much just to ride around?"
It makes me nervous whenever drunk people sit down on the pedicab before we've worked out where we're going and how much they're going to pay. But I answer him respectfully. "Well that would be a dollar a minute. Twenty dollars for a twenty minute ride, for example."
"OK, I'll give you twenty dollars just to ride me around." He takes his wallet out and fumbles with it for a couple of minutes. Finally he turns it upside down and shakes the entire contents out on the seat of the pedicab: a couple of business cards and a single dollar bill.
"OK, take me to an ATM," He says.
Against my better judgment I agree to do the ride. Along the way he blurts out, apropos of nothing, "You gotta pay the piper!"
"Um, yeah," I say to be agreeable. "You've definitely got to pay the piper."
He mumbles something else, the only part of which I catch is "I just want to be left alone."
I'm sure that this is not directed at me, so once again I decide just to go along. "Yeah, we all want to be left alone, don't we?" I say.
I take him to a little daiquiri shop on Decatur Street with an ATM just inside the front door. I sit outside and watch as he stumbles up to the machine, pulls his wallet out, and fumbles with it again, this time dropping the contents onto the floor. He shuffles through them, unable to find the ATM card. Finally he chooses one of the business cards and stands there stabbing at the ATM slot, so drunk that he lacks the dexterity to actually insert the card.
By this time, it's clear to me that there's no way I'm not going to get paid for this ride. I consider riding away. I don't owe this guy anything, do I? To the contrary, he owes me! I'm supposed to pay $155 to lease the bike tonight, and I can't afford to be wasting time like this. On the other hand, this guy is now several blocks farther from his hotel than when we started our little ride. And if I don't take him, how's he ever going to get back?
I watch as he finally gives up on the ATM and walks up to the counter to talk to the bartender. I sit there stewing while they converse for a couple of minutes. It's obvious that this isn't going anywhere. What was he expecting the bartender to do for him?
Still tempted to cut my losses and run, I'm remembering those college kids earlier who said that I was a hero because I take drunk people home. So I decide to live up to their estimation of me and be a hero. I'm going to get this guy back to his hotel. As I walk up I hear the bartender telling him, "You need to leave. You're so drunk that you don't know what you're doing. I'm sorry, I can't help you."
"Get on the bike," I order the drunk guy. "I'm taking you back to your hotel for free." Looking defeated, he stumbles along behind me and collapses into the passenger seat.
Along the way he suddenly blurts out with some new-found (and completely unfounded) resolve, "I'm going to pay you! I'm not going to let you take me for free."
"Well I would love to get paid," I admit. "But I don't see how you're going to do that. Anyway, don't worry about it. I'm going to get you there one way or the other."
When we arrive at the Empress, he instructs me to wait. "I'm going to pay you! You can't leave. Wait right here."
I really don't want to waste any more time. I hand him my business card and say, "If you think about it later and want to get in touch with me and pay me, that would be great. But it's no big deal. Anyway, have a great night. I need to get moving."
"No, no" he says shouting. "Please, I can't let you leave without paying you. I'm going to pay you. Just wait two seconds! Just two seconds!"
"OK, I say. Two seconds." I watch as he walks up to the counter and begins talking to the clerk, apparently a replay of the conversation with the guy at the daiquiri shop. It's been two seconds. I start pedaling away. He runs out after me yelling, "No, no I've got to pay you!"
And just then he reaches in his back pocket and pulls out his wallet again, and this time he pulls out an ATM card, which apparently had been in the pocket but not in the wallet. "Look!" he exclaims waving the card in my face.
"Glad you found it!" I say, riding away as fast as I can pump the pedals. There's no way in the world I'm letting that guy back on my bike to go searching for an ATM. If it were possible to peel out on a pedicab I would have done it.
Aiding and abetting
Later that night the hypothetical dilemma that I had discussed with the college kids presents itself. Two forlorn-looking young ladies are sitting on a dark sidewalk. I ask them if they need a ride, and they say, "We need to know where St. Louis Street is. We're parked on St. Louis, and we can't find it. Everybody keeps telling us different stuff, and we're totally lost!"
"I don't know where exactly on St. Louis you're parked, but St. Louis Street is just two blocks that way," I say, pointing.
"Are you sure?" they ask. "Because every time someone tells us somewhere to go we just end up more lost."
"Get on the bike," I tell them. "I'll take you there."
They protest that they don't have any money, but I'm in hero mode now. And anyway, St. Louis really is very close. "It's free," I say. "Hop on!" They obey.
Along the way, they offer me booze, Adderall, and cigarettes in lieu of cash. I turn all of these down. It soon becomes apparent that, while they're not nearly as drunk as that other guy, they're clearly not in any condition to be behind the wheel. Nevertheless, I deliver them safely to their car, hoping fervently that they won't hurt themselves or anyone else on their way home.
What really happens
Thinking back on the sweet college kids and their flattering assessment of my colleagues and me, it occurs to me just how wrong they are. The scenario they described -- driving drunks home so that they don't have to drive -- rarely if ever happens with a pedicab. When it comes to taking intoxicated people places, here are the actual scenarios that we regularly encounter in our work:
1. Transporting drunks tourist back to their hotel rooms, e.g., the guy at the Empress. In this case, I'm preventing drunk walking, not drunk driving. I heard a guy on the radio one time arguing that, statistically, drunk walking is more dangerous than drunk driving. So maybe in this scenario we really are saving lives. But saving the life of an irresponsible person (the drunk pedestrian) seems much less heroic than saving the life of an innocent person (the drunk driver's victim).
2. Transporting drunken locals home. This would almost always apply to those locals who live within the relatively small radius in which pedicabs commonly operate: the French Quarter, the Marigny, the Central Business District, and the Warehouse District. In other words, these are people who haven't driven anywhere in the first place. Once again, we may be preventing drunk walking, but not drunk driving. New Orleanians who live in more far-flung parts of the city would invariably take a taxi home rather than a pedicab. As much as it pains me to admit it, taxi drivers are the ones who are doing the heroic work of keeping drunk drivers off the streets.
3. Transporting drunks (locals or tourists) between bars, strip clubs, the casino, restaurants, etc. This is a big part of what we do, but not much heroic here.
