I’m back from a fabulous four-day getaway to New Orleans with my best and oldest girlfriend. How and why it took me so long to end up there, I don’t know. While the trip itself and the city’s potential for both family and grown-up travel is certainly fodder for a post (or two) of its own, I’m going to tell you a simple little story about my drive home from the airport instead.
I awoke this morning to a text from my mom warning me about an airport taxi strike, and apologizing that they couldn’t come pick me up because they were entertaining.
I didn’t sweat it too much, but kept an eye on my Twitter feed. I saw photos of striking cab drivers picketing, and read reports of honking horns and traffic slow-downs.
When I finally arrived in Ottawa, I walked out of the airport to a cacophony of horns and shouting men, and a sea of police officers separating the striking taxi drivers from the arriving tourists and Ottawa residents. If I wasn’t already solidly in the Uber camp, this airport situation (the airport has raised the fee for taxi pick-ups charged to the drivers) would have pushed me over the edge.
So I wheeled my suitcase as far away from the noise as I could, and tapped the Uber app on my phone. One tap to open the app. One tap to set pick up location. Done! In six minutes I would be on my way home. The driver called to see which numbered post I was closest to and minutes later he arrived.
Smiling Ron, as I’ll call him, carefully placed my bag in the trunk and invited me to sit where I liked, “Front or back; this is your car,” he said.
We chatted about the scene at the airport. I told him about the elderly ladies in wheelchairs I saw gesturing the ‘thumbs down’ sign to the taxi drivers. I also told him about the bewildered tourists from Hong Kong wondering how they were going to get to their hotel.
Ron told me how it’s been exactly one month since he quit his job as a baker at Tim Hortons, and is now a full-time entrepreneur – a self-employed Uber driver. He told me that his wife sponsored him three years ago and they are both refugees.
This past January, a cousin in Toronto told Ron about Uber. He investigated the situation in Ottawa, and found himself driving part-time. He worked from 4 am to 1 pm at Tim Hortons and then drove in the afternoons.
When Ron asked for a day off from his baking job for a religious holiday, he was denied. He was the only baker, his manager told him. He asked for a day off when his cousin flew half way around the world to see him, but he was denied. He recounted these stories to me without resentment, but with understanding for his manager’s predicament.
After six months with Uber, Ron felt ready to quit his job at Tim Horton’s to drive full-time. And that’s what he does now. He feels free. His wife and three year-old son are thrilled. Not only does Ron earn more, he can now set his own hours and be present for important family moments.
“I never imagined I would have a job like this in Canada”, Ron told me. “It makes me so happy,” he said with an excited, almost gleeful giggle.
As the taxis push their customers farther away with their ill-conceived antics, entrepreneurial workers like Ron seize the opportunity to do something great for themselves and their families.
Welcome to the Family Freedom Project Ron!
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