Jess McDiarmid
Northern News Services
Published Friday, January 4, 2008

YELLOWKNIFE - Rami Kassem drove into Yellowknife two years ago with one piston firing and no spare tire.

He slept in his car that night. It was cold, the first snowfall of the year.

Taxi driver Rami Kassem works 12 to 14 hours a day driving a cab to support his family in Yellowknife and Lebanon. "I'm 28 years old and I look 40," he said. - Jess McDiarmid/NNSL photo

Today, sitting in his idling cab outside the Yellowknife Community Arena, the 28-year-old taxi driver will tell you he looks 40.

It was a long road that led him North. A Palestinian refugee born in Lebanon, Kassem left Beirut for the United States on a student visa in 2001. Shortly after that, he entered Canada as a refugee. He worked in plastic factories in Montreal until 2004, when he went to Edmonton.

There, he saw someone from back home who told him he should get a job driving shuttles at the airport.

"There I started to see people from Yellowknife, really nice people," says Kassem. "I began asking a lot of questions about Yellowknife."

He came here to work at the mines, getting a chaffeur's licence in hopes it would help him get a job.

"I love driving anything, trucks, buses, anything," he says.

He never went to the mines. Instead, he started driving for Diamond Cabs. About a year later, he moved to City Cab.

He drives 14 or 15 hours a day, six or seven days a week. After paying fuel, repairs, insurance and other costs, he just scrapes by.

"If I work less than that, I can't make a living," says Kassem. "Especially if you have responsibilities back home."

Kassem brought his wife to Yellowknife last year after spending five years apart while they tried to get her into the country. The rest of his family - five brothers and three sisters - are still in Lebanon. He sends them what he can.

During the busy winter season, Kassem might make $200 a day and clear about half that after expenses. In the slower summer months, he's lucky to clear $75 for a 12-hour day.

"We have too many cars," he says. "Sometimes I wait half an hour, 45 minutes, sometimes an hour for a fare."

On a Wednesday morning, Kassem cruises the downtown streets watching the meter. Downtown is a bad place to wait for fares because there's hardly anywhere drivers can park. Unless they pay a parking meter, they can't park along the streets and there's not close to enough taxi stalls to go around, he says.

So they drive around wasting fuel, which is hard on the environment and hard on the wallet.

The screen on the dashboard shows how many taxis are in the area and the cab's place in line. As he drives, Kassem watches his place in line drop from 14 - the number of taxis in downtown Yellowknife mid-morning on a Wednesday. Half an hour passes before there's a beep.

"I like this sound, beep. It means a trip is coming," he says, flicking the 'accept' button.

It's a backdoor pickup, which often means people looking for drugs, he says. But not at the address that comes up on the screen. He knows this house, and greets the passenger warmly. They chat as he takes her up to Franklin Avenue, a $7 fare.

The next fare 15 minutes later gets scooped. Just as Kassem is pulling up to Extra Foods, where there are taxi stalls, the man jumps into another cab.

Drivers enter it into the dispatch system when they're scooped and they're moved to the front of the line.

This fare comes pretty much immediately, a call from Sir John Franklin high school.

The cab waits in front for five minutes before two students who were on the sidewalk smoking come over and get in. A few more minutes pass before their friends show up.

They're going to the Robin's Nest, they tell him. It's too cold to walk.

A $5 fare, including the tip. An hour has passed.

"Twelve dollars an hour, maybe six after expenses," says Kassem. "It's just crazy. Go work at Tim Hortons."

Rush hours from 7:45 to 9 a.m. and 4 to 5 p.m. help a bit but the rest of the day is slow.

And nights can be tough. People will get a lift and then say they have no money or take off without paying.

Kassem has had drunks pass out in his van and been unable to wake them up many times.

He has to tolerate people asking him why he's here, telling him to go back to his own country. He's been punched and pushed out of his car by drunks.

"Many times I've had to bring the cops," he says. "Why do they do it? I'm a driver trying to make my living and they're drunk, they don't care."

Council approved raising taxi fares in November 2005 but the Yellowknife Taxi Drivers Association, which Kassem belongs to, wants the city to stop issuing taxi licences.

That way, says Kassem, drivers will get more fares, make more money and not have to work so much. He says he's heard that it was good when there were 60 cars - there's now about 110. Despite the difficulties, Kassem says he loves Yellowknife and it's home.

"We can live with this, it's OK," said Kassem. "It's not fair to take a car from someone who's making a living. But we don't need more cars."