Taxi Talk

I took a cab earlier today and had the pleasure of encountering a friendly driver who kept up a lively line of chatter throughout the 30 minute journey. He referred to himself in the third person as "Uncle" and told me about his wonderful varied career, including a stint as a cook in the navy, 2 years in the tool-die industry, a side-line as a martial arts instructor and almost 30 years of driving a cab.

Then he moved on to other topics; as a taxi driver, he has heard a million stories from his many passengers. Thirty seconds before reaching my destination, he drops a bit of salacious gossip that left me slack-jawed. So much so that we almost overshot my alighting point. Worst of all, I didn't have time to press for more details!!

I am not going to repeat that piece of gossip here. It might be a very nasty piece of slander that should not be spread around. What astounded me is that Uncle has seemed so certain of the truth of it. He even seemed rather surprised that I was not aware of it.

I wish I had managed to get more details about it. I only have one man's certainty, which is mighty convincing but not entirely so. It begs this question - does something become the truth just because a large enough group of people proclaim it to be so? I am Malaysian and in Malaysia, you hear this sort of thing all the time, about famous and powerful people. There is always an "unspoken truth" that "everyone" knows because there are "insiders" and "networks". It gets spread around because we hear it from people we tend to trust and tell it to people who tend to trust us. Everyone ends up believing it, but at some point, nobody remembers who actually originated it.

Does the taxi driver grapevine work like this? Taxi drivers hear so many different things from so many different people. And they tell so many different things to so many different people. Other than the Internet, there might not be a more effective channel to transmit information between entirely unconnected people. It is very powerful, but is it reliable?

I really wish there was a way to confirm this rumour without asking too many different people about it. If I did that, I might just be adding to the weight of "evidence" which is simply this - "so many people have heard about it, there must be some truth to it". And so are urban legends born ....