They are different from the regular guys, you bet.

And you can't miss them, as you roll your trolley out they are the first people you will run into, all importunating you to hire them. Bandra? Colaba? Walkeshwar, they will heckle you as if you are Sachin Tendulkar and they are avid fans.

I have in the past made the mistake of taking one of them, and the experience left me so wise that I will never get into one even if he was the last taxi before Armageddon.

They are that bad.

Since that experience I either get my driver to wait for me at the airport, or simply take a prepaid taxi. They are slightly expensive than what a normal Sahar airport-home ride will cost you, but much less expensive than what the fleecing tribe outside will have you pay.

This morning, I had my driver waiting for me but as I drove away I couldn't but wonder how an administration that promises to make this an international city has never looked at the first thing the international traveler runs into, the Sahar airport. It is still a mess, and the taxis outside are its worst feature. After the smelly toilets.

I have mentioned it before on this blog, for some inexplicable reason the city's CNG powered cabs are especially vulnerable in the downpour. Check for yourself to see the number of taxis you will find stranded in just a couple of centimeters of rain. I know all vehicles bar the high ground clearance ones -- are vulnerable but there is something about the CNG mechanism that makes taxis and autos more so.

Anyway, here I was, huddled in the backseat of the taxi, the rain lashing its way through the closed windows to dampen my clothes and enthusiasm, fervently praying that one, the taxi doesn't stall in the water, two, that the driver who is cleaning the windscreen with a piece of rag doesn't lose control and swing into another vehicle, and three that I reach home safe and sound.

And then it struck me, the yet another danger I was exposed to but had been quite blind to so far. That as lightning and thunder raged outside in true Dante style, the slender, tall antenna in the front that pierced the night sky was in fact a magnet for lightning. And that I was in fact sitting in a tin coffin.

The realisation shocked me so much that I must have turned white like a ghost. But as they say, what's the option to traveling by taxisL

Although all of them have a tape deck, for some inexplicable reason. That belt out ancient melancholy songs by Mukesh and such. Why oh why would I make a miserable journey more unbearable by playing such songs!

Not that some of the stuff our RJs dish out is any better. Quite a few FM stations have lost the plot, and few RJs don't irritate. Nevertheless, FM stations are made for the commute, the inane chatter they provide keeping the mind off mundane stuff as the vehicle's squalid interiors etc.

And where the taxis have an FM transistor, the station of choice seems to be 93.5 which has since undergone a change in numerals I think. Beyond Malishka Mendonca, I don't think the station has a star, but one indication of their popularity among the yellow and black cabs is this orange contraption I see moving about bearing the 93.5 colours and logo. I presume it is the taxi guy who does the traffic updates for them.

But why are our taxis so allergic to installing transistors? Can someone enlighten me?

The thrill of speed is a great turn-on. But I am not a reckless driver. I drive fast, but with care. And I never DUI. If I think I am in my cups I abandon the car. Better still, I don't take the car out when I know the evening involves drinking. Simple.

And for someone like me to endure the lack of pace of Mumbai's taxis is a punishment. I have gritted my teeth as the driver has allowed autorickshaws and other tiny vehicles to go ahead on a clear road. I had sworn silently as the driver stuck behind a truck, unmindful of the empty lane to the right. I have banged my head in frustration as the taxi clips at a breakneck speed of 40km on the fast lane, as a litany of honks from behind sound driver exasperation.

Thanks to my experience I have more than a fair idea of how it feels being a speed bug stuck in a slow-moving vehicle. Recently I also got to know what it feels like to have the shoe on the other foot.

As I got into the cab I had no clue what the drive would be like. The vehicle itself was ordinary, and the driver was a miya like me. For whatever it was worth. Initially the road was crowded, but I got a whiff of what was to follow as he whizzed in and out of lanes to park the taxi at the head of the line at the redlight.

Then, as the road opened up, he just flew. Long ago I was overtaken by a taxi when I was doing a not-bad 70kmph, that being the only time I have encountered a speed demon in the yellow and black. This time I was in the backseat of one!

As he squeezed past two vehicles I thought I would die. As he hurtled down a flyover I was praying his brakes were fine. And when he took on a Honda City, and actually beat it, I knew this was Schumi in the making.

But my legs, they were pressed hard into the floor. My palms were gripping the side of the seat, and I was anxious as hell he doesn't crash or more importantly, someone else doesn't swing the car and plough into him. I was experiencing speed from the backseat and I didn't like it one bit.

Actually it's a tossup between sizzling summer and wetwetwet monsoons. As someone who has endured both in equal measure, I am hard put to decide which is worse.

