A Minicab Conversation

Our minicab driver has a Caribbean accent, although it's been faded by years in England. There's a "Dominica" sticker on his dashboard, and one on his windshield.

He tells us that English children have no discipline. He's carried passengers with kids, and watched in amazement as the kids treated the parents "like servants," yelling at them, and even cursing.

"My mother would never let us get away with anything," he says. "When she sent you to the store, she'd spit in a corner, and tell you you'd better get back before it dried. You hurried. There was a tree near the house--it looked a little like that one, over there--and when she wanted to punish you, she'd pull off a branch, and strip it, and--"

He mimes whipping. "Then she'd tell you to go down to the beach--we lived near the sea--and swim in it."

"Salt water," I say. "Ouch!"

"Salt water," he agrees. "And you had to do it, because when you came back..." He mimes his mother running her finger along the back of his neck, and then licking her finger to check for salt. "And if you just put your head in, she'd lift up your shirt." He mimes the same action, this time on his back. "She knew."

He drives for another minute or two, and then adds, "My brothers and my sisters, they're here in England, but they've sent their kids to her to raise, so they can just work, and send back their money."

"Are your sisters as tough as your mom?" I ask.

"No, they're not," he says, and then adds, "My dad is white." I'm not sure if that's meant as an explanation, or just as a new train of conversation. He goes on, "He's lived in Dominica for so long, though. When I go visit them from England, he says, 'Go back to your country, and take your cold weather with you.'"

And then, unfortunately, we're at our destination. We pay our fare, and go our separate ways.