I guess it's going to be emo post again this one?
I don't feel happy now... disappointing... but this time i'm not gonna say why. Don't really wanna expose what I'm doing that made myself so disappointed. I hope I won't ended up like this for the rest of my life.
and I'm still not recovering from flu after 3 weeks.
I better go sleep.....
:(
Date: 15 June 2008
Venue: Canary Wharf, Docklands, London
Tube: Jubilee Line, DLR
I grouped this 2 makes together as there are not many Swedish makes around. American cars are not easily found in the UK and not cheap due to its market size. British people doesn't really like American cars...
Anyway, cut short all the stuff and lets have a look at Swedish cars first. Volvo came to the expo and most people around only know Volvo from Sweden. Other car makers in Sweden? I'm not sure about it myself... lazy to do research though...
Swedish - Volvo
This is the Volvo C30 hot hatch. I love the front but don't really like the rear view... looks a bit awkward...
C70 convertible
I love convertibles and I think C70 is quite a handsome looking car. Volvo nowadays really design good looking cars... not like in the 80s and early 90s... boxy tank design... gee...
XC90
It was launched few years back to grab a share in the European SUV market to compete with other SUVs like BMW X5, VW Touareg, Audi Q7 etc.
XC60
Latest SUV from Volvo which is smaller than the XC90 to compete with BMW X3 etc. This unit at the expo was the only unit in UK as it was not yet on sale by the time of the car expo so it's a left hand drive. Looks very very nice if compare to the BMW X3.
So much for Volvo.
Heading towards American cars. American cars are usually famous for its size, high fuel consumptions and strange designs. Due to that, it was not widely accepted around other parts of the world, and nowadays even Americans don't really like the idea of it. Famous American marques include Ford, GM, Chevrolet, Cadillac and etc.
Cadillac
It's an American marque which is very famous among the celebrities. It built strange cars and etc. Anyway...
Escalade
Celebrities like Escalade, rappers loves it. I don't know why... but they just love it.
CTS4
This looks better... Not much comment as I'm not too familiar with American cars....
STS
Probably the elder sibling of CTS4. Probably something like BMW 3 and 5 series's different. I prefer the CTS4 over this STS.
Chevrolet
The car Chevy displayed is the famous Corvette Z06 sports car. The only model displayed along with it's convertible version. As there are not much difference, i just put one here.
Hummer
Hummer, a brand of GM, is a controversial brand. It was started as a military vehicle but it was then mass produced to the consumer market. Hummer, totally famous for its massive size, massive engine displacement and massive fuel consumption. The H2 then tries to make its way to Europe but it didn't sell at all. Until the H3, which is the one shown here, start selling a bit. Smaller in size, smaller displacement but still high fuel consumption if compare to other SUVs. It's not as huge as H1 and H2. Even though most people doesn't like, celebrities still love it. Even Becks got a Hummer.
Anyway, that's all for the Swedish and American section. I'll cover about modification and special section if I got time later.
Something about the motorcycle I use for some time. It doesn't have a working speedometer nor fuel gauge. I didn't really care about the speedometer as it's an old bike and it's not going to go like over 80km/h maximum anyway. The thing I can't stand is the broken fuel gauge. The fuel gauge just went out of order when I come back from UK. I didn't know and I broke down on the road once because of it. It ran out of fuel. dammit.
Well, my journey from home to office is around 20 minutes. Not far, but for a half wrecked motorcycle, it's hell bad. I'm feeling the price of the fuel here. Few years ago, I can pump full tank by RM5. Now, RM5 is only over half tank. This RM5 has a story today.
As the day starts, I brought the half wrecked motorcycle to the fuel station, nearly empty tank. I took out my wallet, pull out the RM50 note to the counter, "Pam 6, 5 Ringgit" and hand over the money. The Malay girl at the other side, took my money, nodded, touch the screen - - Pump 6 - - RM5 - - Tender RM50. The screen then shows RM45 change. The Malay girl took 4 RM10 notes, 1 RM5 note, actually she should stop, but she continued and took 2 RM1 notes, making up RM47. I thought she was kidding. She counted the change once. I thought they offer RM2 of fuel for every RM5 pumped. She counted again, and hand me the money over the counter, with the 2 RM1 notes on top. I took and say thanks, put back in my wallet, and go straight to the pump and fill my tank up.
