Malaysia was a new experience for me. In a 13-day period, I barely scratched the surface as I traveled to Kuala Lumpur, Melaka, Cameron Highlands and Langkawi Island. I met some very congenial people along the way – none more so than EDDIE, the airport Taxi driver. Eddie was my introduction to Malaysia - he drove me to my hotel in Kuala Lumpur from the KLIA airport upon arrival. Since his service was so outstanding, I made arrangements for Eddie to meet me at Starbucks near the Puduraya bus terminal in downtown Kuala Lumpur and take me to the KLIA airport at a later point in my trip.

Rendezvousing with Eddie the 2nd time around, I got to learn a little more about his life.
He has been living in Kuala Lumpur for almost 20 years now, having moved to Malaysia from his native Indonesia, where he lived in a small village by the name of Bukitbinegyi on the island of Sumatra. Eddie has been working as an airport taxi driver for only 6 months or so; prior to that he drove taxi in the city for 12 years. According to him, the city taxi drivers have a rough go of it as the taximeter system is antiquated and the government should institute set fares based upon the length of trip.

Eddie travels home every 3 months or so to be with his wife and three children - age 12, 8 and 4 months. He has the luxury of taking off from work so often, because he shares his taxi with a fellow Indonesian who drives taxi during the time that Eddie is away, and vice versa. The company he works for is happy as the car is in operation as a taxi 365 days a year. A very good arrangement, if you ask me. Even though, Eddie does not work the whole year, he says that he is making pretty good monies – it seems that driving an airport taxi is more financially rewarding than driving taxi in the Kuala Lumpur metro area.

Eddie has plans to retire in about 16 years or so and move back to Indonesia for good. As he says, there’s no place like home – especially when home is where your 3 children are.

If you’re in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia and you need a trustworthy and reliable taxi driver to take care of your transfers and touring needs, you definitely cannot go wrong by hiring Eddie. Call 016-244768.

This entry was posted on Monday, December 8th, 2008 at 10:26 am and is filed under Malaysia, travel. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.