Thats very Zen, I’d give them 50 for messing with my holiday vibe.

Please accept my apologies if it wasn’t you but Joris de Bres impersonating David Farrar.

These people are exactly the sort business climate DPF wants for NZ. no ?

[DPF: And that's 20 demerits for being a fuckwit in a holiday thread. And go look at what I said. I don't mind no meters if we negotiate price before hand. I object to them fiddling the meter - that is theft. But of course you don't know the difference]

My general strategy is to agree on a price before you even get into the taxi. If they won’t agree up front, move on (selective deafness is a common phenomenon amongst taxi drivers in the developing world).

You will probably still have to suffer attempts to add ‘extras’ at the end. You just need to be able to hold your ground.

When I was there in 1990 you only had to go a couple of blocks of the main drag and there’d be no tourists and no tourist prices.

“Don’t get me wrong – loved Istanbul, but the taxi drivers are criminals.”
“What do you expect? I won’t be so squeamish: most of them are Muslims. ”

Funnily enough, in Egypt, the people I felt most threatened by, albeit ineptly, were Copts, and in Turkey,the only threatening person, also ineptly, was an Armenian.

The latter drunkenly threatened to kill me on a train, making a throat cutting gesture and announcing that he was a “barbarian”. It took me ages to realise he wasn’t telling me he was a barber who worked shaving people.

ADDITIONAL: THE SOLUTION FOR DEALING WITH THE DIRTY SCAMMING CAIRO TAXI DRIVERS

This advice arrived from two different sources (the Evil Fins and and Australian friend) just as I was about to leave the Cairo. Great timing. When you get in the taxi don’t ask for the price as this marks you as a new person in town and is just asking to be ripped off. Instead just get in the cab and tell them where to go (the place that is). When you get there get out, give them what you think the journey is worth (your hostel can help with this) and calmly walk away. In some cases they may yell and scream at you but as long as you give a fair price then they don’t have a leg to stand on.

Bukshesh Bukshesh !!

Last time I was at Cairo airport they still had the blown up plane wreckages from the last war with Israel littered around the edge of the runway. Have they moved them yet?

That’s when the problems started, all the taxis are the same Yellow Fiats ( I think fiat, small 4 door saloons anyway ) & I the drivers all look the same, well after being in London for awhile they do. So I get in the wrong taxi, thankfully fixed within 8 miles of the airport & went back, but the real driver was a bit scared he’d lost me .

Maybe it was because the taxis I got were company ordered in Istanbul, but they were without fail really good value. Milan, now that is a different story.

If I want to get ripped off I can just stay at home and pay my taxes

You have spent money on yourself when you should have been taxed and the money given to him for his illegal drugs.

[DPF: The tax I have paid (GST, PAYE, Prov, Final etc) recently is enough to fund a few families!]