TAXIS

In your average Western city - New York, for example - the taxicab ritual is pretty straightforward: 1. Hail the vehicle with a wave of the hand 2. Get in and state your destination 3. Pay the amount listed on the meter Advantages are consistency and simplicity; the disadvantage is that people stating an address in anything other than a New York drawl will be given a scenic tour through three boroughs that ends up costing as much as it would if you'd simply bought a car yourself.

The only similarity the Russian taxi experience has to New York is that none of the drivers speak English. Here any vehicle can serve as a taxi. Ambulances can be flagged down as well as off-duty buses, army jeeps, private cars and, on occasion, official city taxis. For the most part these rides are safe and not too expensive, and it's a long-held way for drivers to pick up a few extra rubles.

On 1 April 1997 a new local law decreed this practice illegal, threatening heavy fines for chastniki (gypsy drivers) caught picking up passengers. Elite teams of GAI officers from the Transport Inspectorate were to be trained to impersonate regular folk and sent out undercover to solicit rides and bust drivers. As usual, nobody took any notice and these rides are as popular as ever.

Hail a ride by sticking your arm out and when a vehicle stops open the door and state your destination. The driver will either tell you to get in, name a price, ask you to offer a price, or say no and drive away. If you don't speak Russian this negotiation can be a little tricky and the standard result is a ride several times more expensive than it would be for the average Ivan Sixshots. But it's not that tricky...*

Learn your numbers...taxi prices are usually rounded off to the nearest five rubles (see Language). Know your destination...say it over and over until you say it smoothly before even attempting to hail a cab. Know the neighborhood it's in and the approximate distance from where you are.

Don't renegotiate...the unwritten rules say that a negotiated price can't be changed so even if the driver does figure out you're foreign (and he will) don't fork over your entire stash of hard currency.