4. Transporting drunken locals to their parked cars, e.g, the two young ladies. This is the troubling scenario in which we may actually be enabling drunk driving. Whatever hero status we might legitimately claim for numbers 1 and 2 is canceled out by this. But how can we avoid it? Once again, I'd love to hear from my readers.
Back to those three college kids at the beginning. I think that they were right about at least one thing. We pedicabbies do have some heroic calves!
Saturday, March 23, 2013
A hard luck story: How the Super Bowl turned out to be a super bust
Content warning: The blog post that you are about to view contains whining. Don't say you weren't warned.
With New Orleans set to host Super Bowl XLVII right smack dab in the middle of Carnival season, the world was waiting for party-geddon. From the time that I first started pedicabbing in November 2011 I had been anticipating this with a mixture of dread and delight: dread at the disruption that would be brought on by all the congestion and chaos; delight at the dollars I would be making from the crowds. It was going to be a big mess, no question; but at least it was going to be a very profitable mess.
...followed by desperation
Making a living off tourism in New Orleans is a little like farming. In the first place, there are seasonal rhythms. The autumn and spring are good times; winter is meager; and summer is worse. We also face other fluctuations, which unlike the annual rhythms are next to impossible to predict: droughts and bumper crops, if you will.
In line with the typical seasonal patterns, this past summer was slow. You can't blame the tourists for staying away really. Spending your summer vacation in 97 degree heat and 98 percent humidity is bearable only at the beach -- and then only barely. Unfortunately, New Orleans is separated from the sea, not by a narrow strip of sugar-white sand, but by 60 miles of mosquito- and alligator-infested marsh. In addition to this all-around lack of carriage-ride candidates, there were plenty of days when we weren't able to work more than a couple of hours before the temperature hit 95 degrees, at which point municipal law requires us to take the mules back to the barn.
This was my first summer in the tourism industry, so I had no frame of reference, but my carriage driver colleagues all said that they had seen worse. As summers go, this one was not bad at all, they said. Most of them had set aside money during the easy months of March and April, so they had plenty of reserves to carry them through. Unfortunately, I had started driving the carriage in May, just about the time that things were starting to slow down. Then, right in the middle of the summer, my ex-wife and I had to move out of the house we had been sharing in Slidell and set up separate houses here on the South Shore. Naturally, this move entailed a lot of extra expenses.
When I first started driving the carriage, my intention had been to continue working an occasional shift on the pedicab just for the pleasure of it. As it turned out, I found myself forced by circumstances to work five day-shifts on the carriage and three night-shifts on the pedicab every week -- the equivalent of eight days work a week! I wouldn't have imagined myself capable of maintaining this kind of pace till I actually had to do it. In a way, it turned out to be kind of fun.
Even when it wasn't all that fun, I faced the exhaustion with the confidence that this was only for a little while. October was coming. October was always a great month, my carriage-driver colleagues assured me. Then after that... THE SUPER BOWL AND MARDI GRAS ALL AT THE SAME TIME! That promise of easy money ahead made it possible for me to keep pushing my limits.
...then disappointment
We had a couple of good days early in October, then things fizzled. The old-timers complained that they hadn't seen such a slow October since the year Katrina hit. The crowds of visitors were much thinner than usual; and even when you did manage to load up the carriage, it was getting harder and harder to conduct a tour. The big event was months away, but the chaos and congestion had already commenced. Streets were being repaved, hotels renovated, sidewalks resurfaced. Every tour demanded an elaborate detour. Navigating the mules past cement mixers, jackhammers, and blow torches often transformed what would otherwise have been a sleepy stroll through the old streets into extreme adventure tourism.
And that was on the days that we were actually able to get out and work. There were many days when Decatur Street was shut down, and we couldn't even access our hack stand (the area in front of Jackson Square where we park our carriages and load up for tours). Conditions became so difficult and dangerous that the company excused even experienced drivers from showing up for work.
One day, in the middle of this mess when we had already missed a lot of work, we got word that Decatur Street was going to be open, and we all showed up eager to make some money. Once we got out to Jackson Square it turned out that they were setting up a stage in our spot, so once again we couldn't access our hack stand. Improvising, I headed up Saint Louis Street looking for a place to park. I found myself threading the carriage through a tight spot between a parked taxi on my left and a dumpster on my right, which had been placed there to collect construction waste from the renovation of a hotel. Just as I was navigating this narrow corridor, a construction worker slung a strip of plastic strapping into the dumpster right at the eye level of my mule. The startled mule leaped a foot to the left, causing the carriage to clip the taxi. It didn't look like a lot of damage, but it ended up costing the company $1,900.
On the pedicab, the construction projects were nothing more than a minor annoyance. But there was still the other problem that there just too few tourists in town -- and even fewer who were in a mood to ride. One miserable night in early December I set a record low for money made in a shift on the pedicab. Then I broke that record on the very next shift. Then I broke it again. And again. There were nights in December and January when I was going home with less than $30. (I have to admit that I don't really know whether this had anything to do with the impending Super Bowl. Maybe it would have been an exceptionally slow winter anyway.)
The closer we got to game day, the worse things got. Just when things were at their slowest, the mule carriages were displaced yet again from the hack stand while CBS spent several days hauling in and setting up the stages and equipment to turn Jackson Square into a big TV studio. I remember one day during this time when I managed to do three tours. Under normal circumstances this would have been a D+ performance, but on that particular occasion my colleagues teased me about being the big booker. There were only five tours in total done by all the carriage drivers who showed up to work that day in the city of New Orleans!
Through all the hot, hungry days of my rookie summer there had never been a day that I had gone home after a full shift without having done a single tour. There had been some "two-and-through" days and even a few "one-and-done" days, but I had never "blanked". Then, in the last two weeks before the Super Bowl, I blanked -- not once, but twice. There was a grim joke making its way up and down the buggy line those days: "We can't wait for August to come around so we can finally make money!" It was too close to the truth to be very funny.
Carriage drivers and pedicabbies weren't the only ones suffering. The experience of one of the artists who sells his work at Jackson Square closely mirrored mine. In the days leading up to the Super Bowl, there were two occasions when he spent the entire day out at the Square and failed to sell a single painting. Like me, this had never happened to him before in his career. The difference was that I had been been a buggy driver for only eight months; he had been selling artwork at Jackson Square for eight years!
