Taxi driver MK does not hide the fact that he had polio and is physically handicapped. He also openly displays a handicapped parking label on his windscreen. But the tanned, jovial man in the driver's seat is a polio victim, possibly Singapore's only disabled cabby.

MK (not his real name) does not want you to know his identity.

Not because he's ashamed of it, or that he fears people might shun his taxi.

After all, he tells passengers about his handicap the way other cabbies talk about the weather and politics (not that he has to, with the big handicap sticker on his windscreen).

But talk about it in the national newspapers? MK cringes. He's too modest to do so.

Here is his story.

When I took his taxi while on a short holiday in Singapore, I did not suspect that MK, 50, had poliomyelitis, commonly known as polio or infantile paralysis.

He needs crutches to walk properly.

CONFIDENT, PLEASANT

But he seems so ordinary and happy, very pleasant, normal, confident, cheerful and full of pride over what he has achieved.

MK contracted polio when he was 3.

Until he was 12, he spent his days in hospitals and homes. By the time he had fully recovered, it was too late to be enrolled in a school.

Schools either told him they were not equipped with facilities for the disabled or that he was just too old to enrol in primary school, he said.

MK spent his days working from home, helping his mother with any jobs that she could bring home, including making Chinese prayer paper.

Still, he never gave up his dream to lead a normal life.

In his 20s, MK worked as a factory worker, then as an administrative assistant with an accounting firm, a job he held for 14 years.

When he was recently retrenched, MK decided to drive a taxi.

His disabled friends scoffed at his idea. After all, they themselves had tried in vain to get a taxi licence.

MK, however, succeeded in obtaining his Taxi Vocational Licence (TVL) in May last year after passing the course at the Singapore Taxi Academy.

He also got himself certified fit to drive after going through medical checks required by the Land Transport Authority (LTA).

A month later, he joined ComfortDelGro as a taxi driver.

MK currently drives an automatic Hyundai Sonata taxi (his left leg is too weak to operate a clutch) and he has a relief driver.

But he is treated somewhat differently from other cabbies.

For example, he is required to pay the same taxi rental fee as everyone else, but he can be insured for only $3,000 instead of the normal $10,000 for the other able-bodied taxi drivers.

Still, he is grateful that he has a job and is able to contribute to his family.

Work aside, MK takes pleasure in his passion for sports, which was stoked when he joined an association for the disabled.

Over the years, he has been told many times that it would take a long time for him to turn professional in sports.

This is despite the fact that he had represented Singapore at various competitions, such as the Far East and South Pacific Games for the Disabled (now known as the Asian Para Games) in tennis, basketball, swimming, track and field and marathon, where he competes in a wheelchair.

But to him, these disappointments are small compared to what he feels he has been blessed with.

MK is married 'with two lovely children', a son, 20, and a daughter, 19.

He met his wife, who is able-bodied, when she was conducting a survey on the disabled for an agency.

MK's focus now is on ensuring that his children get the education he never got.

He told me that if he has the opportunity, he would like to reach out to the disabled community and spread the message that they must fight on and never give up.

The writer, a former marketing communications manager of a five-star Singapore hotel, now lives and works in Hull, England 
 
http://newpaper.asia1.com.sg/news/story/0,4136,164263,00.html