Around 10pm Tuesday night, my husband and I hailed a taxi. I went around the back to enter on the right side and noticed a ton of candy spewed across the back console of car. I thought, “oh, that was mean of someone to trash this taxi” and surprised that the driver hadn’t cleaned it up.
Having an everlasting sweet tooth, of course I was tempted to grab a piece but remembered rule #1 – You don’t go around taking candy from strangers!?
Inside the taxi, there were decals and signs on the window and the divider, it was further supporting my theory that the taxi had been trashed. However, reading deeper into it, I’m seeing that the decals were positive and uplifting. .. Live Laugh Love – and the signs were encouraging you to take a piece of candy, that the candy will make you happy – I then NEEDED to know what was going on.
(Keep in mind, the red hue that you see in the picture above wasn’t there when we jumped in.) Eventually we asked the driver and found out that we were picked up by the Candy Cab NYC. Mansoor Khalid, the owner and driver of this taxi, provides his patrons with an array of candy and that his taxi is equipped with a built-in karaoke machine and microphone which is hooked up to an amazing sound system allowing his riders to sing their way to their destination.
The video that the NY Times did about Mansoor can be found on the home page of his site which gives the brief, sad background and the how the idea transpired. As devastating as the loss of his son was, Mansoor was able to transform his tragedy into a more positive environment for his daily life, spreading Life, Laughter and Love to everyone he picks up.
If you find yourself in need of a taxi and some happiness, you can reserve the CandyCabNYC.com for a trip well worth taking 🙂