Wednesday, September 23, 2009



A-Star - it it really so?

As far as the styling of the A-Star is concerned, I don't daresay it's bad. Neither do I deem it good from all sides. What I feel is like they had a review after the basic shape of the car was built, and the design team had indeed done a good job. But the reviewer wanted the front of the car to look better. So he asked them to add more beauty to the front. But all the beauty they had been allowed to use on the car had already been spent on it. So what they did was to take off some from the back and add it to the front. So they got a front which is absolutely striking to look at, and a rear which is just plain ugly. The side profile demonstrates their sincere effort in merging both. I would've liked it better, had they made the rear window a bit more bigger - at least Swift big. Anyway it's only as ugly as the rear.

If, by any chance, the A-Star gets a break down, their owners will sell them at once, because if they try to push it to the nearby workshop, while doing that, they'll see how the car looks from behind, which is horrible. And with the A-star, Maruti seems to be so confident that the owners will never have to push it. So the owners will not see their cars from behind. And it's going to work, till they notice that the name of the ugly car that goes in front is 'A-Star'. Which will never happen, because noone dares to have a second look at it from behind :)

But they say the engine is very peppy, which can stretch a litre of fuel to about 19.6 kilometers. This level of resource squeezing is usually found only in Indian Software companies. And as the end result, what they have made is one of the most fuel efficient petrol cars in India. And it's a lightweight aluminium engine. Again, it's not my choice, because it is a 3-cylinder engine, which I'd accept but had it been 15 years ago.

Tuesday, September 01, 2009

I hate SUVs. Though some people call 'em 'cars'

I'd buy one, had I been a Real Estate agent, because for a few lakhs, I'd be getting more Real Estate, I'd be getting more floor area, more shopping space etc. These are concerns, usually in the minds of real estate agents or a home buyer. Not a car buyer in any imaginable sense to me.

Anyway, they have some peculiar advantages of their own. If I bought one,I'd be carrying more metal wherever I'm going, I'd be seeing truck drivers searching for cushions to put on their seats, to match my driving height, I'd be seeing more people moving out of my way, I'd be safer when I hit others. I'd be happier keeping my car on weigh bridge than on a road because it's where I can prove my car has something more than my neighbor's, I'd be... like that.

Those SUV owners live in a world a few centuries ago, when there were no roads or bridges. I'm quite sure that many of them had in their minds a concern of safety in case of a crash, when buying their cars. It's a known fact that SUVs crash easier than sedans, because they don't have proper control once they go to the other side of 160. But they say it's safer than a sedan, once it crashes somewhere. So they are surely gonna crash it, just because they bought it to crash. And if they don't crash, the few extra bucks they spent for purchasing the obese, unmovable automobile will be wasted, and the extra gallons of fuel they've been spending in moving the most reluctant of things, will be for nothing. The more they think about this, the more they want to hit someone who doesn't have similar huge automobiles as theirs.

But I agree one thing: It's one of the best ways to mock the government. It's like saying " See what I'm driving on the roads made by you". Wish the govt would ever mind that! If I were the ruler here, I'd have had given a serious thought why these many people are using SUVs on my roads. And I'd immediately give orders to mend the roads everywhere in my country. I think our govt is not that good.

Last day I saw a BMW X5 on the NH - 49. I followed it for some time on my bike. I couldn't help thinking good of him would it be, had he driven through the nearby bushes and wastelands, since his 4X4 is capable of doing that, and with the help of his SUV friends, he could try to shape an impromptu answer for the perennial question of road infrastructure development in our hyper crowded state. Way To Go !!! :)
The myth called Roads in Kerala

And finally, I'm about to start writing about something that doesn't really exist in my perspective -
'Roads in Kerala'. After driving a few tens of thousands of kilometers
through the roads in middle Kerala, I fail to convince myself there are proper roads in my state.

Some say ours is the state with the best road network in India. I'd in some way agree with it. In 2 ways -to be precise. It's a big net in which many of us, including me too, have been trapped, and there's always some work going on, either a water connection or some cable works.

But consider puzzles. The more complicated it is, the better it is said to be. If you can solve it in 2 hours, you'd say 'an average' puzzle, if you can solve it in one day, it's 'a bit complicated', and if you can't solve it at all, you can say it's a 'superb' puzzle. or say it's like what we call 'roads' in Kerala.

But whatever, it should be agreed that it is we mallus who have the most homely feel
while on the road. You can see people discussing all things under sky, freely standing in the road, especially in junctions. The buy and sell cows, they fix marriages, they plan the future of their children, all standing on the tarmac, just because they feel so homely while at it, unknowingly though it can spoil their future in a split second. If you feel that's not so, just take your bike and wander through the streets in any of our roads - best between 5.00 pm and 7.30 pm. Lucky you are, if you hit less than 5 of them a day.

A few weeks ago I saw in the newspaper, the road accident statistics of our beloved state - around 40000 accidents, and around 3900 deaths - in a state the size of a cucumber!. Being a biker who rides around 80 km per day in those busy hours, I was sort of surprised. Though a bit in the other direction as you might had been. Just 40000 accidents! in a state where around 30 million people who literally lives on those 'networks'. In a state where rich people think "I'm rich. So I can do whatever I want" and those who are not so just don't care anything about others drive, or more harmfully, that they need space.

Have you had a single journey through our network of State / National/ International highways without suddenly finding a careless driver changing lanes talking over phone, in front of you? Boy, this is Kerala. This is God's own country. Or 'God's my own' country. Or otherwise, 'Road's my own' country. Ya. It's that bad. Can't help saying.

I lost track of the number of times seeing some drivers asking others " What you are
doing, yaar? Are you crazy?" just because the latter was faster, though the reason for all the fuss was that the former chose the wrong lane while, say, entering to the main road from a pocket road. He has the everyday justification that he was slow. But that is not what was expected of him. Keep the rules. Be careful. Be anticipating about what can come in your way. And that's it. According to me.