Great news! That I should have announced weeks ago.  O.K. Taxi now speaks English as well as Bulgarian! Um, wow. This is just one more reason to love O.K. Taxi!!

O.K. Taxi was already by far the best taxi company in Sofia.  They are honest and this I've learned is something that's kind of a rarity. For O.K. Taxi, the base rate is something like .59 leva and then .59 (during the day) and .70 (after 10pm) leva per kilometer.  They have meters and use them without question.

The real O.K. Taxi is a yellow taxi with lettering on the door that is white and says: OK.  But it's really important to make sure that the dots between the O and K are red.  This way you know that you are taking an official O.K. Taxi.

There are lots of impostors in the city.  Some of these taxis say C.K. with the red dots and white lettering where the C nearly touches the K making it look oh so similar to the legitimate O.K. Taxi.  Others read OK but without the signature red dots.  These impostor taxis want to make you think that you are climbing into the real thing only their base rates and their rates by the kilometer are much, much higher.  <!--more-->

In all taxis in Sofia, the rates should posted on the front of the car in the lower corner of the front window on the passenger side.  If you are picking up a taxi from one of the queues around the city--always, always check these.  You'd be surprised how high some of these rates can be and once you're in you're going to have to pay what's posted.

If you're taking a taxi in from the airport, you have two options.  If you can speak some Bulgarian, you can march out of Terminal Two take the doors on the right straight out to the taxi queue, walk to the first O.K. taxi you see, hand over your bags, climb in and give them your directions. Easy-peasy.

If you don't speak Bulgarian, look for the O.K. Taxi counter inside Terminal Two.  When you exit the sliding glass doors into the airport the stand is almost directly in front of you exit either left or right and go to the counter.  They speak English there and will order a taxi for you from the queue outside.  They will give you a piece of paper with your taxi number on it and the address that you are going to.  Your taxi driver will be looking for you when you get outside.  Give him the piece of paper and he'll get you where you want to go.  This is also pretty darn easy.

Recently the O.K. Taxis that I've been in have also had GPS and that's pretty darn cool.  So on a recent trip home, after I gave the driver my address and directions and he either didn't believe me or thought I was making things up.  The taxi driver programed in my address and the GPS gave him the same directions I had.  (Does that make me as good as GPS?!)

When you've arrived at your destination, the driver should give you your receipt and you should pay.  I always round up when it comes to paying mostly because I can't believe how inexpensive taxis are to take in this city and I know how little everyone is paid.  Oh, and after living in Washington DC where simply stepping foot in a taxi will cost you 7+ dollars, it's hard for me to believe that I can take a taxi from my house in the city center to the airport for something like 10 leva.

Aside from all of this, taxi how to.  I feel like I should return to the reason I  am writing this post: O.K. Taxi has dispatchers who speak English (some more than others)!! I am sure that this is silly but I have to say that I feel much, much more confident now that a taxi will come and pick me up when I when and where I want.  Before I was always a little (sometimes more than a little) nervous that I might make a mistake over the phone in Bulgarian or that they wouldn't understand me and I'd never get a taxi.  Now that they speak English it's a lot easier for me to use Bulgarian and reinforce this with English as needed.

So what's the last thing you need to know? Well, I'd guess that it's the phone number.  If you're calling locally 029732121 and if you're calling from an international phone +359 2 9732121!!

In closing the thing I get the biggest kick out of is that rather than calling you when you're taxi is on the way or outside, they send you a text message! Um, O.K. Taxi you're more than okay in my book.