My brief experience as a taxi owner

For the past two and a half years I have had a very reliable and trustworthy taxi driver. He takes me to class each day and helps me run every variety of errands. I starting calling a taxi driver instead of just walking to the street to find one because there are many people who offer me rides who are not in fact taxi drivers and it made me nervous to get in the cars of random strangers who could turn out to be unfriendly. 

I became very good friends with my taxi driver and so this year, my last in Nouakchott, I decided to take a risk to help him. I bought a 1990 Mercedes and became his boss. We wrote up a contract in which he would bring me $17 each day. This money would be put into an account and when these funds equalled the value of the car, the car would be his. The idea is simple but the outcome could be truly life-changing. If the taxi driver had his own car, he could work hard and eventually buy a second car with the extra income earned. He could have someone working for him and then use his time to go back to school or do any number of things. He could be his own boss, free to go where ever he wanted...

Unfortunately, my taxi driver proved to be unreliable. As soon as I bought the car, I noticed a change in his attitude. For the first time, he arrived late to pick me up and forgot appointments. That was the start of the disappointments. He would always tell me the car was running fine and then tell other Americans that the car was in the shop for repairs. When I confronted him about this, and insisted on total honesty, he promised to change. A couple of months later, he stopped bringing me the money each day and made up millions of  excuses and justifications. We had countless talks. I made deadlines and asked him to start providing documentation for every expense. When we spoke, he nodded and said that he agreed to the terms we set but then afterwards nothing changed. 

When I went home to the U.S. for five weeks, he refused to bring a single Ougiiya to the friend in charge of the project during my absence. The taxi driver still insists that he didn't make any income during this time. It is possible but since he won't provide any details or documentation of expenses, I have no idea if this is true. I do know that he was working and that he could earn about $30 per day, under normal circumstances.

When I returned to Nouakchott, the car was fine but the next day it was in the garage for repairs. It has been there for nearly three weeks and finally he called me yesterday to tell me that the engine can not be repaired. I parked the car in my friend's garage and want to forget I ever bought it. I will sell it as soon as possible. This disastrous project has caused me to lose a lot of money. Even worse than the money, I lost a friend. 

When I talked about this project with my friends, many of them told me that taxi drivers are not to be trusted and that I will definitely lose in the end. I truly believed that my taxi driver would not let me down. Unfortunately, he proved to be immature, irresponsible, and dishonest. I really wanted my taxi driver to prove all these cynics that they are wrong but instead he justified their apprehensions.

This project was a failure. I may have helped the driver make a lot of money for a few months, but he likely didn't save anything. Now he is back to where he was when I met him, working hard for someone else to get a little extra income each day. Nonetheless, I don't have any regrets. Life is about taking risks to help others even if those risks don't always pan out the way we want them to. The biggest lesson I will take from this experience is the importance of effort. I will never stop trying although I do think this is my first and last time to own a taxi.