The first two days we're in Saigon, we encounter 3 taxi incidents which mainly concerns the taxi fare. One of them, was downright horrifying.
Prior to our journey to Saigon, I've made quite a research on that city. And in most of the websites that I've visited mention about the taxis in Saigon. After reading all of the warnings those blogs post, and gathering all the information I got, I felt quite confident with traveling around Saigon using taxi.
Or so I thought.
The first incident: Upon exiting the Arrival Hall at the airport, at the left side of the door, there were tons of wardens and taxis lined up to do their business. We walked away until at the end of the taxis as we want to take the Vinasun Taxi(as per suggested in many websites). At first I spoke to the Vinasun Taxi Warden to get us a taxi. But then, he suddenly disappear to do something I dont know what and come another warden in front of us and ushered us to the taxi beside the Vinasun Taxi. I was quite confused and just followed her automatically. It's a VinaTaxi. Having read somewhere in the website stating that VinaTaxi is safe, I dont really mind hopping into it. However, the warden said the fees for the taxi was 10USD, which is VND200,000(more or less). Now, if we want to go to the area near Ben Thanh market, I wouldn't mind paying that much. But thing is, our destination is just 5-10 minutes away.
Wasn't that a rip-off?.
Should I have ask for discount? Or should I have asked for using the meter?
I don't know ! We're just arrived at Saigon for god's sake!
Before we got into the taxi, my mom asked the warden whether we should pay at the warden or pay at the taxi driver. At first the warden said to pay to her. And then the taxi driver said, no! pay to him. What The Heck !! ?? Shouldn't this like common knowledge to you guys. And I grumbled as I ducked my head into the taxi. And taxi driver tsk-ed me for grumbling. >:O
We've reached in front of the hotel safely tho.
The second incident happened after we finished watching the Dragon Water Puppet. It's already dark, so we kinda just want to go back to the hotel. ASAP. As we exit the place, at the entrance, again, there were taxis lined up. But those were white taxi. Now, here in Saigon, white taxis are leech taxis. So you don't want to hop on that one. I was hesitant at first to take one of the taxis but we took anyway. We want to go back to the hotel ASAP remember?. During the drive, the driver was quite chatty and we kinda felt comfortable with him. BUT!! our eyes watched the taxi meter like a hawk!! That meter run like Usain Bolt sprinting on the 100m race !
long story shortened, the driver refused to drop us in front of the hotel so we have to walk like 3~5 minutes. And paid him VND198,000. (The taxi fare from the hotel to the Dragon Water Puppet was VND135,000).
And we come to The last incident.
It was a nightmare..........................
On the second day, we were at the Ben Thanh Market and I decided that we should go to Saigon Square. By taxi. And when I scanned those taxis that were lined up beside the Market, I've found one Mai Linh Taxi. I was hesitated to take that one at first. And this is because when I read the numbers on that taxi, it said 3 28 28 28 instead of 38 28 28 28(something like that. Forget the exact number). And, the triangle thing on top of the taxi was kinda fishy(it read TAXI sure enough, but kinda different from the MaiLinh taxis we've hopped previously). And just before we got into the taxi, Imah asked me "betulke nak naik teksi ni ? ". And I, foolishly nodded my head.
Have you ever got a nudge(or call it instinct) that something is not right. Or it's bad. Or you better turn around or else something will happen...... Well, that's what I felt the instant I read the numbers on the taxi. But did I listen to it? No !! So we ended up with this!
Heh..Sure enough, the taxi's meter runs like hell and the digits keep on increasing shamelessly fast. Bravo to me for bringing my family on this Leech Taxi. *snort*.
There's an inner conversation back and forth going on inside my head during the drive as I come to realize that the door lock handle on my side was snapped. I kinda felt alarmed. But again, I chose to ignore it......
And then we reached The Saigon Square. From our view, the meter was 98,000. So, my Mom at first bring out the 10,000 note which is obviously was the wrong note. So she took out another note. This time, it's the 100,000 note. We thought that took care of the fare and we kinda ready to get out, BUT...the taxi driver said that that's not enough!. We were confused. We told him that we gave him 100,000 which should cover the fare. But he said NO! NO! it's 980,000. We tried to clarify again with the taxi driver about the fare, but it was a hard case. He could barely spoke English ! ! but one thing was clear. He demanded 980,000 VND ! ! !
WHAT THE HELL! ! ! ..And we argued and argued and argued with the taxi driver for quite sometime. about 5~10 minutes? He was shouting at us and we were shouting at him back. Well, mostly Imah who's doing the shouting. I'll turned into a timid person when it comes to argument(mouth argument. If someone argues, I tend to just watch safe on the sideline and trying Not to involve myself). The taxi driver keep on pointing on the taxi meter, keep on resetting the meter, and keep on shouting at us. And this repeated more than 5 times.
I was scared. Mom was scared. Imah was scared. At one point, I just felt suffocated and tried to grab and pull the door handle. It was broken! I asked my mom to open the door, she tried, but then she turned her head alarmly at me and said the door was locked! I turned to Imah to do the same(she took the shotgun seat) and she said her door cannot be opened from inside. I've see someone outside but not sure whether he can see us or not because of the heavy-tinted window. I want to shout at him but we couldn't even roll down the window because the freaking crazy driver broke those window handle too!!! We're trapped!!!
I kinda felt helpless and starting to tell my mom to just give him the money. But Imah kept on shouting at the driver. Kept on pointing at the meter. And she brings out her handphone and threatened the taxi driver to call the police or the Taxi's company. seeing that, he made a gesture that was like 'Call - lah ! '. Imah even asked the driver the Taxi's company number. And then, Imah realized something on the meter shout at the driver saying that she noticed the black marker pen which was on the meter to black out the 'point' dot on the screen. So when it read 980,000.00 , it supposed to be 98,000.00. After Imah pointed that out, the driver keep on blah blah blah shout shout shout and Imah was like, gimme the company number! gimme the company number.
At last, the driver took the handphone. But not to key in the phone number, but to jab our fare. He jabbed in 98,000. And this while he kept on blah blah blah blah.
Didn't we just gave you the 100,000 bill? so what's the problem?
And he magically pulled out a 10,000 note indicating that we gave him the wrong note!
what ever. We grabbed the 10,000 note in his hand and gave him (yet another) 100,000 note.
And we get the hell out of there as fast as we can, which by the way, the taxi driver was still grumbling and blabbing nonsense on his seat!.
Syukur Alhamdulillah we're safe!
IMPORTANT NOTE: To choose a taxi in Saigon!
1. Choose only Vinasun Or Mailinh (but beware of the copy cats like the one we got into)
2. Those real Vinasun Or Mailinh taxi have a good exterior.
3. When you open the door, check the door handle, the lock handle, and the window handle
4. Make sure when you get in, the door was not locked
5. If you notice that the window was heavy tinted, just forget the taxi and try to find another.
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