I’ve been in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia for two days now (pictures will be uploaded this weekend) and am still amazed by how cheap everything is. For everything you pay the same price in Malayan Ringgit as you would in Singapore Dollars, but Malayan currency is worth around half of Singapore currency. So this is truly a place for cheap food and shopping and cabs.
But after todays cabride, forced by the tropical rain that started all of a sudden, the cheapness sort of leaves a sour taste. Cabdrivers in Kuala Lumpur don’t use their meters, only maybe for locals. So obviously, as the cheap Dutch bastard that I am, I feel a bit ripped off and try to haggle money of the first price they offer. Which means that for a cabride of around 30 minutes we pay 20 ringgit, which translates to 4 euros, which translates into a euro per person. It is indeed cheaper than a metroride in Paris or even a busride in Zwolle or Eindhoven.
But today we had a cabride with an 62 years old man, who was very open and honest. He explained us the situation for Kuala Lumpurese cabdrivers, which made me rethink my opinions. He started of the talk with the usual “where are you from?”, but the conversation turned pretty serious pretty quickly after that. He first admitted that he had some really bad experiences with Dutch tourists, trying to haggle really really hard to get the lowest possible price. I do kind of agree with trying to haggle, since Dutch people are considered to be cheap, right? But then he explained why he felt this was a bad thing.
The meter in these cabs charges around 10 cents for 100 meters. A small example: the trip we took from the Petronas Towers to our hostel was 6.90 on the meters, but we had a fixed price of 20.00. So you’d feel ripped off right? But what’s your opinion if you hear that this 62 year old man works 17 hours a day, 7 days a week and hardly makes any money. He has to raise 200 ringgit a day just to break even on the costs of cab rental, gas and cab maintenance. So if this guy would run on the meter, he would make around 7 ringgit per half hour aka, undoable.
After hearing a story like that and realizing you’re doing your best to push the price down as much as possible, you don’t really have any choice but to feel at least a bit bad about yourself.
So that’s what I’m doing right now. Feeling bad, writing a blogpost and promising myself not to haggle that much for the prices of cabs anymore.