Budget Taxis

Who has ever heard of budget taxis? No, I'm not talking about going back to the old days where you have rickshaws and people who run around pulling passengers in. Although I do believe that will improve all taxi drivers' health and keep them fit, that's not what I'm talking about.

Lately, taxi fares have increased. Not only that, the taxi companies seem to have piled on a huge amount of peak hour charges, airport transportation rates, midnight rates and there are telephone book fees to be paid. And if you are unlucky to hit all these charges, then well, you pay for it, literally! Nowadays, people refrain from taking taxis and move towards other forms of transportation like trains and buses, only taking taxis as as last resort, because with these rates, not many can afford it. Taxis are considered more of a luxury transportation, well, perhaps not in all countries.

Now, what if, based on the idea of budget airlines, we come out with a company for budget taxis? Think about it, budget airlines came about because airfares were too expensive, airlines didn't fly to destinations frequently enough for you and for short-haul flights, it was just not worth it paying so much to fly such a short distance.

Now apply this same idea on a smaller scale to a small country, and with an abundance amount of vehicles. You start small, a fleet of 20 to 50 vehicles, depending on how many your startup can afford. Perhaps 2nd hand vehicles if you don't have the capital to buy new vehicles. You have relatively good drivers, who are courteous, willing to go the extra mile for passengers. You also get rid of all those pesky peak hour and booking charges. You start your passengers on a flat rate of perhaps $3 and bring them to their destination safe and sound.

Now with a small company, you don't make much losses as compared to your larger competition. Having no extra charges will make the passengers come back and take your taxis more often. And the best things in life are spread by word of mouth. So if you provide excellent service to your passengers they will remember it and highly recommend it to their friends. Their friends will in turn start talking about this new budget taxi that doesn't have pesky charges and do bookings to their other friends and sooner or later everyone will catch wind of your budget taxi. As with all things, skepticism always plays are part when starting something new, so you'll have to pump in a lot of effor to provide good service for passengers, that's what they always want and usually remember.

Starting small, you always have the excuse not to charge anything, even if the private taxi companies that charge everything start pressuring you to charge all those pesky rates. Passengers will also start playing a part to change the system, in turn asking those companies why they are charging when it really isn't necessary. Of course there will be competition, but you have all the passengers available. Passengers (customers) are always the ones who will help your business, all you have to do is to treat them well and they'll always remember what good things you did. Of course, they also remember the bad things you did, but well, there has to be a balance. You can't satisfy all of them, especially those really demanding ones, but you can try your best to please them.

All good enterprises start with an idea. They are built upon, gather moss, as they say, till they become something big and workable. And although we all aspire to be rich, unfortunately I do not have the financial capital yet to build upon this idea, it isn't an Information Technology (IT) idea like Facebook or Google, where you can start it in a dorm room. However, perhaps this blog entry will spark off somebody else's thoughts somewhere in some country, like a stone thrown into a pond, causing ripple effects that spread far and wide and affect everyone, for the better I hope.

Will this work? I can't say for sure. Look at the skepticism faced when budget airlines started. Plenty of people had their doubts. Eventually some of the better budget airline companies prevailed and look, mostly in Europe and Asia, budget airlines have become a hit. So, will this budget taxi work? Who can say, but I'm sure in the long run, it is worth trying out and who knows, it might become a commercial success.

Afternote: There are already small budget taxis that operate in New Zealand and a few other countries, they charge low prices for bring people around. Some are even used for whole day tours, which is an interesting idea also. Like I said, it depends on how you want to set it up, but the main aim is to be in competition with all those pesky fare hikes and extra charges which are unnecessary.

Once - Falling Slowly

Thank you, Motion Picture Academy, for not forgetting about last spring's Once when it came time for nominations in the Best Original Song category for this year's Oscars! Once, which grew into being a modest indie hit last year, is an Irish film starring real-life rocker Glen Hansard as "Guy," a street musician -- or, a busker -- who meets Czech immigrant "Girl" (played by Markéta Irglová, also a musician) and enlists her to cut what he hopes will be a career-making demo.

The two wrote the majority flick's songs, including the just-nominated "Falling Slowly". In addition to the music, part of the appeal of Once is that Glen and Markéta enter into what has to be the most chaste coupling since Bill Murray and Scarlett Johansson in Lost In Translation.

"Falling Slowly" is up against three songs from partly-animated fantasy film Enchanted, as well as one from August Rush. But the real fairy tale will be if comparatively unknown Hansard and Irglová end up triumphing over the mighty Disney with their duet from Once, a movie whose budget was $160,000. I believe that this song will win either the Grammy or the Oscar, or both!

If you haven't watched this amazing and beautiful love story, it's still not too late to catch it. It will make you cry.

