"bystander problem" in Russia

[JoAnne Van Tuyl]

I had an extraordinary taxi driver experience in Moscow:  he went to the 
ends of the earth to help me make it in time for a train to Saratov, and 
also came through splendidly when I asked him to somehow relay to my 
telephone-less friends in Saratov that I would be arriving.   I related my 
story to an American friend who lived in Moscow who was VERY 
security-conscious, and her response was, "You know, I would trust a 
Russian cab driver with my life."

--On Wednesday, July 26, 2006 2:13 PM -0700 Jose Alaniz 
<jos23 at u.washington.edu> wrote:

> I have a sad story and a happy story. A gang of thieves posing as beggars
> once attacked me near Kievsky vokzal, in broad daylight, and no one tried
> to help. Fortunately I got away. More recently, a pair of young guys were
> following me on Leninsky Prospekt at about 4 in the morning (don't ask
> what I was doing there alone at that time or what state I was in). When
> it became quite clear that they were closing in on me, I made a run for
> it. Suddenly a taxi screeches to a halt on the road just ahead of me, the
> door pops open. I slipped in and we high-tailed it out of there. "I had
> been watching those men," the driver said. "They definitely wanted to rob
> you." I thanked the man profusely and insisted on paying him, though he
> said I didn't need to. It was one of those wonderful Moscow moments that
> made me love the city and its people more than ever.
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