Tough luck for honest taxi driver

A sum of 10 UAE dirhams (less than $3) was the reward received by an honest taxi driver, who returned a sum of 36,000 ($10,000) left behind by a passenger in the cab, a UAE daily reported.

“I have to admit I felt a little bad because I spent a lot of time trying to track the passenger down and even spent more than an hour waiting at our office for him to come and collect the money. But I would have returned the money with or without the reward, so it doesn’t matter,” UAE’s the Gulf News quoted the Pakistani driver, Shaaban Ali, as saying on Wednesday.

Ali discovered that the passenger, a Saudi, has left his bag behind, so he had to go in a few rounds looking for him, but he failed to find him, so he took the bag back to the office.

“The bag contained Dh36,000, the man’s passport and some other documents,” Ali said.

In an hour, the passenger was contacted and he came to the office to collect his belongings. “He told me thank you and handed me AED10,” Ali told the Gulf News.

According to the newspaper report Ali’s family — wife and parents — live back home in the Pakistani town of Kohat.

It was not the first incident to have taken place with drivers of the taxi company. Another Pakistani driver, Sajjad Arif, has recently returned valuable belongings to a Nigerian businessman.

“A laptop bag with 106,500 Nigerian Naira (AED 2,480), passport, laptop, blackberry, cheque books and watch was left behind in my cab,” Arif, who hails from Sialkot in Punjab, Pakistan, was quoted as saying.

“We are here to earn our money by working, and not to make easy money. No matter what I would not even consider for a second about holding on to someone else’s belongings,” he said.

Arif said that the next day the passenger collected his belongings and thanked him cordially. He added that he had returned back mobile phones and other belongings to passengers several times before.

That must be one sad sad cab driver. Tough luck!

Saudi's proposed only women city

The catch phrase, ''No man's land" is not new to anybody; but this phrase is actually about to happen in real life if news from the Saudi authorities is anything to go by. The next big thing in Saudi Arabia is an all woman city. Yeah! No man at all. Not even the finest or richest of the menfolk would be allowed in this hallowed city of women.

Does it sound alluring? First thing that came to mind was, ''really, a city without men?'' We don't know, but why do we feel something is missing here? Sure, we've all at one time or the other imagined our planet without the opposite sex. Let's think of a world without women. Perhaps, Brad Pitt would be without Angelina Jolie, all men would be gay, we'd have to find some way to make new people as conception and pregnancy would be totally impossible, the tampon and plastic surgery industries would go out of business and our roads would be a lot safer....hahahaha! Maybe texting would also go down to a large extent and gadgets would cost twice as less as they do now. On the other hand though, most men will die of food poisoning and our houses will look like shanties.

Now, let's imagine what the all woman world would look like especially in regards to the proposed Saudi all woman city. We most certainly think such world would be devoid of laughter and humor. Guys are responsible for most of the humor in the world. Check out Rowan Atkinson, Chris Rock, David Lachapelle, to name a few. Wouldn't it be a little boring? We just think the world is pretty much fine with the variety that both genders bring. In the absence of men, will these women feel less need to look good and attractive? (Not that it matters in Saudi Arabia anyways). It just doesn't jell.

Yes, we understand it's Saudi Arabia and there's sharia and all that; but an all woman city!! We don't know for sure the reasons behind this proposal; probably to reduce the disparity between the male-female employment and create more job openings for women to enable them to have a more important role in the country's development, but still, a prospect of an all woman city leaves us all excited and wondering.

P.S.
 The blogger isn't against Islam or any other religion nor against the people and laws of Saudi Arabia. Issues are discussed based mainly on interaction and public opinion.