A Baby Was Born in My Uber · Rafael, Boston
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Weekly. Free. Straight from the driver's seat.
According to Sergio at The Rideshare Guy, Rafael is the Ironman of Uber driving. And he’s a friend.
In this episode, Rafael tells me about a woman who gave birth in his car, how he made $1.5 million doing more than 76,000 rideshare trips, and how he's now going to flight school to become an airline pilot.
Rafael is one of those people who makes you question what “working hard” actually means.
For years, he drove Uber full-time in Boston, driving the overnight shift for 12 hours, seven days a week. He learned the city, learned when to drive, learned which trips worked for him, and put an incredible number of miles on a succession of inexpensive cars. One of them went more than 300,000 miles. His current Lincoln has done the same.
But Rafael's story isn't just about Uber.
Before rideshare, he was a chef. He came to the United States from Brazil, worked in restaurants and high-end hotels, and spent years in kitchens where long days were normal. Compared with standing in a hot kitchen for 12 or 16 hours, driving a car around Boston didn’t seem so bad.
That work ethic carried over.
He became known for taking many short trips. At his peak, he says he was making roughly $15,000 to $18,000 a month in gross earnings. His best year produced around $30,000 in tips. Over about seven and a half years, he says his gross rideshare earnings totaled roughly $1.5 million.
And then there are the stories.
A lot can happen when you spend that much time with strangers in the back seat.
A few nights before we recorded this episode, Rafael picked up a pregnant woman and her husband in the middle of the night. He thought he was taking them to the hospital. They didn’t make it. The woman went into active labor in the back seat of his Lincoln. Rafael pulled over and called 911, and before long, a baby was born in the car. Then, because this was a rideshare, the trip ended early, and Rafael says his original fare of around $12 was reduced to about $8.
He cleaned the car himself. And then he kept driving. His next passenger was a flight attendant.
That story is funny and absurd, but it also says something about the job. Drivers spend a lot of time doing ordinary work, until suddenly the ordinary becomes anything but ordinary.
What I like most about Rafael’s story, though, is what comes next.
At 46, he started flight school. He told me he doesn’t call becoming a pilot a dream. He calls it a goal. That stuck with me. Rafael didn’t simply drive Uber for seven years. He used it. He earned money. He kept his vehicle costs low. He bought a multifamily property. He created rental income. He built enough financial room to take a shot at something he had wanted to do for years.
Now he drives less and studies more. He is learning to fly.
Something is fitting about that. A guy who spent years moving people around on the ground is now preparing for a career moving people through the sky. And that may be the bigger lesson in Rafael’s story.
Gig work can be a destination for some people. For others, it can be a bridge.
The important thing is knowing which one it is for you.
Rafael clearly loved driving. He still does. He learned how to make the job work for him, and he made a lot of money doing it. But he also kept looking beyond the next ride. That’s what I admire most.
More than 76,000 trips later, he’s still moving forward. He's just climbing now.
He’s living above the algorithm.
