It is a truth universally acknowledged...

that if a foreigner does not understand you, the best course of action is to speak at increasing volumes.

Some people take this to new levels by skipping moderate volumes entirely.  A few nights ago, Sydney, Kelsey and I were taking a taxi back from JiangShan -- it's only about a five minute drive -- and the driver began yelling as soon as we got in.  Fortunately his Chinese was quite clear or at least he had an accent that I'm familiar with, so I understood more of what he was saying than I normally do.  (For the record, my Chinese really is pretty terrible and I haven't learned much more this year, due to being busy with other things... like teaching...)

Anyway.  Here was the conversation as I remember it...  it was dark out and quite cold so we were in a hurry.

me:  *flagging down the taxi and then dashing to get in*  "Huaqiao Wai Yuan!" [name of our school]
Sydney and Kelsey jumped in the back.
driver:  *yelling something something something, possibly with KUAI KUAI KUAI LE*  [about how we were in a hurry]
all of us:  *laughing*
driver:  "NIMEN SHI NAGUO REN????" [what country are you from?]
me:  "Women shi meigguoren!" [we're Americans!]  "Ni ne?"  [how about you?]
driver:  "ZHONGGUOREN something!"  [I'm Chinese of course!!!]
me:   *deciding that this was absurd and if he was going to yell, I was too*  "ZHENDEMA????"  [really????}
driver:  "ZHENDE!!  NI HUI SHOU HANYU MA?"  [of course!! you can speak Chinese?]
me:  "YI DIAN DIAN.  NI HUI SHOU YINGYU MA?" [just a little, can you speak English?]
driver:  "NO!!!"
me:  *laughing*
*random conversation about how I was sort of translating for Syd and Kelsey and they sort of understood, at this point I wasn't catching a lot of what he was saying so I was just using a sound that is the most useful sound in Chinese since it either means "Yeah" or "I have no clue what you're talking about" or "what???" depending on what intonation you give it...]
Sydney and Kelsey:  *begin singing in the back seat*
me:  "TAMEN SHI FENGLE!!!"  [they're crazy!]
driver:  *yelling something about being crazy and asking if they were my friends...*
me:  "...Dui... tamen shi wode pengyou..." [yeah... they're my friends...]
*random other conversations about craziness and other stuff I was not understanding...*
me:  *as we got to the university*  "NI KEYI JINRU MA?"  [can you go in? -- rather than dropping us off at the gate]
driver:  "BU KEYI!!! something something something"  [I can't!]
me:  "SHENME??? WEISHENME??????"  [What???? WHY?????]
driver: "TA BU something something" [he (the guard) won't let me!]
me:  "WOMEN SHI LAOSHI!!!"  [We're teachers!]
driver:  "NIMEN SHI LAOSHI??  Ahhh... KEYI!"  [You're teachers?  Oh.... I can!]
...and then he dropped us off and we paid him.

It was an exciting ride.

I have to say, though, he was one of the calmer drivers I've had.  On the way to the Thanksgiving dinner in our city or something, I was in a taxi with an insane driver.  He nearly rearended the car in front of us... which was a police car... which had no license plate.

If I was a taxi driver, I'd probably yell at foreigners too.