Hotel and restaurant workers reported similar experiences. An online article in NolaVie contained a poignant passage which bears quoting verbatim: To those voices that were not heard, I dedicate today's column. I dedicate it to the hotel housekeeper who works in a mid-sized French Quarter hotel for $8 an hour. The housekeeper whose shift was cut in half, two days in a row, because scores of guests who had pre-paid the four-night minimum stay simply decided not to show up until Saturday afternoon. Losing $800 or more of your pre-payment isn't that big of a deal, I guess, when you're paying in excess of $1500 for one seat to one game. But losing 8 hours of work is a big deal... when you make $8 an hour. This is the kind of thing that makes me want to go join an occupy protest.
According to USA Today the NFL had an agreement with the city by which they blocked out 90% of the 30,000 hotel rooms in the New Orleans area. Many of the remaining 10 percent were snatched up by corporations, the article reported. This helps to explain why there weren't many tourists in town the last week before the big game. But it doesn't really do much to explain three terrible months.
...and finally a little relief
On the morning of Friday, the 1st of February -- two days before game day -- my landlord called, and I didn't answer. I didn't have the money to pay the rent, and I couldn't bring myself to face telling him that.
That day turned out OK. Kind of an average Friday. Which is to say much, much better than the preceding days had been, but still nothing that even remotely resembled the kind of Friday I would have expected just two days before the Super Bowl.
The next morning, Saturday, the 2nd, the landlord called again. This time I forced myself to pick it up. "I'm really sorry, but I just don't have it," I told him. I'll give you half now, and try to give the rest as soon as I can. I'm really sorry. I've never been in this situation before, but things have been hard lately."
He was gracious. He told me that I was a good tenant and that we would work something out. How soon could I come up with the other half? he asked. I told him that I really didn't know but that I would do my best.
Twenty-four hours later I had made more than $1,100! I worked the carriage all day and the pedicab all night, setting personal records on both.
The pedicab actually turned out to be more profitable than the carriage. The rides were pretty much non-stop, and people were practically throwing money at me. The shift began at 6 PM. I hadn't eaten since early that morning, but I didn't want to stop accepting rides and go out of my way to get something to eat. I figured that sooner or later I would find myself between rides at a spot where I could grab some food. As it turned out, it was definitely later rather than sooner. 11:10 PM to be precise. Looking back, I know that I was a bit irritable because I was so hungry. Ordinarily, I don't make make much money on the pedicab if I'm not in a good mood; but this was one night where you could get away with being a bit rude.
I went home after the shift and collapsed in bed, calculating that I had just enough time for a 30 minute nap before I had to get up and get ready to ride out on the carriage again. Fifteen minutes later I got a call from an old friend in Kosovo. No matter. Life was good. I didn't know what time my landlord usually woke up, but it took all the will power I could muster to wait till 7 AM to call him with the good news: "You can stop by and get your check. I've got it all!"
That Super Bowl Eve had turned out to be a super day for me -- a day in which I made more money than I had ever made in a 24 hour period in my life. But that one gully washer didn't begin to make up for the three months of severe drought that had preceded it. I was thrilled to be able to pay the rent, but it would be several more weeks before I was caught up on all my bills.
Super Bowl Sunday itself was mediocre. No surprise really. Nobody had carriage tours on their mind that day. At the end of the day, having missed the chance to give Joe Montana a ride, I went home and went to bed. I slept right through the game. I didn't know about the blackout till the next day.
Having survived the Super Bowl, I don't think that I would wish the experience on my worst enemy. Actually... I'm lying. The next time they're looking to pick a host city, I think that I'm going to volunteer to head up the committee to lure the game to Atlanta. Wouldn't that be sweet!
Friday, February 22, 2013
Sound bites and snippets (some sexy)
A female passenger is making complimentary comments on my butt then starts grabbing it. I whirl around. "It's OK," she reassures me. "I'm allowed to do this. I'm a nurse."
(By the way, this kind of thing happens to my co-workers and me on a pretty regular basis. Oddly enough, I'm pretty sure that we male pedicabbies get more sexual harassment than our female colleagues. Although at this stage in my life, it's hard not to think of this as more a job perk than harassment. Oh yeah, and nurses are generally the worst!)
A couple of middle-aged local men are griping about the price of the ride. "We could get a cab for cheaper! How can you charge more than a cab?" It's the night before Super Bowl, and I'm on the way to setting a personal record. People are pretty much throwing 50s and 100s around, and I'm not in the mood for this. I'm not charging a penny more than the legal price, but this isn't a night for doing discounts either.
"We're not trying to compete with the cabs on price," I explain. "We're offering a better experience."
"So how is this a better experience?" they challenge me.
"Well for one thing, I'm more charming than your average cab driver. But if you don't want to ride with me, I'll be happy to help you hail a cab."
"You're getting less charming by the minute," one of them grumbles.
In the end, they get off without paying, and I'm relieved to see them go.
A couple of 20-30 something male passengers, evidently hyper-sensitive to the sensual connotations of sharing the passenger seat of the pedicab, shout out to everybody we pass: "WE'RE NOT GAY!" I wonder whether they're trying to convince the strangers on the street or themselves.
I ride by a group of gorgeous girls and hear one of them say (loudly enough to be sure that I don't miss it): "God, why are they all so hot? Is it like a job qualification or something?"
I look around to see if there are any other pedicabs in sight. "Yeah, I'm talking about you!" she says, reading my reaction.
My pedicab floats about six inches off the ground the rest of my shift.
(By the way, here's someone making pretty much the same observation online -- but in this case a gay guy in a different city.)
I'm dropping off a middle-aged resident of the French Quarter at her historic Creole cottage. "I hear the tour guides telling people that this was the home of a famous madame," she says. "Which is kind of funny. I haven't had a date in seven years!"
I pick up a young couple. "Bret?" asks the female hesitantly as she settles into the seat.
"No, my name's Mark," I respond.
"Wow, you look just like this guy we know named Bret," she says.
"Yeah, totally! Dead ringer," her date agrees.
"Wow, this Bret guy must be really good-looking," I say, emboldened by all the positive attention I've been getting on the bike lately.
