News / John Tabatabai / 22 July 2008 / 5 Comments

Firstly I'd like to thank everybody for replying or making comments to my previous blogs. There is nothing worse than writing to seemingly nobody.

Its like when you were a kid at school and you tried to endlessly to get through to your parents or teacher and tell them something, but they never listened. Well, writing a blog or whatever you want to call it, and no one ever comments is slightly worse than that ! So thanks to all for humouring me.

I haven't played much poker since busting out the Main Event. My luck was pretty bad so I decided to relax and spend some time with poker magician, Antonio Esfandiari. One of the many things I learnt from him which I found both amusing and educational was that he stuck to his principles regardless of the situation. If someone tries to screw you over, separating you from your hard earnt cash dishonestly or deceptively, you should punish them.

The incident took place when we got a taxi from his flat to take us to the Venetian on the strip. The taxi took a right out of the apartment block, the conversation went as follows:

"doctor, where are you going?"
"to the Venetian"
"Venetian is the other way, stop the car and turn around"
"I was going to take the freeway!"

Now, I don't live in vegas and I am geographically challenged but from what I understand, taking a right out of the complex to get to the Venetian is the equivalent of folding AA preflop in a HU match. That big of an error. Anyway, Antonio whispered to me, "don't pay, just stay in the car, watch and learn kid." At this point, the only thing that excited me was the fact that we wouldn't have to play rock, paper, scissors for the taxi bill and that he was going to pay outright! First for everything. Naturally, when we pulled up outside the Venetian Antonio asked if I had any small bills as he only had 100's. lol. Badbeat. I gave him a $5 bill and 5 $1 bills. The taxi fare was $9.66. Antonio handed the guy the money, totalling $10 and we sat in the back. The taxi driver looked at him, in a manner which implied he was waiting for more money, his tip. Antonio then said, "I would like my change sir". "hehe, you want change?" exclaimed the taxi driver. "yes please sir, I gave you $10, the bill is $9.66, therefore I am owed 34cent." "You really want 34 cents change?" "Yes, I want my change, 34cents is a lot of money these days".

I am dyng trying not to laugh out loud, was amazing to see someone go through this much effort just to punish and hopefully educate the taxi driver, to not con people. Anyway, the taxi driver then got out of the cab, tried to get change from the Valet and other taxi drivers. Of course no one had any change. He came back into the car and said "I don't carry change, its $10 sir." Antonio, one to never give up said "Sir, the fare is $9.66, I need my change, I cannot lose money. I can give you either $10 and you give me my change or I can give you $9." This line of talk went back and forth a little bit and in the end we ended paying the taxi driver $9.

The irony is that by trying to cheat us into a longer route, the fare would only have increased by $2-3. That is what he would have got from us as a tip as a minimum, plus he would have had another fare much sooner instead of arguing with us for the extra 5mins. His play was definitely -EV loooooooool.

Lesson learnt for both myself and the taxi driver, stick to your principles and punish those who try to deceive you.

Last night was my first night of online poker in long time, played a bunch of the Sunday betfair tourneys and the only tourney I did good in was the $1,000 GTD. I think it was a $5 or $10 freezeout, final tabled. Was very tired, jet lagged etc etc. Played avg all night, but next Sunday I will hand out some punishings. Feel free to find me and chase me then guys. Question time too if you like 

I got my PokerMillion heat on Saturday, so hopefully will win my first heat and progress to round 2. Need to win to break even from Vegas. Oh dear.

Good luck all.