How do my sunglasses relate to earning my first taxi fare in Jamaica? Keep reading and watch the video below to find out!
I broke my sunglasses one day in Black River, Jamaica and desperately needed to replace them so I headed into town to find some. I found a random parking lot to park my Budget Rental Car and asked the first person I saw where I can buy a pair of sunglasses. I figured he would direct me to a store but instead he pointed right “ova deh so” to a guy standing in the parking lot with a little table set up full of sunglasses and belts for sale. My lucky day! I headed over to the table and proceeded to try on numerous pairs of glasses as a small crowd of guys gathered to be my fashion assistants and tell me which pair looked the best.
After purchasing my favorite sunglasses for $800 jmd I was about to leave when a taxi pulled into the lot. The driver of the car came out and started chatting me up and asked if I needed a ride, to which I answered NO because I have my own car. He told me to just get in and we’ll go for a ride. My adventurous side won and I decided to drive around with him for no reason whatsoever and met a lot of fun passengers on the way. Little did I know this guy would turn into one of the coolest people I’ve met on the island, and the most fun too!
I shot this video using my dash camera while following him around his community a couple days after our original meeting. There were very few passengers this day but lots of livestock on the road. And in the end his car was fully loaded with people so I ended up taking some passengers to Black River. It was a lot of fun and very coincidental that one of my passengers ended up being a fellow Canadian! They did end up paying me the proper fare even though I tried to refuse it. I didn’t want the money, I just wanted the experience!
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