"Actually, yes," she says. "He used to be a male stripper,"
(By the way, this kind of thing happens to my co-workers and me on a pretty regular basis. Oddly enough, I'm pretty sure that we male pedicabbies get more sexual harassment than our female colleagues. Although at this stage in my life, it's hard not to think of this as more a job perk than harassment. Oh yeah, and nurses are generally the worst!)
__________
"We're not trying to compete with the cabs on price," I explain. "We're offering a better experience."
"So how is this a better experience?" they challenge me.
"Well for one thing, I'm more charming than your average cab driver. But if you don't want to ride with me, I'll be happy to help you hail a cab."
"You're getting less charming by the minute," one of them grumbles.
In the end, they get off without paying, and I'm relieved to see them go.
__________
__________
I look around to see if there are any other pedicabs in sight. "Yeah, I'm talking about you!" she says, reading my reaction.
My pedicab floats about six inches off the ground the rest of my shift.
(By the way, here's someone making pretty much the same observation online -- but in this case a gay guy in a different city.)
__________
I'm dropping off a middle-aged resident of the French Quarter at her historic Creole cottage. "I hear the tour guides telling people that this was the home of a famous madame," she says. "Which is kind of funny. I haven't had a date in seven years!"
__________
"No, my name's Mark," I respond.
"Wow, you look just like this guy we know named Bret," she says.
"Yeah, totally! Dead ringer," her date agrees.
"Wow, this Bret guy must be really good-looking," I say, emboldened by all the positive attention I've been getting on the bike lately.
"Actually, yes," she says. "He used to be a male stripper,"
__________
Thursday, February 7, 2013
Driving the mule by day, being the mule at night
Swinging both ways
Not long ago I was out on the big yellow trike, and I ran into a guy who had recently started pedicabbing for one of the other companies. He looked at me, did a double-take, and blurted out, "Didn't I see you earlier today on the mule carriage?"
"Yes, it's true," I said, amused at the look of amazement on his face. "I swing both ways!"
It's noteworthy that in New Orleans of all places, where almost nothing is shocking, my career combination strikes people as being so strange. New Orleans is notorious for cops moonlighting as robbers -- or vice versa. But a carriage driver who also drives a pedicab? Now that's just weird!
Bad blood
The mule carriage and taxicab companies fought tooth and nail to prevent the introduction of pedicabs to New Orleans. There was a two-and-a-half year legal battle before the city finally passed a law allowing pedicabs to operate. As a concession to the carriage companies, pedicabbies were forbidden to do tours -- even if they were licensed tour guides. The bitter aftertaste of that legal battle still lingers. (See here for a reference in one of my early blog posts to carriage drivers as "the enemy".) Both sets of colleagues constantly complain to me about the a**holes on the other side.
There are current points of conflict as well. One frequent flash point is the intersection of Saint Ann and Decatur in front of Cafe du Monde. Technically it's illegal to do a U-turn there, but there's a kind of understanding between mule drivers and the police that we have to be able to do a U-turn in order to do our jobs -- with the added understanding that we have to be extra careful not to run over pedestrians in the crosswalk or run into cars. On the other hand, it's technically illegal for pedicabs to park at that intersection (or anywhere else for that matter), but there's a kind of understanding between pedicabbies and the police that we really need to be able to park there sometimes in order to do our jobs -- with the added understanding that we have to be extra careful not to block pedestrians or the handicapped parking spot. Pedicabs and carriages often get in one another's way at this intersection, and whenever this happens both parties protest vociferously that the police aren't enforcing the law on those a**holes on the other side.
There is a general perception on the part of my colleagues on both sides that the police are lenient toward "them" and strict on "us". Neither side has trouble finding ammo.
Exhibit A: There are strict municipal dress codes for both buggy drivers and pedicabbies. Pedicabbies are sometimes levied outrageous fines for offenses as trivial as wearing a baseball cap that is not an official part of the uniform. Buggy drivers, on the other hand flaunt the dress code day in and day out with complete impunity.
Exhibit B: The police routinely harass and fine mule carriage drivers for being illegally parked. They rarely bother pedicabbies for the same offense. (Some carriage drivers claim that pedicabbies never get tickets for illegal parking, but this is definitely not true.)
I don't want to make things sound worse than they are. There are plenty of pleasant exchanges between carriage drivers and pedicabbies. A lot of carriage drivers regularly ride on pedicabs -- and not just mine. I can hear my colleagues on both sides saying, "I really don't have anything against them. It's just that..." But the way I see it, as long as everybody feels obligated to tack on that "It's-just-that..." disclaimer, the situation has plenty of room for improvement.
How it happened
I began pedicabbing in November 2011. One day, not long after starting the job, I was pedaling past a mule-drawn carriage parked at the corner of Bourbon and St. Phillip, and I heard the driver call out my name. I turned around to see an old friend from my church youth group sitting in the driver's seat of the carriage. We hadn't seen one another in more than 25 years.
I'm sure that we must have said some of the normal things that you always say when you run into an old friend with whom you had lost contact many years ago. (Great to see you again! What have you been up to all these years? Looking good!) But to tell the truth, I don't remember any of that. All I remember was his blunt question: "Why are you doing that and not this?"
"Why should I be doing that?" I countered. "I LOVE pedicabbing!"
Over the next couple of months as my friend and I renewed our acquaintance he told me more about his job and why he enjoyed it so much. Meanwhile I was starting to realize that, as much as I loved pedicabbing, I wasn't making enough money at it to support my family, especially given the fact that we were starting a new life in a new place.
I started driving the mule carriage in May. These days I drive the carriage five days a week and the pedicab 2-3 nights a week. I recognize that I can't keep up this kind of pace forever, but right now I really need the income from both jobs. Even if I didn't need the money, I would have a very hard time giving up the pedicab because I enjoy it so much.
Being a bridge
During my years in the Balkans, I always hoped to be a force for understanding and reconciliation. I would like to think that I had some kind of small-scale impact. I'd like to think that... Anyway, having failed to bring a deep and lasting peace between Albanians and Serbs, maybe I'm ready to take on a more manageable project.
Not that I'm claiming to be unbiased. One thing I've learned in life is that nobody is ever unbiased. In practical terms, I probably have much more in common with the carriage drivers; but emotionally I identify much more strongly with the pedicabbies. At any rate, I walk in both worlds, and I have a unique perspective.
