Passenger
How often is it that you get to ride shotgun in a BMW driven by a 23-year-old Chinese girl with bad teeth, poor English, and a pink blazer over a "Lilo and Stitch" t-shirt? Being chastised in Chinese for fastening my seat belt was only the first step in a harrowing, white-knuckled trip through the center of the city, mercifully crawling past Tiananmen Square, where South Sudan flags waved next to the sickle and stars.
"I've had my driver's license for three years, but this is the first year I've driven." Matter of fact, slightly proud, yet embarrassed by her BMW, which she won't tell her coworkers she drives. Her GPS emits sounds in the tone of a 90s-era modem, and the directions are all wrong. I guide her to my apartment using the accumulated knowledge of less than 4 months of Beijing taxi rides.
Heavy on the brakes, late on the start, honking liberally and being liberally honked at, we lurch from lunch to my place, where she drops me off and speeds away to meet her friends in some distant place, trusting her GPS to get her there.
I breathe a sigh of relief and light a cigarette.