Another Chicago Paradox, Cabbies Love NPR
Not only is Chicago squeaky clean and Joe the Trucker loves Obama but taxi cab drivers listen to NPR, National Public Radio. Who knew?
I've hailed 6 cabbies so far and all 6 were intently listening to "All Things Considered," "Fresh Air," the BBC and local WBEZ programming. They keep the radio at a soft decibel but after a short conversation I prompt them to 'crank it up.'
So far, my drivers hail from Somalia, India, Pakistan and the Philippines. Most have been here for over 3 years and though they'd love to cast a ballot for Obama, they're still waiting on the naturalization process.
Unlike in New York, cabbies here keep the speed limit, obey traffic lights and don't talk chit-chat on a cell while they drive. They each deserved a magnanimous tip for arriving safely without raising my heartbeat or injecting whiplash.
Public transportation, buses and trains, are just as convenient and a whole lot cheaper. I hopped the Red and Brown Lines into downtown with help from a teller who looked like Oprah minus the money. Strangers one minute, friends the next, she provided a train map and advice without prompting. A swift injection of this kind of western hospitality is sorely needed on the streets of Manhattan.
Once downtown I caught sight of this hugely popular Cloud Gate sculpture, also known as the Silver Bean. It sits in a 24 acres interactive park called Millenium Park with a spider web-like outdoor concert venue designed by Frank Gehry and an interactive Crown Fountain that spits water through video images reflected off glass bricks.
posted by Sonja Stark of PilotGirl™ @ 7:08 AM
1 Comments:
I continue to be struck by the idiocy of the McCain/Palin (mainly Palin) campaign's praising of small towns as being where the 'real Americans' are. These pronouncements are, however, not made in small towns at all but in large arenas in cities just as full of 'real Americans' as small towns and just as necessary to the health and growth and creativity of our country as small towns.
I grew up in a small town (population ca. 7000) and my parents grew up in equally small towns - but we had big cities (New York, New Orleans) to go to for museums, symphonies, specialty grocery stores, specialty shops, serious bookstores and libraries, the multiculturalism which is America's strength.
Until this current political campaign I had never see anyone try to pit these two living experiences against each other and for no good reason other than political expedience.
We need alpha cities like Chicago with its planetarium telescope (to help us understand the universe) just as much as we need small prairie towns with few streetlights to dim our view of the night sky.
We need Millenium Parks just as much as we need neighborhood Kiwanis and Jaycee baseball parks. It's the entirety of possible experiences which make this country as wonderful as it is.
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