Night before last I went to a concert and brought a fellow buggy driver along with me. One of my pedicab colleagues was a member of the group that was performing, and there were a couple of other pedicabbies who turned out to hear her sing as well. After it was over, all of us -- pedicabbies, the other buggy driver, and me -- went out for drinks, and we had a wonderful time. This might have been a first.
If anybody knows anybody on the committee for the Nobel Peace Prize, feel free to drop my name!
Not long ago I was out on the big yellow trike, and I ran into a guy who had recently started pedicabbing for one of the other companies. He looked at me, did a double-take, and blurted out, "Didn't I see you earlier today on the mule carriage?"
"Yes, it's true," I said, amused at the look of amazement on his face. "I swing both ways!"
It's noteworthy that in New Orleans of all places, where almost nothing is shocking, my career combination strikes people as being so strange. New Orleans is notorious for cops moonlighting as robbers -- or vice versa. But a carriage driver who also drives a pedicab? Now that's just weird!
Bad blood
The mule carriage and taxicab companies fought tooth and nail to prevent the introduction of pedicabs to New Orleans. There was a two-and-a-half year legal battle before the city finally passed a law allowing pedicabs to operate. As a concession to the carriage companies, pedicabbies were forbidden to do tours -- even if they were licensed tour guides. The bitter aftertaste of that legal battle still lingers. (See here for a reference in one of my early blog posts to carriage drivers as "the enemy".) Both sets of colleagues constantly complain to me about the a**holes on the other side.
There are current points of conflict as well. One frequent flash point is the intersection of Saint Ann and Decatur in front of Cafe du Monde. Technically it's illegal to do a U-turn there, but there's a kind of understanding between mule drivers and the police that we have to be able to do a U-turn in order to do our jobs -- with the added understanding that we have to be extra careful not to run over pedestrians in the crosswalk or run into cars. On the other hand, it's technically illegal for pedicabs to park at that intersection (or anywhere else for that matter), but there's a kind of understanding between pedicabbies and the police that we really need to be able to park there sometimes in order to do our jobs -- with the added understanding that we have to be extra careful not to block pedestrians or the handicapped parking spot. Pedicabs and carriages often get in one another's way at this intersection, and whenever this happens both parties protest vociferously that the police aren't enforcing the law on those a**holes on the other side.
There is a general perception on the part of my colleagues on both sides that the police are lenient toward "them" and strict on "us". Neither side has trouble finding ammo.
Exhibit A: There are strict municipal dress codes for both buggy drivers and pedicabbies. Pedicabbies are sometimes levied outrageous fines for offenses as trivial as wearing a baseball cap that is not an official part of the uniform. Buggy drivers, on the other hand flaunt the dress code day in and day out with complete impunity.
Exhibit B: The police routinely harass and fine mule carriage drivers for being illegally parked. They rarely bother pedicabbies for the same offense. (Some carriage drivers claim that pedicabbies never get tickets for illegal parking, but this is definitely not true.)
I don't want to make things sound worse than they are. There are plenty of pleasant exchanges between carriage drivers and pedicabbies. A lot of carriage drivers regularly ride on pedicabs -- and not just mine. I can hear my colleagues on both sides saying, "I really don't have anything against them. It's just that..." But the way I see it, as long as everybody feels obligated to tack on that "It's-just-that..." disclaimer, the situation has plenty of room for improvement.
How it happened
I began pedicabbing in November 2011. One day, not long after starting the job, I was pedaling past a mule-drawn carriage parked at the corner of Bourbon and St. Phillip, and I heard the driver call out my name. I turned around to see an old friend from my church youth group sitting in the driver's seat of the carriage. We hadn't seen one another in more than 25 years.
I'm sure that we must have said some of the normal things that you always say when you run into an old friend with whom you had lost contact many years ago. (Great to see you again! What have you been up to all these years? Looking good!) But to tell the truth, I don't remember any of that. All I remember was his blunt question: "Why are you doing that and not this?"
"Why should I be doing that?" I countered. "I LOVE pedicabbing!"
Over the next couple of months as my friend and I renewed our acquaintance he told me more about his job and why he enjoyed it so much. Meanwhile I was starting to realize that, as much as I loved pedicabbing, I wasn't making enough money at it to support my family, especially given the fact that we were starting a new life in a new place.
I started driving the mule carriage in May. These days I drive the carriage five days a week and the pedicab 2-3 nights a week. I recognize that I can't keep up this kind of pace forever, but right now I really need the income from both jobs. Even if I didn't need the money, I would have a very hard time giving up the pedicab because I enjoy it so much.
Being a bridge
During my years in the Balkans, I always hoped to be a force for understanding and reconciliation. I would like to think that I had some kind of small-scale impact. I'd like to think that... Anyway, having failed to bring a deep and lasting peace between Albanians and Serbs, maybe I'm ready to take on a more manageable project.
Not that I'm claiming to be unbiased. One thing I've learned in life is that nobody is ever unbiased. In practical terms, I probably have much more in common with the carriage drivers; but emotionally I identify much more strongly with the pedicabbies. At any rate, I walk in both worlds, and I have a unique perspective.
Night before last I went to a concert and brought a fellow buggy driver along with me. One of my pedicab colleagues was a member of the group that was performing, and there were a couple of other pedicabbies who turned out to hear her sing as well. After it was over, all of us -- pedicabbies, the other buggy driver, and me -- went out for drinks, and we had a wonderful time. This might have been a first.
If anybody knows anybody on the committee for the Nobel Peace Prize, feel free to drop my name!
Tuesday, February 5, 2013
No special treatment
All day Saturday I had worked the mule carriage (my day job if you haven't heard by now) showing off my city to Super Bowl guests. Then Rock (the mule I'm driving these days) and I headed back toward the stable, threading through the throngs of football fans who were choking the narrow French Quarter streets, moving as quickly as we could without trampling anyone. Back at the barn I unharnessed Rock and put him in his stall; dropped the day's earning in the safe; hopped on my bike and pedaled furiously back through the crowded streets to the Bike Taxi Unlimited shop where I quickly changed into my uniform and set out on the big yellow tricycle just in time for the beginning of the 6 PM shift.
