Summer, 1987. Reagan was president, and like Trump polarising the nation like a storm, and Janet Ingrid George (JIG) and I had just touched down in America. It was our first trip to the United States together and everything felt charged with possibility—until we climbed into that cab at JFK. What should have been an ordinary ride to Manhattan turned into something stranger, darker, and altogether unforgettable.
The Hispanic looking cabbie with side parting black hair was tall and wiry, with a lean, angular face that caught the passing streetlights like the shadows of a noir film. His presence was magnetic, yet unsettling, his intensity resembling Travis Bickle from Taxi Driver. He didn’t just drive; he prowled the streets, gripping the wheel like it was the only thing tethering him to this world.
The car itself was a time capsule of the city’s grittier days: no air conditioning, cracked leather seats sticky from the humid night, and windows half-down to let in the hot, sour breeze of the city. A faint crackle came from his transistor radio, tuned to the Super Bowl Final. Between bursts of static, snatches of commentary surfaced, only to vanish again, as though the game itself were slipping in and out of another dimension.
He asked us questions, his voice as rough as the potholed streets he navigated. “Where you from? What brings you here?” Each question seemed innocuous, but there was a weight behind them, a probing curiosity that made us cautious with our answers.
“You know,” he said after a long pause, “people come to New York thinking they’ll find something. Truth is, they end up leaving pieces of themselves behind instead. You pack your bags, but you can’t pack everything.”
His words hung in the air, heavy and unshakeable, like the haunting lyrics of Hotel California: “You can check out any time you like, but you can never leave.” The city, his voice seemed to suggest, wasn’t just a place. It was a trap—beautiful, chaotic, and impossible to escape.
The streets grew quieter, eerier. We hadn’t seen another car in what felt like miles. The cityscape around us was no longer the New York of postcards but something darker, more sinister. “New York’s funny,” he continued, his voice almost wistful. “It’s not what you think it is. It’s what it wants you to be.”
The radio crackled again, and he laughed—a sharp, hollow sound that made the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end. Janet squeezed my hand tightly. We were in the belly of the beast now, and the cabbie—like the sinister innkeeper in Hotel California—seemed to know it.
Finally, the car came to a halt outside our pre-booked accommodation in bohemian Greenwich Village. The building was shabby but welcoming, its dimly lit facade a relief after the suffocating ride. The cabbie cut the engine, and the silence hit us like a wave.
“Here we are,” he said flatly. His eyes found mine in the rearview mirror, cold and detached, like he was appraising us one last time. I handed him the fare, careful not to let my hand linger near his.
As we retrieved our luggage, he sat motionless, watching through the rearview mirror. His gaze was like a shadow that followed us, a reminder that some part of the city—his city—would stay with us forever. “Relax,” I could almost hear him say, “we are programmed to receive.”
Inside the guesthouse, the iron gate clicked shut behind us, but the night clung to me. The ride wasn’t just a trip from JFK to Manhattan. It was a brush with the soul of the city—a living, breathing entity that tests and transforms you, leaving behind a piece of itself in exchange for something it quietly takes from you.
That night, I understood the essence of New York: seductive yet treacherous, like a song you can’t stop humming, even as its haunting melody echoes in your mind long after the last note has played.
