And I have been procrastinating for so long ... shame on me!
Yes, you heard me right. A taxi driver in Singapore has been blogging regularly since the start of his career. Though he has only been a taxi driver for 6 months due to an unfortunate event, during those period, he blogged simply to record stories he experienced during his contract. Little that he knew his misfortune made me move my arse and type something here.
This special taxi driver's name is Dr. Cai Mingjie. Yes, he has a "Dr" title as he has a Stanford PhD. He was terminated from his job May 2008 and since then he had so much trouble to find job as either he was overqualified or there were simply no responses to his applications. (He has started to look for job since May 2007!!!!) Putting his PhD aside, he decided to be a taxi driver in November 2008 and the rest is history.
I have heard of him on the newspaper before. At that point of time, I thought the media wanted to show how bad the market was during the crisis that job was so scarce. I pitied him, and many of the Facebookers did too. But few days ago, I was shocked, I saw his book at the book store and without shadow of a doubt, I bought it. Even though it's at quite a hefty price (for local book it is a little bit high, I should have bought it online and I could get his autograph! HAHA) I just thought to myself,"Hey! This is interesting! I want!".
The title is Diary of a Taxi Driver.
The book - it's an easy read. Simply love how simple the way he wrote it and most importantly the daily life stories stories were intertwined with philosophies and reflections. As most people now, there are good and bad people that taxi drivers may encounter and this book covers both sides. But he focused more on the good sides and even the bad, he reflected on it and they become life lessons. He's my idol.
What I love the most is when despite his unfortunate circumstance of losing his job and being pushed from one of the more prestigious career of scientist to one of the lower one of a taxi driver, yet, he managed to put his pride aside and did what a scientist will do to the whole experience - learn, observe, reflect and share. I know I connect with this most because I used to be a passionate observer and sharer like him through my blog. Then ... I slacked and slacked and .... you know what happened after that long time of drought in actions = NOTHING!
Lots of the stories he shared inside, especially about the sides of Singapore that not many of us will chance upon - lives of the prostitutes, the senior citizens who are struggling, the old men with some "needs", the executives who are stingy and rude, etc. They opened my eyes and heart to learn more about what we have easily missed about our surroundings. I am grateful to chance upon his book and slowly awakening that curious gene inside me. One lesson at a time.