The money was flowing, which was nice because the last couple of months have been brutal. I worked through the night allowing myself just enough time to bike home for a quick shower and a 30-minute nap before biking back to the stable to work the carriage again on Sunday morning. That was the plan. As it turned out, I was about 15 minutes into what was supposed to have been that 30-minute nap when I got a phone call from an old friend in Kosovo. How was he to know? And what difference does 15 minutes make anyway?
All that to say that I was sleep deprived. It's important to mention that before I start to tell my story. I don't know exactly how things might have turned out if I had had a good night's sleep and all my wits about me, but I'm pretty sure that it would have been different.
Anyway, it was late in the afternoon on Super Sunday. I had done a few tours, but by this time the crowds were streaming up Decatur toward the Superdome, a counter current to the Mighty Mississippi just across the levee. Under different circumstances I might have been looking forward to watching the big game that evening, but on this occasion the thought didn't even enter my mind. All I wanted was sleep.
I was standing there by my buggy waiting for the word from my supervisor to head back to the barn, when a man walked up and asked, "How much to take my friends and me down to Canal? We just don't feel like walking."
I looked up at him. He was a couple inches taller than me, attractive, fit, about my age or maybe a few years older. I knew this guy from somewhere, I was pretty certain of that. But in my sleep-deprived state, I couldn't quite place who he was. We must have met before, but he wasn't showing any sign of recognizing me. Maybe it was an old friend testing me to see if I would remember him.
I hesitated, almost ready to say: "I'm really sorry. I know that we've met somewhere, but I can't quite place you. I'm Mark..."
But at the last second I aborted that plan and decided to simply address his question. Which raised another issue. I wasn't at all sure know how to address his question.
"Uh, we don't usually do drop-offs," I said. "I mean, I could take you if you want, but I would probably have to charge you for a full tour." This is company policy under normal circumstances, but we had been given a little bit more discretion over the last few days. I could have consulted with my supervisor, and he probably would have allowed me to offer this guy some kind of deal. The truth was that I wasn't sure I really wanted to.
He stood there waiting for my answer, and I began giving mumbled voice to the debate inside my head. "Traffic's really bad now. I don't even know how long it might take me to get down to Canal and back. And with everything so crowded it might be a little bit dangerous..." I trailed off, still unsure of myself. All the while in the back of my mind I was still thinking: Where do I know this guy from?
"How many of you are there?" I asked. If I was going to quote a price, I needed to know.
"Nine," he answered.
"Oh, well that settles it then," I said, relieved that the decision was made. "I can take a maximum of eight passengers. It's the law. It's for the protection of the mules."
"OK, thank you anyway," the man said as he turned to walk away.
I looked back and realized that the buggy driver behind me was grinning and pointing excitedly at his carriage. "Oh!" I said quickly. "It looks like my colleague would be willing to give you a ride if you'd like to go with him."
"Thanks, but that's OK," the man said. "We'll just walk."
Just as he and his friends passed out of earshot, I heard a stranger in the crowd comment, "Damn! If Joe Montana had asked me for a ride, I would have figured out a way to make it happen!"
Joe Montana?
JOE MONTANA!
I considered running after him, chasing him down, pleading with him to get on my carriage. But that impulse vanished as quickly as it had flared up. It was better to let him go, to preserve what was left of my dignity, to face the fact that I had blown my big chance.
Looking back on the incident, I've been consoling myself with the thought that even though I missed the chance to be the guy that gave Joe Montana a buggy ride, I ended up placing myself in another elite category: I'm the guy who told Joe Montana no. I'll bet it had been a long time since anybody did that.
The money was flowing, which was nice because the last couple of months have been brutal. I worked through the night allowing myself just enough time to bike home for a quick shower and a 30-minute nap before biking back to the stable to work the carriage again on Sunday morning. That was the plan. As it turned out, I was about 15 minutes into what was supposed to have been that 30-minute nap when I got a phone call from an old friend in Kosovo. How was he to know? And what difference does 15 minutes make anyway?
All that to say that I was sleep deprived. It's important to mention that before I start to tell my story. I don't know exactly how things might have turned out if I had had a good night's sleep and all my wits about me, but I'm pretty sure that it would have been different.
Anyway, it was late in the afternoon on Super Sunday. I had done a few tours, but by this time the crowds were streaming up Decatur toward the Superdome, a counter current to the Mighty Mississippi just across the levee. Under different circumstances I might have been looking forward to watching the big game that evening, but on this occasion the thought didn't even enter my mind. All I wanted was sleep.
I was standing there by my buggy waiting for the word from my supervisor to head back to the barn, when a man walked up and asked, "How much to take my friends and me down to Canal? We just don't feel like walking."
I looked up at him. He was a couple inches taller than me, attractive, fit, about my age or maybe a few years older. I knew this guy from somewhere, I was pretty certain of that. But in my sleep-deprived state, I couldn't quite place who he was. We must have met before, but he wasn't showing any sign of recognizing me. Maybe it was an old friend testing me to see if I would remember him.
I hesitated, almost ready to say: "I'm really sorry. I know that we've met somewhere, but I can't quite place you. I'm Mark..."
But at the last second I aborted that plan and decided to simply address his question. Which raised another issue. I wasn't at all sure know how to address his question.
"Uh, we don't usually do drop-offs," I said. "I mean, I could take you if you want, but I would probably have to charge you for a full tour." This is company policy under normal circumstances, but we had been given a little bit more discretion over the last few days. I could have consulted with my supervisor, and he probably would have allowed me to offer this guy some kind of deal. The truth was that I wasn't sure I really wanted to.
He stood there waiting for my answer, and I began giving mumbled voice to the debate inside my head. "Traffic's really bad now. I don't even know how long it might take me to get down to Canal and back. And with everything so crowded it might be a little bit dangerous..." I trailed off, still unsure of myself. All the while in the back of my mind I was still thinking: Where do I know this guy from?
"How many of you are there?" I asked. If I was going to quote a price, I needed to know.
"Nine," he answered.
"Oh, well that settles it then," I said, relieved that the decision was made. "I can take a maximum of eight passengers. It's the law. It's for the protection of the mules."
