The elusive triumph of a Grab fare under $10

Surprise savings are chicken soup for the soul in a year of rising costs and the constant fear of worse to come.

- Mubin Saadat Deputy Opinion Editor

Divine intervention? Timing? Luck?

A rough morning compounded by a heavy downpour and a bus that perhaps ghosted me — since an app promised it was two minutes away ~ forever.

Resignation met self-pity, with just one possible redemption left.

With a prayer, hope, anda pseudo-scientific strategy that involved refreshing (and isn’t worth getting into), I tapped “Book Standard” on my Grab app.

Seconds later, I was matched with a driver, and the algorithm delivered something much more consequential... the fare.

A single digit (with decimals of course)! I felt forgiven for something I might have done. The algorithm stars had aligned.

Divine intervention? Timing? Luck?

I was emotional, just slightly, but enough to screenshot this digital trophy and send it off to my better half. A heart emoji followed and the world was welcoming again.

The flip side, after all, is the darker tale of sticker shock and surge pricing that leaves us stranded, indignant and poorer for the privilege.

That was the plight of friends heading home after a work event, shocked and exasperated when the app pushed a fare of $50. I’m fairly certain an expletive escaped in the heated reaction to a fare that might have felt like a fine.

Eventually, they chose to walk to the nearest MRT station, even as they were confused over the coloured lines — to take or transfer. Then again, it was money spared to be splurged on another occasion, deemed more deserving.

Divine intervention is said to appear in mysterious ways. In Singapore, it can arrive as a Grab fare under $10. It can flow from bargains beyond ride-hailing.