Chinese Fire Drill

Okay... not an actual fire drill. But did you ever hear friends talk about Chinese fire drills when you were a kid? You know, when people are sitting in a car at a red light and everyone jumps out of the car in traffic, runs around the car, and changes seats with someone for fun. Well, who would have EVER guessed, that we would legitimately have a Chinese fire drill IN China?

So, on Friday night, Matt and I were going into town to eat dinner with 4 other people. The taxis here only hold 4 people, and they are really difficult to catch on a weekend at dinner time. But lucky as we are, a very strange hatchback taxi pulls up in front of us offering to take all six of us in one taxi. Excellent, we think! So, Matt grabs the front seat, the 3 girls take the back seat, and two guys climb into the storage area behind us. After about a kilometer, the driver asks one of the guys to lean towards the middle. This is strange, but we don't think too much of it till we begin to smell burning rubber and hear a very strange grinding sound. Aha, we think, we Americans are too heavy for this small taxi, and we are weighing the car down so that it is sitting on the tire. Just another reason for the Chinese to think we Americans are all fat. So before long the driver stops in the street and asks us all to get out and switch seats so that two of us girls are in the back. I can't imagine how ridiculous this must have looked to anyone who happened to be walking or driving by. In any case, it didn't fix the problem, but he assured us that if he slowed down, the tire would not blow out.

Amazingly, he was right, and even gave us his phone number and offered to take us anytime we needed it.