"OK, thank you anyway," the man said as he turned to walk away.
I looked back and realized that the buggy driver behind me was grinning and pointing excitedly at his carriage. "Oh!" I said quickly. "It looks like my colleague would be willing to give you a ride if you'd like to go with him."
"Thanks, but that's OK," the man said. "We'll just walk."
Just as he and his friends passed out of earshot, I heard a stranger in the crowd comment, "Damn! If Joe Montana had asked me for a ride, I would have figured out a way to make it happen!"
Joe Montana?
JOE MONTANA!
I considered running after him, chasing him down, pleading with him to get on my carriage. But that impulse vanished as quickly as it had flared up. It was better to let him go, to preserve what was left of my dignity, to face the fact that I had blown my big chance.
Looking back on the incident, I've been consoling myself with the thought that even though I missed the chance to be the guy that gave Joe Montana a buggy ride, I ended up placing myself in another elite category: I'm the guy who told Joe Montana no. I'll bet it had been a long time since anybody did that.
Monday, January 28, 2013
Weddings
A colleague of mine commented a while back that one of the main reasons our job is so much fun is that we're working with happy people so much of the time. I think he has a point. In the first place, most of our passengers have come to the French Quarter for a good time, so they're already pre-disposed to have a pleasant experience on the pedicab. And let's face it: the pedicab isn't the cheapest way to get from Point A to Point B, so when people get on board the bike, they're generally expecting to have fun. When I'm hauling happy people around all night long, it's easy to be happy along with them. (I guess that pedicabbing is kind of the opposite of working in the complaints department or the emergency room.) All of this is amplified when it comes to weddings, which is why working weddings on the pedicab is such a treat to me.
There are two common kinds of wedding rides that we do. The first involves a distinct New Orleans tradition called the second line, a kind of parade, in which friends and family of the newlyweds strut and prance down the street waving white handkerchiefs and decorated parasols to the accompaniment of a brass band. Usually my role is to transport elderly or handicapped relatives and guests. (See here for the story of my first -- and most memorable by far -- second line experience.)
The use of pedicabs in second lines seems to me a clear case of an innovation that manages to enrich an already priceless tradition. Let's say the groom has a seventy-something-year-old grandmother with bad hips and knees. If her grandson had gotten married a year and a half ago (before the introduction of pedicabs to New Orleans in September 2011), she would have been excluded from the second line experience. Nowadays she rides like royalty right in the middle of the happy, hankie-waving throng.
The second kind of wedding ride involves transporting the new couple from the reception site to their hotel. Typically the newlyweds are giddy with love -- not to mention relief that the whole happy ordeal of the ceremony and reception is finally over. Their joy overflows not just to me but also to the people we pass on the street who shout out their congratulations as we roll by.
(By the way, I'm evidently uniquely qualified for this kind of ride. No less an authority than USA Today recognized riding with the Crescent City Pedicabbie as one of the most romantic things to do in New Orleans!)
Recently I did a wedding ride, which turned out a bit less pleasant. I had waited outside the reception venue for a good half hour till the party wound down enough for the couple to make a graceful exit. There's nothing unusual about this. Most wedding rides require a bit of waiting around on my part. Even 45 minutes or an hour is not uncommon. Naturally, I need to be compensated for my time since every minute that I'm not cruising around looking for fares is money lost. A dollar a minute is the usual rate, and a tip on top of this is customary. In most cases the fare has been negotiated well beforehand so that the newlyweds don't have to bother themselves with such logistical minutiae on their first night of matrimonial bliss.
On this particular occasion, no sooner had the couple waded through the crowd of well-wishers and boarded the bike than the bride began reading aloud the posted, by-the-block fare structure. She quickly did the mental math and blurted out happily, "Oh, this is only going to be $10! That's not bad at all!"
I swallowed hard and kept my mouth shut. This was supposed to be one of the most joyful moments in the lives of these two people. I wasn't about to spoil the first night of their honeymoon by haggling with them over a few bucks. If it ended up costing me $30, I would just have to consider that my wedding gift to a pair of strangers.
When we arrived at the hotel, the groom pulled out his wallet, and the bride ordered him to give me fifteen dollars.
"Oh, I want to give him a tip," he protested. "I'll give him $20."
"But $15 includes a tip! The fare is only ten bucks. Fifteen is plenty," she said
"OK babe," he said looking a little embarrassed as he handed me a ten and a five.
He hung back a minute as if unsure what to do while his new wife walked toward the door of the hotel. Then he pulled out another five and handed it to me. "It's my money!" he said, trying to sound defiant, but keeping the volume low enough that his bride wouldn't hear him. "I can do what I want with it!"
I wish them well. I really do. I'm not a gambling man, and even if I was, I would never want to bet against anyone's marital happiness. But in terms of cold hard cash, I think I would be pretty safe betting that $20 against the long-term prospects of that marriage. I really hope I'm wrong.
There are two common kinds of wedding rides that we do. The first involves a distinct New Orleans tradition called the second line, a kind of parade, in which friends and family of the newlyweds strut and prance down the street waving white handkerchiefs and decorated parasols to the accompaniment of a brass band. Usually my role is to transport elderly or handicapped relatives and guests. (See here for the story of my first -- and most memorable by far -- second line experience.)
The use of pedicabs in second lines seems to me a clear case of an innovation that manages to enrich an already priceless tradition. Let's say the groom has a seventy-something-year-old grandmother with bad hips and knees. If her grandson had gotten married a year and a half ago (before the introduction of pedicabs to New Orleans in September 2011), she would have been excluded from the second line experience. Nowadays she rides like royalty right in the middle of the happy, hankie-waving throng.
The second kind of wedding ride involves transporting the new couple from the reception site to their hotel. Typically the newlyweds are giddy with love -- not to mention relief that the whole happy ordeal of the ceremony and reception is finally over. Their joy overflows not just to me but also to the people we pass on the street who shout out their congratulations as we roll by.
(By the way, I'm evidently uniquely qualified for this kind of ride. No less an authority than USA Today recognized riding with the Crescent City Pedicabbie as one of the most romantic things to do in New Orleans!)