Let us see how bad summer gets. With a few days left for the rains to come down, the civic administration's contractors are on overdrive, reportedly trying to make the city's roads safe from the rains. But everyone, including the contractors, know this is only a sham, and is an annual exercise meant to hoodwink the public while their bank accounts are being lined with gold. Our gold.

Anyways, with so much of road work going on, you can bet the sky is full of dust particles. There are patches of road where it is a virtual dust-storm, believe me, as vehicles plunge through half-done roads. The only way you can escape this is by rolling up your windows, but then this makes the taxi a hot oven on wheels. After some time you realise there is no escaping the heat, so resign yourself to your fate and lower the window and let the dust come in too.

The net result is that by the time your destination comes, your hair is tousled, clothes are drenched in sweat, and the nice aura of perfume you left home with is no longer in place. Instead, you look unkempt and unwashed, as though you have just stepped off a tour of duty in Iraq.

Given this, the monsoons, when temperatures come down, must be a blessing, right? Wrong. For the rains are when the vehicles come to a halt even in a couple of inches of water. The drivers tell me the CNG vehicles are particularly vulnerable during rains, though I have yet to come across a scientific reason why it should be so.

But taxis breaking down is just one problem during the monsoons. The other is that since the windows are mostly left open, the rain water comes in, making the seats soggy as hell. When you lower your backside on the seat you feel like you are perching on a waterbed, with a squelch. And slowly you can feel the wetness climb into your trousers, up the back of your shirt, etc. So when you get off, your backside looks like you have been in the rain, while the front looks dry and normal.

But the biggest problem, for me, during rains is the poor condition of the wipers in taxis. Have you noticed that most of them don't have one? For they have been removed and kept in the glove compartment by the drivers, since they are the first target of urchins. So when there is an unexpected shower, most drivers are caught without wipers. A few in my ken have pulled it out of the glove compartment and tried to fix it on the windshield, while the taxi is in motion! Most drivers, however, have given up, and pull out a phatka (rag) with which they wipe the outside of the windshield with their right hand, managing the steering with the left, with visibility being low to poor.

And poor me, lolling in the backseat, with my backside wet as an ice-cream in summer, watches in silent horror, wondering when the driver, through his ministrations, hurtles into the vehicle ahead while trying to fix his wiper.

Maybe this monsoon?

OK, pardon the sad humour, but one of the best tings I like about Mumbai taxis is how the drivers, mostly, are so encouraging of what the media has taken to calling canoodling couples in the backseat.

The apoplectic moral brigade that is all over Mumbai has thankfully spared the yellow and black cabs; may they never cast their eyes this side and ruin a perfectly good place to neck.

You can easily tell a taxi whose driver intends it to be a vehicle of (physical, at least) love. I have been in quite a few, and their ingenuity never fails to amaze me.

But the cake must be taken by this taxi whose driver has so thoughtfully fixed mirrors on the vehicle's inside roof. Yes!! Most couples, it is well known, get off on seeing themselves in the mirror while at it, and this driver has helped them in their exertions while the taxi is stuck on the fast lane to nowhere, probably because a cyclist is holding up traffic somewhere. But our couple is oblivious to all that, thanks to the mirrors on the roof!

Most of us have at some time or the other made out in taxis, so one knows that if it gets down to it one will be almost horizontal in the backseat, however constricting it may be. And with the only view from this position being up, mirrors in the roof are a damn good idea, says I.

The love vehicles can be spotted by their elaborate and soft upholstery, are generally clean, smell pleasant thanks to the use of dhoop or even freshener, and at night-time display colourful fluorescent lights.

Personally I have eschewed taxis with young drivers while getting into a clinch, for it's my belief the young cads have only one eye on the road, the other is glued to the strategically-placed rearview mirror. And while the rooftop mirror is a splendid idea, I don't get off on exhibitionism, thank you. So I choose my love vehicles with care.

I don't need the accessories, really. All I want is a clean taxi, with sunfilm on the windows of course, and an old driver who has lost all interest in his libido or that of his passengers. And yes, he has to be uncommunicative too.

But I wasn't rattled unduly, cos years of commuting by the Mumbai taxis have sort of inured me to its risks. But the first time was not like that at all.

I still remember the time as I was heading home. At a sharp right turn of the busy artery, it's always a battle of wits to decide who goes first. The guy coming straight from the opposite side, or the guy wanting to turn right. The absence of streetlights makes the task tougher at night.

That evening my driver's age, and the consequent poor eyesight I presume, didn't help much. As he lurched to the right without looking, hoping to swing by before a truck bearing down on him could hit him, sitting in the backseat I knew he had made a grievous error in judgement.

