Wednesday, September 5

On owning one's first car...

Saturday:
Welcome to Maruti Service Masters, Okhla. We hope you had a pleasant time finding the damn place, which should have taken you no less than an hour, while remaining in a five hundred meter radius the entire time. Please remove everything not nailed down, and figure out a way to remove your brand new speakers as well, or we will screw them up. Your car is in excellent condition, and we appreciate that you decided to come in for a servicing to start the service cycle, so that we can mess up your car and give you reason to come and get it serviced hereon. Oh, and we forgot, speakers can't be removed. Very well, we'll just have to screw them up. Enjoy the auto-rickshaw ride home considering we shall neglect to inform you of our value-added service of providing you a car for the day we keep your car with us for servicing, and remember, that not only will we call you over the day to tell you your brakes are close to failing, something you didn't notice because of your habitual double clutching and double braking as a result of spending time with drag-racing types, but that we must replace nevertheless with our exorbitantly expensive genuine Maruti parts lest the result be a mild case of, well, death for you. Remember, bring a credit card or lots of cash, and keep in mind that you will be back to see us in a matter of days, since your car shall begin to wobble when you cross speeds that we don't touch on, completely neglecting the fact that a fellow your age will never drive his car at 60 on an empty road. Especially not at fifth gear, as we prescribe for most efficient fuel management. Thank you, and have a great day.

Wednesday:
Welcome to Maruti Service Masters, please sit in our sub-standard lounge and eat stale patties while we screw you some more out of your hard earned money. Today we shall take over forty five minutes to send someone to attend to you, and then take another hour to re-balance and re-align your wheels. Once that is done, we shall take you for a road test, only to find out that your car still wobbles at 80. Very well, you shall return to the lounge for another thirty minutes during which time we shall discover that your wheel's bearing and hub have worn out and need replacing, something we couldn't possibly have figure out last time you were here for a full car service, considering we're only certified Maruti car technicians. This process shall only take us another forty five minutes to complete, during which you can try and scrape together something over thirty five rupees so that your friends who accompanied you for the 'half hour' this was supposed to take can get to Nehru Place and an ATM. Once you have sent them off, we shall take you for another road test, to discover that once again, your car continues to wobble. After sending you back up to the lounge for another obligatory thirty minutes, we shall discover that one of your wheels, which we allegedly removed and balanced and aligned and played musical chairs with no less than three times, has, on the back side of it, well, A BIG BLOODY GASH. This wheel will have to be changed, and we can't put your spare tire there instead, as it is also completely worn out. We will now treat you like a retard for no less than fifteen minutes, all the while dropping hints, but not acknowledging that you are already aware of the fact that you will have to replace at least four of your wheels or else you'll find the ones you replace wearing out far too early. Oh and while we're at it, we'll arbitrarily point at something on the underside of your axle that you, being a lifetime car owner and all-cum-car technician ought to recognize as the suspension arm, which we also must replace. And before we forget, we have to change the entire steering frame of your car. Did we mention we're going to charge you through the ass for all these spare parts? And we'll continue to commend you on the amazingly well maintained five year old second hand car you bought with only 30k clocked on.
If you would like a car to take home while we keep your car overnight, follow Prashant, the incredibly inept car technician overseeing all the work on your car to our loan-car fellow and waste yet another forty minutes waiting for him to tell you that he just gave their last car to someone, and that if you wish, you can come any time this week with the car, all the way to Okhla again, and sit for another five hours waiting for us to discover other problems in your supposedly well maintained and smooth driving car.

26 comments:

AL said...

hahahaha renovatio maaann!! tht ws awesum ryt up hahaha NEVER EVER TRUST MARUTI MAN NVR EVER.... BELIEVE IN D LOCAL GUYS WHU CN PREPARE UR CARS FR DRAG SHIT WID LESS money!!!...n thy noe it well better than maruti!!

I love Lucy said...

Yay!!Finally,a new post!! :-)

The whole car-buying-and-owning is somewhat warped I feel.Starts off with the excruciatingly painful encounter with the car salesman at the dealer's.(Aaah..that experience calls for a separate ranty-post!)
And then comes what you just went through!
Empathizing all the way...

jugni said...

mahn. you make owning cars sound like a frikkin nightmare. but one thing i've never understood, honestly, is the obsession these service station people have with the remotest of areas. do they have a tie-up with the fuel industry or sth? hmmm... *wonders*

Pri said...

thanks to you i now have a headache. plus i am petrified of taking my car in for its much needed servicing.

Revealed said...

I hear ya! I do, I do. I keep my 2 year old second hand away from all prying eyes, especially if they look in the least bit technicianical.

??! said...

aaaaaaaaaand he's back!!
what fun.

will he stay though?

Anonymous said...

good to c a post!!!

may be weird, but reading this makes me happy that I don't own a car yet!

Anonymous said...

@blow: how the fuck does one read ur blog?

Arthur Quiller Couch said...

Sell the car. Buy a Bullet.
And a full poncho.

GuNs said...

Came here from your comment on the compulsive confessor's post.

Amateur Film Maker... hmm. That sounds like a really really interesting thing to do. I shall blogmark you right now and read up on your past posts soon.