Recently I did a wedding ride, which turned out a bit less pleasant. I had waited outside the reception venue for a good half hour till the party wound down enough for the couple to make a graceful exit. There's nothing unusual about this. Most wedding rides require a bit of waiting around on my part. Even 45 minutes or an hour is not uncommon. Naturally, I need to be compensated for my time since every minute that I'm not cruising around looking for fares is money lost. A dollar a minute is the usual rate, and a tip on top of this is customary. In most cases the fare has been negotiated well beforehand so that the newlyweds don't have to bother themselves with such logistical minutiae on their first night of matrimonial bliss.
On this particular occasion, no sooner had the couple waded through the crowd of well-wishers and boarded the bike than the bride began reading aloud the posted, by-the-block fare structure. She quickly did the mental math and blurted out happily, "Oh, this is only going to be $10! That's not bad at all!"
I swallowed hard and kept my mouth shut. This was supposed to be one of the most joyful moments in the lives of these two people. I wasn't about to spoil the first night of their honeymoon by haggling with them over a few bucks. If it ended up costing me $30, I would just have to consider that my wedding gift to a pair of strangers.
When we arrived at the hotel, the groom pulled out his wallet, and the bride ordered him to give me fifteen dollars.
"Oh, I want to give him a tip," he protested. "I'll give him $20."
"But $15 includes a tip! The fare is only ten bucks. Fifteen is plenty," she said
"OK babe," he said looking a little embarrassed as he handed me a ten and a five.
He hung back a minute as if unsure what to do while his new wife walked toward the door of the hotel. Then he pulled out another five and handed it to me. "It's my money!" he said, trying to sound defiant, but keeping the volume low enough that his bride wouldn't hear him. "I can do what I want with it!"
I wish them well. I really do. I'm not a gambling man, and even if I was, I would never want to bet against anyone's marital happiness. But in terms of cold hard cash, I think I would be pretty safe betting that $20 against the long-term prospects of that marriage. I really hope I'm wrong.
Thursday, January 24, 2013
On being a professional athlete
Some time back, Russell, a fellow pedicabbie, approached me about getting involved with a foundation he had founded. The purpose of the foundation as my colleague explained it was to get professional athletes engaged in philanthropy and community service.
Reading the "OK,-but-what-does-that-have-to-do-with-me?" look on my face, he said to me: "You know we're professional athletes, right?"
My first reaction was sheer bafflement. We ARE?... I AM?... How do you figure that? But after giving it some thought, I decided that Russell had a point.
Pedaling three- or four-hundred pounds (occasionally much more) of human flesh around all night long is physically demanding, of course. But that fact alone just isn't enough to qualify us as professional athletes. I have worked brief stints as a roofer, a plumber's helper, and an oilfield roustabout. These jobs may have been more physically demanding than pedicabbing; but roofers, plumbers and roustabouts are clearly not professional athletes.
The thing that we pedicabbies have in common with sports stars is that we rely on a mixture of athleticism and entertainment to make our living. Qualities like speed, strength, stamina, and physical skill are vital, of course; but ultimate success requires a bit of showmanship as well. That's true for Lebron James, and it's true for me. (Yes, I'm putting myself in the same category with Lebron James, but only to the extent that you put a chihuahua and a rhinoceros in the same category by acknowledging that they both have four legs.)
So if Russell and I are right that I'm a professional athlete (technically "semi-pro" now that I'm only pedicabbing part-time), this is bizarre turn of events to say the least. If anyone in the class of '84 at Pearl River High School had been named "least likely to grow up to be a professional athlete", I'm pretty sure I would have won that distinction. In fact, I'm pretty sure that I would have utterly crushed the competition! Let's put it this way. When it came time to pick teams, most of the girls went higher in the draft than me. To this day I can't hit a softball with a bat or catch it with a glove.
My junior year in high school I finally worked up the nerve to start playing touch football with the guys at lunch. I soon earned the nickname Swivel because I was so uncoordinated that it seemed to my classmates as though all my body parts were randomly rotating independently of each another.
Who would have dreamed back then that at the age of 46, I, Mark "Swivel" Orfila would find myself a professional tricyclist! You know, I've never been to any class reunions. Never had much desire till now. But I'm thinking maybe I'll go to the next one. Maybe I'll wear shorts so everyone can admire my monster calves!
Reading the "OK,-but-what-does-that-have-to-do-with-me?" look on my face, he said to me: "You know we're professional athletes, right?"
My first reaction was sheer bafflement. We ARE?... I AM?... How do you figure that? But after giving it some thought, I decided that Russell had a point.
Pedaling three- or four-hundred pounds (occasionally much more) of human flesh around all night long is physically demanding, of course. But that fact alone just isn't enough to qualify us as professional athletes. I have worked brief stints as a roofer, a plumber's helper, and an oilfield roustabout. These jobs may have been more physically demanding than pedicabbing; but roofers, plumbers and roustabouts are clearly not professional athletes.
The thing that we pedicabbies have in common with sports stars is that we rely on a mixture of athleticism and entertainment to make our living. Qualities like speed, strength, stamina, and physical skill are vital, of course; but ultimate success requires a bit of showmanship as well. That's true for Lebron James, and it's true for me. (Yes, I'm putting myself in the same category with Lebron James, but only to the extent that you put a chihuahua and a rhinoceros in the same category by acknowledging that they both have four legs.)
So if Russell and I are right that I'm a professional athlete (technically "semi-pro" now that I'm only pedicabbing part-time), this is bizarre turn of events to say the least. If anyone in the class of '84 at Pearl River High School had been named "least likely to grow up to be a professional athlete", I'm pretty sure I would have won that distinction. In fact, I'm pretty sure that I would have utterly crushed the competition! Let's put it this way. When it came time to pick teams, most of the girls went higher in the draft than me. To this day I can't hit a softball with a bat or catch it with a glove.
My junior year in high school I finally worked up the nerve to start playing touch football with the guys at lunch. I soon earned the nickname Swivel because I was so uncoordinated that it seemed to my classmates as though all my body parts were randomly rotating independently of each another.
Who would have dreamed back then that at the age of 46, I, Mark "Swivel" Orfila would find myself a professional tricyclist! You know, I've never been to any class reunions. Never had much desire till now. But I'm thinking maybe I'll go to the next one. Maybe I'll wear shorts so everyone can admire my monster calves!
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