Editor’s note: In this edition, The Daily Orange presents a series throughout its sections about people who embody Syracuse, the university and the community surrounding it. 

 

Don Thatvihane drove his taxi cab to the bus station. He awaited passengers, as usual if he doesn’t already have assignments for the day. 

A 6-foot-2 man approached his maroon Chevy Impala LT. 

‘Want to drive me to Manley Field House?’ Mike Williams, the former Syracuse receiver, asked. Don will drive anywhere in Syracuse. He’ll even take you to New Brunswick, N.J., if that’s where you want to go. 

‘You know Paul Harris?’ Williams inquired. Of course Don did. 

‘That’s my best friend!’ 

Don, a Syracuse resident, doesn’t advertise his University Transportation taxi company. He doesn’t want to encounter danger with strange calls from people. Everyone he drives around he has been referred to. Think of his phone number as an old family heirloom. Mike Williams? Paul Harris? Kris Joseph? No different. The trio passed down Don’s business card to one another. Now, he’s the only cab driver they’ll use, Don said. 

Don moved to the United States in 1985 from Laos and has been an Orange fan since he arrived in Syracuse. But now with the personal relationship he has built with some of SU’s athletes, he has even more reason to root for the home team. 

Don’s lure isn’t his spotless car with leather interior and spacious leg room. Everyone has nice cars these days, Don says. It’s not Don’s work ethic, either — his seven-days-a-week mentality and 6 a.m. to 7 p.m. hours help support his wife and five kids. 

His costumers adore him for his personality. 

Don said whenever Kris Joseph, the rising junior forward on the SU men’s basketball team, gets in the car, he asks Don, ‘Why do you think we lost that last game? I want to be better. What can I do to be better?’

Not enough teamwork. At least that’s what Don thinks. 

Don simply told Joseph to show his SU basketball coaches that he’s a team player. Then, he’d receive more playing time.

Don wasn’t sure if Joseph listened. But as he kept watching SU games this season from the comfort of his home on his Sony projection TV with his three sons, he slowly saw Joseph playing more. 

‘We’ve been following SU as long as I can remember,’ Don’s oldest son, Po, said. ‘We’re pro-SU fans.’ 

The feeling of pride, joy overcame Don on Feb. 18 when Syracuse traveled to Georgetown. Po recalls Don saying during the game, ‘I told Kris (Joseph) he can’t be stubborn.’ Joseph completed an epic dunk and finished the game with 11 points. Don felt the moment along with Joseph, knowing his own small advice helped Joseph succeed. 

Athletes need the mental aspect of the game in order to excel on the field or court. Marred former receiver Mike Williams struggles with this, Don said. 

‘Mike Williams, I know him personally. He’s good! He plays well,’ Don said. ‘But his mental was not there. That is why he could not make it with us.’

Call him a psychiatrist with leather seats. Call him an off-the-court coach that drives the team van. Regardless, Don’s small clan of athletes values his advice. 

The small, two-car taxi company provides Don his living. He and his son Po, 27, drive identical maroon Impalas. Only, Po’s car has fabric interior. 

Don always takes the athletes — he doesn’t relinquish those costumers to his son. Harris and Joseph offer Don tickets to games frequently, but Don always turns them down. He says he’s too busy. Plus, he likes watching from home or listening on the radio as he drives around other SU fans. 

Only when his daughter, Emmy, graduated from SU with an information technology degree in 2009 did he enter the confines of the Carrier Dome. Don said he didn’t pay attention to Joe Biden speaking. ‘Too boring.’ 

But Emmy said she remembers Don’s face lighting up on graduation day. To Don, SU was always No. 1. In education and in sports. She recalls that every time Don dropped her off for class, he would beam with pride. 

‘He’s a very disciplined man. He always put education first. If you don’t have a good education then you really have nothing. Education is a foundation for everything,’ Emmy said. ‘He really pushed me to go to SU and to graduate. And that’s from the professors, athletes and students he’d met taking them places, picking them up. Him telling me, ‘I picked up a professor today,’ I think he would relay those stories to me to inspire me.’

Don naturally inspires everyone around him. His children, the athletes. ‘I want everyone to be better,’ he said.

With that notion in mind, Don feels little sadness that Williams and Harris have moved on from SU. He wants Kris Joseph to leave Syracuse, too. He wants Joseph to make it to the ‘Big Time.’

‘As a father, as an old person, I like to see the kids do the right thing,’ Don said. ‘Move in the right direction. I want people to get out of Syracuse and become like Donovan McNabb or Carmelo Anthony. Then they come back. And be big people and role models of the program.’

Don enjoys conversing with the athletes. He enjoys all of his customers, but Joseph and company, they don’t receive special treatment. The fare is the fare, no matter who you are. 

‘Everybody has to be treated fairly,’ Don said. ‘Sure, other people wouldn’t know if I gave them special treatment.’

He looks up at the ceiling of his car and points his finger to the sky. ‘But God, he knows what I am inside. That’s the way I live my life.’  

Sometimes, the athletes go weeks without calling Don. And sometimes they call four or five times a day. Joseph’s roommate, Wes Johnson, has a truck, so Joseph doesn’t need a taxi as much. 

Don will drive them around regardless of when they call. He has to make a living.  

‘Everybody can take people where they want to go,’ Don said. ‘But how you do it? Got to give them a little hope.’ 

mkgalant@syr.edu

Published on April 12, 2010 at 12:00 pm