No, the truck didn't hit his side of the taxi, but the rear portion where the passenger usually sits. It was a Hollywood moment; I could see the truck heading into the vehicle, and hit the backdoor and boot section with a thump despite the poor driver hitting the brakes. The impact sent the taxi careening, with me inside, and I believe the taxi went for two spins before coming to a halt by the divider.

The driver was out in a trice, to argue with the other driver. I was in a daze, my legs felt wobbly, my back felt like it had been ferrying gunny bags through the day. I sat in the taxi for some more time, before I realized it ran on CNG and I didn't want to go up in flames. At least not before my time.

I clambered out of the vehicle, made my way through the small crowd that had materialized from nowhere, stumbled to the culvert on the other side of the road, and sat there for some time, taking in deep breaths. I retched a few times, before coming to my feet, hailed a taxi and headed home.

And as I walked into the family, I was normal again.

Lack thereof, that is.

How many times have I gritted my teeth in the backseat as I watch autorickshaws and other slower vehicles race past my rickety taxi, cruising along at 40 kmph on the fast lane! The driver oblivious of furious motorists honking behind him or the headlights blazing in his rear view mirror.

Once, only once, the vehicle I was in was overtaken by a cyclist, but that I put down to the bad condition of the roads than the driver's innate lack of speed.

Combined with their slow pace, the drivers also excel in sticking to slow-moving lanes in high-traffic conditions. Thus, I find myself watching the other lanes zip by while I am stuck behind a smoke-belching behemoth. I will frantically look behind, look at the next lane, hoping the driver will take his cue and shift lanes but often it does not work as well as direct action. And by the time the driver finds space to move to the next lane, the earlier lane would have picked up speed and once again I will find myself stuck in a static line.

Today's Times of India reports on a Mumbai taxi catching fire and killing a senior citizen inside. Given that these vehicles are a major source of transport in the city for the lack of a better option, I would have expected it to be on page 1, but given our newspapers' emphasis on T&A I am glad at least the TOI mentioned it. I am not sure the others did.

Loosely, what happened was this. This bunch had hired the taxi from Bandra station and on the way it caught fire. While the driver was the first to flee on noticing sparks, three of the four passengers managed to get out of the vehicle, leaving one to burn to death.

It's one of those things that make you go, there but for the grace of God go I.

For, a few years ago (yes, I did mention that I have been condemned to this mode of transport for a long time) I was bumping along in one and when I slowed down in Mumbai's inevitable traffic the motorcyclist next banged on the car to draw my attention. Chingar hai, chingar, he exclaimed. Kya, I asked him disbelievingly and also uncomprehendingly. Arre there are sparks coming out of your taxi, he yelled at me.

But the driver was blasé about the whole thing. Haan saab, but nothing will happen, don't worry, he grinned at me and continued along merrily. But, I stuttered, there is CNG in the car, it can be dangerous. Nothing will happen, don't worry, was his sage advice.

At the next two signals too motorists pointed out the sparks coming out of the vehicle, unnerving me further, but nothing could shake the driver's confidence that a fire won't break out.

But my own confidence was badly shaken this morning on reading the news item about a taxi catching fire.

Despite all this once in a while I do go wrong.

As happened the other night. Actually everything warned me not to get into the vehicle, but since this driver was the only one who showed any enthusiasm to reach me to my destination I had no choice. My instincts were proved right when I realised that the lever to lower the window a little, so the fetid city air could replace the fetid air inside, wasn't working.

And I really should have got off when the engine died at the first traffic signal. As the driver wrestled with his ignition, and the vehicles lined up began honking in unison as if that will spark the engine into life, I knew I had made a mistake. As the car finally came to life, seconds before the signal turned red, I asked the driver if it will go the distance or if I should take another vehicle.

No, no, he assured me, this won't happen again, don't worry.

But barely five kilometres later, he suddenly veered the car to the kerb and switched off the engine and sat there like the family dunce. I removed my earphones and asked him what was wrong, even as the traffic behind me kept up a cacophony. Nahi, the engine has heated up, this won't go further, he explained without remorse. But I asked you early on if I should take another taxi, you said no, now where will I find another cab in this mess? Sorry, but these things happen, he shrugged.

Cursing my luck I paid him off and waddled into the traffic, deftly avoiding Tata Sumos and Bajaj autorickshaws hurtling towards their destiny and made my way to a rickshaw. As I got into the maniacal three-wheeler, my last sight of my previous driver was as he zoomed of in his rickety cab, 'heated engine' and all, into a side lane.

The bastard, I realised, all he wanted was to head home, and now he got paid for it too.