Here's the beautiful duet from the movie Once - Falling Slowly.

Some Thing Has Found Us

I just got back from the much anticipated screening of Cloverfield. It was not an alien invasion flick, the title is a codename used by the Department of Defence for the monster in the movie.

There are some spoilers below, so please read at your own risk.

This movie reminded me of The Blair Witch Project (BWP) from many years back. It is filmed from a single hand-held camera, so for those with motion sickness problems, if you got sick watching BWP, then you can forget about this movie. But the difference with this is, in BWP, you never got to see the witch, in fact, in that movie, you barely got to see anything at all, other than the actors running around, panting and the works. In Cloverfield, there is at least some character development, many glimpses of the monster and rather realistic responses to a disaster-type situation.

There was a hinted reference to the origin of the monster. In fact, it was the actor holding the camera and filming it who provided all the bright ideas and theories. He talked about a fish that was thought to be extinct, but was recently found off the coast of Madagascar. The reason being, it could have gone further underwater into trenches and unknown locations to breed or to get away from humans. Similarly too, the evolution of the monster in Cloverfield.

Movie-goers nowadays have high expectations when watching movies, especially the younger generation. They probably grew up with watching tons of action movies with lots of explosions. Several instant verbal reviews of the movie immediately when the end credits started rolling was, "That's it?"; "What the hell?"; "This was such a terrible movie!".

Well, they didn't understand it obviously. Typical spoon-feeding attitude. In other words, they didn't want to think, they wanted all the information spoon-fed to them in the movie. Otherwise, it's just another waste of time. Ah, and one of them actually said that Aliens Vs Predator 2 would have been much better (that was a terrible movie!). I rest my case with them being brainless and needing to be spoon-fed.

However, I personally enjoyed the movie and found that it was done very realistically. In realistically, I mean like a home-made movie from a camcorder, and how one (and their friends) would response to a disaster situation. It started off being filmed as a friend's farewell party for his departure to Japan. After which, mid-way, the disaster occurred, the survival of friends, the perseverance of one to go back into danger to look for another friend - a very human trait; glimpses of the monster and its parasitic little creatures that came along with it.

I would have loved if they touched on a lot more in a shorter time-span, but that would have spoilt the movie in so many ways. At the same time, although not a lot of acting was really required, the actors and actresses performed admirably in portraying a disaster situation. You get to see the monster in its entirety and up close towards the end of the movie.

And I'm sure, if you think about it, that the characters were not the only ones filming the whole thing. Come on, it's America, they always want to destroy Manhattan, New York (Think Independence Day, The Day After Tomorrow etc.). Plus everyone wants to do their own home-movies, including celebrities, who's to say that a sequel to this movie won't feature another point of view from another group of friends? Again, something to ponder over.

I applaud director/producer J.J. Abrams, who, once again, changes the way movies are made, and wanted to create an American monster of his own. Another original version of Godzilla, instead of trying to copy the Japanese version over and over again.

I was also fascinated with the camcorder and how long the battery lasted, how much tape was inside and how resilient it was to dropping and damage etc. Especially surviving the blast at the end and providing the Department of Defence, the Cloverfield tape.

If anyone happens to catch a glimpse of the brand on the camcorder, or even know of one they use personally that is good, long-lasting and resilient, do drop me a note in my comments to let me know, I'm interested to invest in a camcorder for my vacations.

I would highly recommend anyone to watch this movie, especially if they're interested in a new way of story-telling, instead of the stale old ones. This movie has its fill of explosions and action, but in a different and more human sense. Go to watch it with an open mind.

7.5 out of 10 stars

2 Great-Looking Movies To Look Out For

After the trilogy, they decided that it was such a hit that they wanted to do more. So Steven Spielberg and George Lucas decided to write 1 more for old times sake, with 66 year old Harrison Ford as Indiana Jones again, added characters include Shia LeBeouf as Mutt and Cate Blanchett as an evil spy agent. Fortunately/unfortunately Sean Connery turned down his role as Indian Jones Senior in favour of his retirement.

Jumper is a sci-fi thriller about a young boy who discovers he has the ability to teleport. He uses his ability to get away from his abusive father. Later on in life he realises that he's not the only one with this ability, however, there are "police" who regulate teleporters and it's an eventual showdown between them. Stars Hayden Christensen (Darth Vader), Samuel L. Jackson (Mace Windu) and Jamie Bell (Billy Elliot) with Rachel Bilson (Miss OC). Should be nice to watch Vader and Windu face-off again in another movie setting. I watched the trailer for this movie and it was interestingly entertaining. 2 great-looking movies to look forward to, let's hope they don't disappoint.