Do check out my "amateur" blog if you care.

-PeAcE
--WiTh
---GuNs

Renovatio said...

@anky
You know I didn't want to man, I was more than happy just running the damn thing. And it's all your fault making me go to frigging okhla. Bitch.

@lucy-lover
There was no dealer, my uncle's an auto consultant. He just waited for the go-ahead, and picked the nicest car out of those he'd received for reselling for me. He then pimped it up for me.

@blow
It's not the owning the car that's a nightmare, unless you're referring to the whole filling gas, filling air, driving, and traffic thing, it's getting these bastards to maintain it for you. They give you a reason to get it serviced at all.

@pri
Welcome. I can't figure if you mean my tiny font which I love so much(it's called lucida grande) gave you the headache, or my horrendously bad writing did the trick, or just, well, your heart bleeds for me. Take it from me. Don't go in for a servicing, Karol Bag is your friend. Or get in touch with me, I will send you my uncle's way.

@revealed
Dear lord, I don't plan to keep this tiny little Zen(I'm 6'4" and drive with the seat all the way back, and the backrest down a bit, terrible for my back, yes) for more than a year at the most. Just getting my hand settled on Indian roads since I just learned to drive a matter of months ago. Then I'll get myself something nice. Something low, and long, and silver, and smooth, and big. Oh and to stick with the 'two words starting with the same letter' thing, and badass too :p

@the explitives
Back indeed, but back to what, I don't think I've seen you around this motley place of mine... Welcome anyway. I hope to write more often. But I'm a lazy bastard. Bleah.

@chandni
How the hell do you get around town?!? Oh and blow's acting very pricey. She expects you to email her and ask her for an invite. Pshaw.

@AQC
I was planning to learn to ride a bike, hell my license says I can, must remind my classmate to bring his Vespa in so I can learn on that. He claims the damn thing is so heavy and old it resists falling, and is a great thing to learn on.

Oh and with a poncho, do I need a sombrero too? One with an elastic strap so it doesn't fall off my head? Because I'm very picky about helmets. They mess with the hair.

@guns
Man, that reminds me. We were arguing about what gun sounds to use. Then we saw the most silent bloody pichkari in pyaar kiya to darna kya in the customer lounge of said maruti service center. Ladies and gentlemen, we have a winner.

Revealed said...

Hah! That's zackly what I started out saying. Less than 6 months. Just till I find the car of my dreams. And now into my second year I'm like "*Now* I know how Noddy felt!"

You could have gone for ba-ba-boom. More pizazz.

??! said...

renov:
back to writing. been a lurker, now a commenter. which is all you've been doing for the last couple of months. apart from whining.

Anonymous said...

Baby u wer supposed to tel me wen u wer going for da service so i cud bring you back. u never let me take care of u :-(

I love Lucy said...

Lucky bum,you!
For not having to deal with those irritating salesmen!!

Anonymous said...

hi, did you go to convergence in Delhi?

Anki said...

Who is this other AnkY stealing my name...grrrr
n giving u bad advice bout cars

n wat else do u excpect...u own a zen not a freakin mini cooper

Chrisann said...

I'm so glad I don't drive

Renovatio said...

@revealed
Nothing in this world can keep me in this tiny thing for more than a year. Nothing.

@the expletives
I never lurked, and as far as the whining bit, somebody's got to do it. I will write more. I have stuff to write, just not the mindset.

@neets
Pshaw. You stop that and get more sleep.

@lucy-lover
What can I say.
Oh I know
Ne ne ne ne boo boo, I've got an uncle doing this for me but not for you :D :D :D

@anony
Trying to 'converge' in on your old classmates eh? I'm afraid I wasn't one of them.

@anki
It's a damn good zen. The other anky is a hyperactive 19 year old. Oh wait, that sounds just like you. :D

@chrisann
You ought to, the level of freedom is really something. Again it's not the driving part I dislike, it's this maintenance and dealing with these bastards.

twip said...

Excellently ranted.

It actually made me feel cathartic (in a vicariously-living-through-someone -else's-experiences sort of way).

And small fonts are awesomeness, IMO.

Revealed said...

Famous last words.

Anonymous said...

Ha ha ha. You really sound like my dad. I guess this frustration seeps in to the younger folks as well. Why have a car when you can have a Bullet...and yes, I shall write as soon as the Sify fuckers land up at my place and end my No Internet ordeal :)

Renovatio said...

@her prod-iness
There, finally someone who can appreciate tiny fonts. Ever heard of soul mates?

@revealed
You've lost your right to be smug. Hmph. Murky coffee drinker, you!

@lostlittlegirl
Again, I'm extremely vain when it comes to my hair, so I shall never primarily ride a motorcycle.

Unknown said...

Huh! Pichkaari?

-PeAcE
--WiTh
---GuNs

DreamCatcher said...

gosh..this sounds so damn familiar...and yes they screwed up the boston speakers too!

Renovatio said...

@guns
The most silent gun in a hindi film, ever.

@dreamcatcher
Increasingly, I find people saying that about car services. I see myself leaning more towards services in open air service centers where I can stand around and breathe down there necks from now on.