You here, long time?

More than 40 years back, I found myself in a NYC taxi. Though the driver didn’t greet me, he didn’t seem unfriendly.

As he was dressed in clothes from the Indian subcontinent, I assumed he had recently arrived in the States.

To know his story, I asked him in mock pidgin English: “You here, long time?”

He responded in the King’s English: “I have been here 10 years, but I don’t know if that is long or short.”

We laughed.

There is nothing to know.