The first thing that came to mind when we woke up was "we lost the ukulele!" Pallavi, eyes on the prize, determinedly said, let's go and find it!
Sarah: "Find it?! There are a bazillion cabs in this city. How to find it?"
Pallavi: "Well, let's go back to the intercity bus station where we arrived last night. Most taxi drivers have a certain spot, and let's go and see if they know who it is."
Sarah: "But how will you know which cab it is?"
Pallavi: "Don't you remember what the taxi driver looked like? He had a mustache, was of medium height, slightly frail, older, had gray hair and his back left door didn't shut properly." (No! I do not remember any of this! Did you not hear the story about the time I was a witness in a car accident and completely negated my grandmother's testimony because I'm a crap witness!)
So, Private Investigator Pallavi and me, the sidekick in the story normally used for either comedy relief or to help show how wise the PI actually is, went off to the bus station with this basic information to try to get our man.
We showed up at the station at 2 p.m., found a taxi driver who spoke English, who asked us all sorts of questions. Where did you go? What time did you arrive last night? What did the guy look like? Was he a big guy or a small guy? What did you lose? With each question, one more taxi driver came over into the conversation. All of them were talking to each other and you could clearly see they were trying to figure out who we were talking about, each of them gesturing with a small air guitar. By the end of this interrogation, we were marched over to the "manager" who looked into some book which appeared to be a record of all cabs, all routes, and he looked at us and said, right, this guy won't be here until 5 p.m., taxi number 797.
Slightly hopeful, we said, we'll wait. And we waited; And we had lunch; And we waited; And we walked around the mall; And we waited; And we sat at the bus stand; And we got a coffee; And we waited. Of all of the days when I didn't bring some sort of book to read! Finally, after what felt like an eternity of boredom, 5 p.m. came. Our driver didn't!
The English speaking taxi driver came over around 5:45 and said, he won't come until maybe 7 or 8. You can take a cab to his house and then into Koto Kinabalu for 30 MYR (~$10). We said, we don't want to go to Koto Kinabalu, so we'll pay 10 MYR to go the 2 kms to the guys house. It cost us 25 MYR to get to 7 kms into Kota Kinabalu. More than fair.
No takers. I started to get a little less hopeful. Plus, what if we'd gotten the description wrong! What if Pallavi's attention to detail had failed. What if she had made up that he had a mustache? What if we've been waiting for hours for the wrong man!
We waited another 45 minutes and finally, by 6:30, our English speaking taxi drivers came over and said, come on, I'll take you for 10 MYR. He drove us to the taxi driver's general area but didn't know where he lived. So we circled the apartment complex looking for a cab. We looked everywhere until finally, we spotted a cab - it was taxi number 797. But where did the taxi driver live? Our man called him up and we waited.
After 5 minutes, we saw a man with a mustache, who was of medium height, slightly frail, older. So maybe he didn't have grey hair, but he held in his hand, my ukulele!!!!!!!
Detective Pallavi solved the case! The ukulele was back in my hands and I swear I'll seriously learn to play it and never let it out of my sight again!
The End. By Sarah.
Sarah: "Find it?! There are a bazillion cabs in this city. How to find it?"
Pallavi: "Well, let's go back to the intercity bus station where we arrived last night. Most taxi drivers have a certain spot, and let's go and see if they know who it is."
Sarah: "But how will you know which cab it is?"
Pallavi: "Don't you remember what the taxi driver looked like? He had a mustache, was of medium height, slightly frail, older, had gray hair and his back left door didn't shut properly." (No! I do not remember any of this! Did you not hear the story about the time I was a witness in a car accident and completely negated my grandmother's testimony because I'm a crap witness!)
So, Private Investigator Pallavi and me, the sidekick in the story normally used for either comedy relief or to help show how wise the PI actually is, went off to the bus station with this basic information to try to get our man.
We showed up at the station at 2 p.m., found a taxi driver who spoke English, who asked us all sorts of questions. Where did you go? What time did you arrive last night? What did the guy look like? Was he a big guy or a small guy? What did you lose? With each question, one more taxi driver came over into the conversation. All of them were talking to each other and you could clearly see they were trying to figure out who we were talking about, each of them gesturing with a small air guitar. By the end of this interrogation, we were marched over to the "manager" who looked into some book which appeared to be a record of all cabs, all routes, and he looked at us and said, right, this guy won't be here until 5 p.m., taxi number 797.
Slightly hopeful, we said, we'll wait. And we waited; And we had lunch; And we waited; And we walked around the mall; And we waited; And we sat at the bus stand; And we got a coffee; And we waited. Of all of the days when I didn't bring some sort of book to read! Finally, after what felt like an eternity of boredom, 5 p.m. came. Our driver didn't!
The English speaking taxi driver came over around 5:45 and said, he won't come until maybe 7 or 8. You can take a cab to his house and then into Koto Kinabalu for 30 MYR (~$10). We said, we don't want to go to Koto Kinabalu, so we'll pay 10 MYR to go the 2 kms to the guys house. It cost us 25 MYR to get to 7 kms into Kota Kinabalu. More than fair.
No takers. I started to get a little less hopeful. Plus, what if we'd gotten the description wrong! What if Pallavi's attention to detail had failed. What if she had made up that he had a mustache? What if we've been waiting for hours for the wrong man!
We waited another 45 minutes and finally, by 6:30, our English speaking taxi drivers came over and said, come on, I'll take you for 10 MYR. He drove us to the taxi driver's general area but didn't know where he lived. So we circled the apartment complex looking for a cab. We looked everywhere until finally, we spotted a cab - it was taxi number 797. But where did the taxi driver live? Our man called him up and we waited.
After 5 minutes, we saw a man with a mustache, who was of medium height, slightly frail, older. So maybe he didn't have grey hair, but he held in his hand, my ukulele!!!!!!!
Detective Pallavi solved the case! The ukulele was back in my hands and I swear I'll seriously learn to play it and never let it out of my sight again!
The End. By Sarah.
No comments:
Post a Comment