I start to look around, like nothing happen, while turning my eyes towards the counter. I saw her smiling, looking at me... I pretended nothing happen. I know she suddenly realized she got me the wrong change. I was thinking if she's going to come out to get my RM2 back, or shut the pump off so I can't refill as much. After I finish, I ride the half wrecked motorcycle away to work, like nothing happen, while laughing.
Even though it's only RM2, but it makes difference. My lunch today only cost me 70 cents as the full price is RM2.70.
For RM5 of fuel, I get discount of 40%, not bad eh. But I think the poor girl needs to put her own RM2 back into the cash register....
Yeah right.... We'll help you get there... in "no time"...
From KitKat's blog, I saw his complaints about this bank. Last weekend, I heard complaints about their car loan services from a friend... today it's my turn to complain... DAMN!!
Well, I got myself a job, and the company requires me to open a bank account at that bloody bank. Well, I'll try to explain.
From my office to the nearest branch, journey is around 20 minutes by using 2 wheels, due to traffic, cars will consume more time to reach the destination. My lunch break is 1 hour 30 minutes. That seems really long as some offices only have 1 hour lunch break.
So I took my motorbike and went to the petrol station for refill, adding traffic and such, with exhaustion due to concentrating on the road, and going to another bank to get my deposit to open the new account, I reached my destination at around 12.30pm. I walked into the bank, the security old man gave me a number to queue up, but due to that there's not many people I felt quite lucky. Until I saw the wall which states that opening bank account doesn't need any numbers and just queue up at counter 1 and 2, well, including Fixed Deposit services. I was thinking, well, I;ll have a try, but the lady at other counter said I need to go there to queue... O___O" I saw 2 person queuing up and 1 lady standing at the counter quite long already. I rushed towards the queue... but it was too late... another lady suddenly appear in front of me... so there's 3 person in front of me... and 2 counters, there's only 1 open. That doesn't really piss me off until I knew that they need the MYKad reader to open the bloody account!! and there's only 1 at counter 1!!! What for setting up 2 counters with 1 person working and only 1 card reader!!! It took ages for the people in front of me to settle their stuff... I waited for 40 minutes for my turn... and took like nearly 10 minutes to finish everything. The time is 1.20pm and there's only 10 minutes left. There goes my lunch break... but I didn't care and went for lunch before "flying" my motorbike through heavy traffic at around nearly 1.30pm. I reached there 10 minutes later.... half the time I use to reach the bank cutting everything else out.
For me... I was more lucky than KitKat as he doesn't get his card on the day while I got mine on spot! but damn... totally poor service... Banks should set up sufficient counters for customers to open account!! It's their bloody business and they should be happy that there are people coming to open up account in their bloody bank!! Instead they only have 2 counters and using some extra process time due to slow card readers and lack of card readers.
RHB Bank sucks!! Rotten Hole Bank...
Date: 15 June 2008
Venue: Canary Wharf, Docklands, London
Tube: Jubilee Line, DLR
The previous post is all about British cars and now it will be German cars. Germany has lots of history in car manufacturing. Most of Malaysian people are more interested in Mercedes, I really don't know why as I'm not a huge fan of it, but now I think it had already improved and it starts to catch my attention a little bit. As for other German manufacturers, there are Audi, BMW, Volkswagen, Porsche and etc. For me, I'm a total BMW fan.
In this Motor Expo, Audi did not participate and it does not participate in the British International Motor Show (BIMS) as well which is totally disappointing. Anyway, here are the pictures I took of the German marques.
Volkswagen
Volkswagen (VW), what do you think of when I mention it? Many people know VW Beetle, the classic cute car which started production since 1938 until 2003. In 1998, the New Beetle rolled out of the production line and sold since then, but the classic Beetle was still in production and was phasing out.
This is the New Beetle convertible which was displayed at the Motor Expo along with other VWs.
