Eugene Jansen relaxes into the back seat of his blue kombi and smiles. This is his favourite place to kick back or to do homework with his son between lifts.
Eugene Jansen relaxes into the back seat of his blue kombi and smiles. This is his favourite place to kick back or to do homework with his son between lifts.
But you will not find him here during the National Arts Festival or the Highway Africa conference, when he can work up to 16 hours a day, ferrying visitors and delegates all around Grahamstown. In a town where unemployment is rife, Jansen is lucky to have two jobs.
His bread and butter comes from shift work at the Rhodes Campus Protection Unit (CPU) as control room supervisor. His second job is that of the shuttle driver of the blue Volkswagen combi you may have seen making its way around town.
“It’s all above board,” says CPU Assistant Manager David Brown. Forms can be filled out by employees to take on extra work as long as it is entirely done in their own time.
Brown himself helps Jansen out with the shuttle service when he needs a hand. Jansen also has a third job, which starts after 8pm when he comes home.
“Then I’m a husband,” he laughs, and talks animatedly about his two young children. Originally from Port Elizabeth, Jansen moved to Grahamstown 10 years ago.
He realised the need for public transport in the coloured community where he lives, and researched starting a shuttle business.
With experience of working for the student shuttle service Rhodetrip, all he needed was a pair of wheels,
which he bought in 2007.
His first assignment was taking school children to PJ Olivier High School. The learners remain a strong part of his client base, which has grown to between 35 and 40 permanent clients this year.
Another group whom he calls his ‘crew’, are fellow employees he takes to and from work. Eugene Mini Cab Services, as the company was registered under this year, has expanded airport services, social visits and sightseeing tours.
But one trip Eugene will not be making any time soon, is one down a muddy farm road on a rainy night. His worst call-out was taking three students to a club about 15km outside Grahamstown on the road to Peddie.
“My nightmare started that evening,” he says, his eyes focussed on the grey seat cover in front of him. After dropping off the partygoers, his kombi got stuck in the mud for three hours, and when a tow-truck finally arrived, it got stuck too.
On top of that, he was unable to get cellphone reception to contact his wife, whom he had told that he will be back soon! “Then I decided never again will I go out for any random caller if it’s raining and I have to go on a farm road,” he says.
His most positive experience, however, was on a family trip to Cape Town last year. He realised that his kombi was ideal for long trips, and his family was able to enjoy the long-distance cab service.
“When you take people on tours, you always say to yourself you want to take your family to these places.” Jansen lives for his family, and since he sacrifices so much time doing two jobs, I ask him whether taxi-driving as a second job is worth it.
“At this stage there is no profit I’m making. Everything that comes in, goes into the business,” he says. With God’s blessing, however, he believes he will see forward movement, but for now he is happy to help other people.
Jansen’s cellphone rings. “I’ll be there in five minutes,” he says, and shifts slowly from his relaxation area. It’s time to move to the front seat again.
