[steven]

I haven't used many taxis in my life... but Japanese taxi drivers tend to not have to use navigation systems too often. However, I've noticed that a lot of them tend t be pretty cold as far as friendlyness goes. They hardly ever have an opinion on anything and are almost too polite. The ones who actually talk and carry on a conversation are great and usually funny though.

By the way, I'm not very well travelled so I've always wondered about this: do other countries have daiko service? (I'm sure the word is different, but do other countries do this too?). Daiko is a special taxi where there are two people riding in the car. When they are called, one of them will drive the customer's car home (as they are usually intoxicated) and the other one will follow. Then they will return to their base together and start all over again. I've found those guys to be pretty good at navigating... which they usually do late at night. If there is no traffic they seem to know the exact speed at which to travel to not hit any red lights too!