Another VW which grab the attention of the crowds is the VW Golf or known as VW Rabbit in some countries. The 2 models displayed at the Expo were the Golf Mk5 GTI and R32. Among the 2 models, most people choose to drive the GTI 2.0L rather than R32 even though R32 has the 3.2L V6 under the hood as to fuel consumption and many said the GTI is a better driving machine.
The difference from behind.... Silver one is the R32 while the red one is the GTI.
Other than the Beetle and Golf, there are still many more models available. Here are few of them which were displayed at the Expo.
This is the New Passat, similar size to the BMW 5 Series or the Mercedes E-Class.
This one is the Phaeton, the most luxurious is VW fleet.
This is the VW Eos convertible, another of my VW favourite. It's not too big and it's a convertible. The price is not too attractive though. I think it should be a fun car to drive.
As for SUVs, VW has 2 models displayed. The smaller Tiguan and the huge Touareg. Personally I go for the Touareg if I need to choose one.
Well, so much for the Volkswagen at the Expo.
Mercedes Benz
For the Mercedes Benz, I did not have much to say about it as I'm not really a big fan and I had seen too much of it running around. There is 2 models which I would like to share though. That will be the new CLC class and the facelifted SL. Other one displayed is the S-class and maybe there are others? I forgot... There are only 5 photos taken at the MB section and I'll show them all.
This is the CLC, looks quite similar to the old C-class hatch, but with uglier rear lights and the new C-class lookalike lights. I seriously doubt that the designers were drunk when they design the rear lights, and the cheapo wheels. They called it an entry level sports coupe!! Must be joking... No wonder it had poor reviews...
And the new SL facelift model. This unit which was displayed here actually was sold already. I wonder who bought it. I can't feel my adrenalin rushing at all.
Overall, I think I like the new S-class more and I think the best model will be the CLS which was not displayed at the expo. AMG models are more interesting but they are all not there.
Porsche
Yawn.... for the designs of Porsche.... every single one of them looks so similar that I can't really differenciate some of them... facelift no facelift it's all the same. In the end, I still love the classic ones as they have more characteristics.
Well this is the Cayenne GTS, a more powerful Cayenne. People around are saying the Cayenne looks horrible. I can't deny it though. In the end, I only love one thing about it, when the engine starts to consume fuel and roars. A true monster under the hood. Design wise.. duh...
This is the Cayman... I don't know what is special about it...
The 911 Turbo... I only know it is expensive... and it's a turbo.
and that's... Porsche..
BMW
BMW, I'm lovin' it, really. My wallpaper is a BMW, on my table there is BMW picture, my dream car is a BMW... geezz...
BMW, Bayerische Motoren Werke, or known as Bavarian Motor Works in English, used to build aircraft at first, that is why BMW logo is a blue and white propeller. It was founded in 1913 by building aircraft, then after World War 1, 1924, they start to build motorcycles. Then their automotive history started since even before 1924 as proposals and prototypes. They build their first car since 1927 onwards. Read more here.
So much for that, here are some of the models displayed.
This is the new 135i and the one displayed is the M Sport convertible version. They say the 135i is the replacement for the old E30 3 series which is still famous until now that no other BMWs can replace for it's niche handling. Actually this 135i really is similar to E30 in its size as the current 3 series has already grown up a lot in size like all other cars.
The 135i has paddle shift fitted.
The other one will be the X6 xDrive35d which has a controversial design of hatchback on a SUV body. The X6 has its own class which is called SAV, which stands for Sports Activity Vehicle.
I think it looks fabulous in real, better than in the picture. Even though some people doesn't like the design, I love it as it got its own character which nobody dares to think of.
And finally... my dream car.... The M3. This unit is the E93 convertible model.
It has the classic M3 wheels like previous version. 
The M style quad exhaust pipe for the new 4.0L 420hp V8 under the hood.
The guy then suddenly came out with the key and ignite the V8. My goodness it sounds so so nice and powerful!! Well, he revved the engine for a few times then there goes the roof. The roof retracted in 22 seconds.
Well, that's all for the German cars section. I'll post more about others in later posts...
