zaichikarky | LJ Idol Topic 5: Afterthought

You know that happy little family in the toyota camry commercial?- oh this one:

To sum up this cheesy commercial, a family gets a '97 camry and keeps passing it down to their children. They get another camry- a hybrid and the youngest kid wants to drive that one, but it seems like he's stuck with the old camry.

Well, this can never be my family since we go through cars rather rapidly.

I remember our first car when we moved to America. My dad had to first get his license. I'm not sure how he did this considering when he took the drivers test in Russia, he failed it until my mom bribed the instructor to get him to pass. When he did manage to get his license, he got to drive my grandfather's car. A top of the line Yugo. I'm sure my father was happy to have such a magnificent car to drive. The only problem was that the Yugo was a piece of shit. We can't blame it on *our* Yugo, no, it was just the Yugo. The worst car ever released in the US.

My grandfather was a very frugal man. He was a Jew so of course what he wanted was the newest car at the cheapest price. A new car under 4000 dollars?! Well he was sold. After he died, my father was passed down the Yugo. The Yugo, made in Yugoslavia, was said to have been a communist car that was built in factories with rifles pointed at the production line.

The only thing Yugos were good for was breaking. I'm not sure how many times dad tried to get the Yugo fixed. I'm not sure how many times he had to go to the junkyard looking to replace some part that had fallen off. Junkyards at the time probably had hundreds of Yugos, all with broken timing belts. Yugos also had a tendency to get blown off bridges.

There are also a wide assortment of Yugo jokes. For example:

Why does the Yugo have a rear-window defroster? So you can keep your hands warm while you push it.

Yu*go (yoo-go)
n. 1) Small, economical, Yugoslavian-built automobile.
2) 4x4 hood ornament.
adj. 1) What dosen't happen when you press the accelerator.

What do you call a Yugo with a flat tire?
Totaled.

What do you call a Yugo with 100 miles?
An overachiever

When I was 7, one day my mom was late to pick me up from my Jewish day camp. I was there waiting for hours and suddenly dad showed up. Where was mom? "She had an accident..." dad said. She was involved in a serious 5 car pile up and was right in the middle... in our Yugo. Considering she was in the Yugo, it was a miracle she was even alive, but she didn't come out of it completely unscathed. She pulled her neck and needed some physical therapy from that and has had some problems with a stiff neck ever since. However, I think that she considered the physical ailments worth it. That menacing Yugo was FINALLY out of the picture!

We replaced it with an early 90s Volkswagen Rabbit. I liked that car. I thought it was so cute how its logo had little bunny ears. I'm not sure what happened with that car. I remember the day we got our Ford Escort in 1992. This was my most favorite car we owned. I was crying the day it was sold suddenly! I remember that day in particular because getting it took FOR-EVER. For a young child, sitting at the dealership for hours on end wasn't fun. I remember eventually my grandmother came to take me for a walk. Thus came a string of cars... a subaru that we owned for so little time I don't even remember the model, A Mercury Sable, an Oldsmobile Alero, a Toyota 4 runner, a Camry Hybrid, ANOTHER Camry Hybrid, and finally a Toyota Highlander.

The Alero was particularly significant because it was passed onto me and we owned it for *gasp* 11 years. I did like my little alero:

But its time was up as it developed a massive water pipe break a couple months ago which cost more than the price of the car to replace it. It overheated on a really hot day in the middle of no where on the highway. I now drive around one of my parents' camrys and I was so happy that day it was given to me. Only cars that are passed down to me last more than 5 years in our family.

Recently, my boyfriend got into an accident. He wrecked his car and his friend was nice enough to lend him his car, which he wasn't using. I know that beggars can't be choosers, but now he is sporting around a little Geo Metro. This car reminds me so much of the Yugo. It's also a subcompact piece of crap. It constantly needs oil, transmission fluid, oh and it's loud as hell until you get into 2nd gear. Timing belt issues? Where have I heard this from? Not to mention the people who just point and LAUGH at you while you're driving. I'm not even kidding. Either that or yell random crap that you can't even understand. It happens on an almost daily basis.

My boyfriend actually likes this car. He wants to buy it from his friend, or at least is thinking about it. He also loves the Yugo and thought that it was a really cool car. I don't know what his problem is. He said that his family member owned it for as long as he could, and kept fixing it, but then wasn't able to get replacement parts. I really doubt any Yugos made it past 1995. I do give the Geo Metro some credit. While essentially being an afterthought of a Yugo, this one has at least has lasted 10 years. Something the Yugo could literally never do.

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LJ Idol Topic 5: Afterthought

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