The first-prize-winner in the 18-21 group from Cabinteely, 

Co Dublin takes us inside the thoughts of a black African 

cabbie waiting for late-night fares at a city-centre taxi rank

Murali Okoye was careful to wind up the windows of his cab, and only when he had finished did he adjust the volume of the CD player. The music grew louder but not loud. Dublin would not hear the Jùjú music of King Sunny Ade.

“Ja funmi!” Murali sang as he shook the wheel with his grip. The words meant ‘fight for me’, and he had bought the song when it had first become available in Nigeria. He closed his eyes and as he rapped his hands on the dashboard in time with the drums, he didn’t notice his driver ID fall from its place until he heard it tumble to the pedals. He reached down a hand and fumbled blindly around for a moment before locating it and replacing it upon the dashboard. He looked at it for a moment and quietly spoke the words beneath his photo: Murali Okoye. That was his name, but most people in Dublin just called him ‘Murray O’.

He saw the door to a bar located near the taxi rank was open, and music and roaring spilled out with the light onto the street. Murali watched as a number of people stumbled down the few steps to the pavement, and saw them spin their heads around looking for inspiration of where to go next. One of them located the taxi rank and alerted the others, and as the group began to approach, Murali darted his hand to the CD player, replacing the King with late-night Dublin chat.

Though he had been parked for a long while, he was still several places from the top of the rank. However, there was a chance that he would take a passenger or two from the group. A few climbed into the first taxi, and the remainder into the second. The top of the rank cleared, and Murali started his engine to take his new place.

A light on the dashboard informed him that he was running low on petrol. He hadn’t yet made any money that evening, so he would need to ask his next passenger to give him some payment in advance. He moved the car forward, and watched the door of the bar, but it had closed once more and showed no signs of opening. He switched off the engine again.

Beyond the bar, he saw a man in a suit approach from down the road. He wondered if the man would come over to the rank, but as he drew nearer, he still showed no interest in the cab and passed by without a glance a moment later. So Murali was surprised when he heard the sound of a taxi pulling out from the rank behind him, to see the same man seated in the passenger seat, signifying with his arms the best route to take for the benefit of his Irish-looking driver.

Murali, who had so carefully watched the man, wondered when he himself had been observed, for he must have been. He was curious to know if the man had seen the Dublin scarf he kept drawn out across the dashboard, before recalling that he had only that morning lent it to his daughter, Niamh, before she had left for school. He had asked her to return it, so he turned and checked the backseat, but it was not there. He cursed her under his breath, for he had stressed to her the vital nature of the hurling scarf. Hurling? Or was it Gaelic football…? Oh, what did it matter, it was of no consequence to him.

The bar door opened once more, revealing another group of intoxicants for release upon the town. They, too, collected confusedly at the steps’ base, before gathering the final morsels of their senses to get them to the rank. Murali lowered the passenger window slightly and increased the volume of the radio chatter – to entice them in their stupors with the homeliness of Dublin brogues.

“…an’ ‘ow much milk is ‘ee drinkin’ now?” the presenter said.

Slightly louder.

“…dats outrageous!”

The group were in a worse state than the last, and their journey to the taxi was slower and with more uneven steps. A man squinted towards the cab as he approached, and raised his hand to his brow for assistance. When he reached the door, Murali reached out towards the passenger door handle, but the man pressed his face against the window, continuing to squint into the cab. He did not seem able to locate Murali.

“Can I help you?” Murali said, his voice raised to carry through the door.

His contribution seemed to equip the man with whatever information he sought, and he stepped away from the door and directed his group towards the next taxi in the rank. Murali watched as it pulled out, as its bright yellow beacon faded slowly into the distance.

He rubbed his eyes with his hands and cursed his daughter again in his pain, frustratedly elevating the power of the scarf on potential clients to a level of farce. He realised this; how of course he was wrong and his daughter not to blame. How could she be at fault, for having become cold in a breeze? But then, she was so carefree and naive, and her thoughtlessness had consequences. But… good! Thank goodness that she did not know the same stresses. After all, she was not so young at fourteen, and knew Dublin for the same four years he did. All he desired was for all to be well for her.

When Murali recalled his attention to the city, he discovered the silhouette of a woman approaching, and as he watched, the light slowly contributed detail to her form. Her face was pale and weary, and she wore a long winter coat that came down to her heels. Her hair was in a bad state, having clearly strayed from whatever her ambition for it had been earlier in the evening. The direction of her walk conveyed a disinterest in the taxi rank, but then so had that of the man in the suit. Murali therefore watched her carefully. He wished to spot her as she caught sight of him, when she would try to dismiss him. He would catch her gaze and force her to recognise his humanity.

As Murali stared, the woman’s shoes sounded clips off the ground. As she neared, the clips became mighty in the night for the air was otherwise silent but for the dull pounding of the bar’s dying night and the sour-nothings of the radio’s chatter. Clip, clip and the woman walked, closer to the cab, yet maintaining a projection of disinterest. He continued to stare, and the clips continued, and then, at last, there was that swift and subtle aversion of her gaze from a focus on whatever lay before her to Murali’s cab, up towards his what-colour-is-it face, before settling, finally and against all intention, upon Murali’s returned stare.

The woman broke off and looked straight ahead. Murali watched over his shoulder as she clambered over to the cab behind him.

“Could you take me home for three euro? I lost my purse,” she spoke, though her speech was slurred. The driver must have declined her request, for the woman headed for another cab. Murali listened as the initial scenario became replicated down the rank, before pressing his fingers into his ears and resting his head against the steering wheel. But it was not long before a noise alerted him, and he turned to see the woman at his own passenger-door, gazing in at him sadly, tapping against the window with her finger. He wound the window down.

“What do you want?” he said, and turned off the radio.

“You’ll take me home for three euro, won’t you?” she said, and Murali heard a sentiment that had not at all been intended: an accusation, rather than a plea.

“I lost my purse,” she said, rubbing her eye, “and I’m so tired.”

“Where do you live?”

“Leopardstown.”

Murali nodded in a resigned way and made to open the passenger door, but she went to the backseat door and climbed in.

As he eased his car out from the rank for free, losing his place, it became suddenly so much more difficult to breathe, as though he had entered into a thick fog. A traffic light stopped him a moment later.

“Where are you going exactly?” he said, and saw in the mirror that the woman was slumped against the window, fast asleep.

The light turned green and Murali pressed down on the accelerator, but the car did not move for the petrol level had at last come down to zero. A queue of drivers behind him sounded their horns, but there was nothing he could do and so he sat still.

Then he recalled King Sunny Ade, and suddenly the car was filled with it. He heard through the music car horns beep, and so he raised the music until he heard only the King. The windows were open so Dublin could hear the Jùjú. In the backseat, the woman woke and began to shout, and Murali also felt like shouting, only he did not know the words. All that he could think to do, and he did not think too long, was to turn to her and sing ‘Ja Funmi’.