To be honest, I think this is what most kids would regard as "their first car"
No, I’m not talking about the first car that you bought with your own money. That is a topic for another day and for someone with a better understanding of the matter. I’m talking about the first car you remember as a child, the one you sat in to go out for short drives, long drives or just to go around with no real destination in mind, but just to spend some time with your parents, grandparents or whoever was driving.
Before we get any further, I’m not William. I’m Thern Yang. I’ve had the pleasure of knowing William since the beginning of our national service days, and now I am contributing to this little pet project of his as well.
So, what comes to mind when you think about the first car you could remember as a child? Some people might struggle to remember, so I count myself fortunate that the bug for liking and appreciating cars bit me at a young age. If you ask me what led me down to taking an appreciation for cars, up to now when I am writing about remembering the first car that came into my life, I guess I was shown the right path as a child, which is why I suppose you’re here reading this as well.
So, this piece would be… my opinion on cars that have been in my life as part of my family. I will give my thoughts and perhaps a little nugget of information I knew about the cars. These cars are not the fastest, nor are they the most attractive, but they still left an indelible mark on my life in one way or another, each in their own unique ways.
The first car I remember spending time in, or rather the one that was owned by my family, it was a Mitsubishi Lancer 1.6 wagon, with wheels in a star shaped design, a very nineties shade of maroon with the typical nineties upholstery that came on many bread and butter Japanese cars of that era, and an engine that could hardly get the car up to expressway speed without sounding like it was suffering from asthma.
I have to say, the car did not appeal much to me when I was a young lad. Funny how age changes your viewpoints on what is attractive
I spent a great amount of time in that car with my family, driving places, enjoying the rainstorm while sitting in the car park of the now long gone Marina South area, it was the little things that really came to meant a lot to me when this car was still a part of my family. the roof rails were plenty useful, many a times I remember my parents strapping something to the roof of the car to bring it somewhere, be it furniture, random objects or even my bike. It was a handy little feature that should really be on more cars today. It was a distinct part of my life from 1996 until 2005, when it was deregistered and scrapped or exported. I don’t remember much about the car leaving my family, but I do remember prying the single DIN radio out of the car with my dad because he wanted to "do something with it in the future". That project never happened, welp.
Some people say, "it can only get better from here, right". Well, if these same people saw the car that came into my family next to replace a reliable Japanese workhorse, I think they might change up that phrase somewhat. Even until today, I still believe tat the only reason why my dad bought that car was because it was "too good a deal to pass on for the space we were getting". Honestly, I wonder what the hell my dad was smoking when he made the decision to buy this car because it was really one of the ugliest vehicles I have seen to date. If you’re still wondering what the car could be, it was the Chevrolet Vivant.
The damn thing is so ugly that I could barely find a decent picture of it on google to begin with
And to make matters worse, the Chevrolet Vivant isn’t even a Chevrolet. It is a rebadged Daewoo Tacuma. Imagine the shock I got when I found this out when I was older. Korean cars of the early 2000s had a reputation that wasn’t exactly the best, so obviously I wasn’t too happy to find out that my family had been living with a car engineered by GM Korea. This car was cheap AF. The interior was cheap, the seats felt cheap, heck, even the drivers side seat belt became frayed and borderline dangerous. I sincerely doubt the seatbelts would’ve held up if this car ever got into a crash.
It also explained why the car was spending extended periods in the workshop even for simple repairs, because the parts were just so hard to find locally. Granted, the car was purchased from the local Chevrolet dealer, Alpine Motors, in 2005, but even they didn’t have stock for the parts, and the independent workshop my dad went to for servicing could only do so much when it came to getting parts.
Still, I shouldn’t be so hard on this car. I figured that this would be the car I would first get to drive after I got my licence, and I was right. After getting my licence in 2011, it was the first car I drove, excluding the cars from driving school.
Granted, the car did have plenty of faults I could find with, one being the colour which was the most unimaginative shade of silver that could be painted on a car. Not to mention it had a wooden accelerator pedal, brakes with barely any feedback and steering that had even less feelings than the girls I’ve tried to date. Plus, towards the end of its life, it started to develop a whole host of problems, from wonky electronics to mechanical ones like when the gearbox decides to get itself stuck in 3rd gear for no reason, even when driving normally.
Yes, it was a love hate relationship with the Chevrolet Vivant. It was ugly, not very reliable and drank a fair amount of fuel for a 2-litre car (I guess the clunky 4 speed slushbox it had played a big part to that). But, it was still the first car I drove as a newly minted driver, and the first car I went speeding in (or as much as I dared as an 18 year old), the first car I actually drove out to meet my friends, and the car that dropped me off on enlistment day.
It also had this feature where the front passenger seat could be turned around 180 degrees, effectively becoming a rear facing seat. Feel free to let me know but I can’t think of any other car that as a feature like this.
Unfortunately, or fortunately, the Vivant didn’t make it to the end of its COE life, choosing to develop a serious mechanical fault just before Chinese New Year 2015, which led to my dad scrapping it early and changing to the next car in this article, because throwing more money on a car that was a never ending dumpster fire just didn’t make financial sense any longer.
The car that replaced the Vivant was a Honda Airwave.
Yes, if you are seeing a theme here, my family really likes cars that come with a hatchback.
Yes, I know what the text in the photo says. the white Vezel was a rental for my activities with Uber. But it is also one of the few photos I have of the Airwave, and the first car in my family I actually bothered taking pictures of.
The Honda Airwave was only part of my family for less than 3 years, considering that it was bought as a cheap replacement for the prematurely dead Chevrolet Vivant. Remember how I said earlier that the Mitsubishi Lancer had an asthmatic sounding engine? Yeah… the 1.5 litre inline 4 engine in this thing wasn’t any better. With 110 horsepower, it lacked any sense of urgency to bring the car up to expressway speed, and it wasn’t too happy about being pushed past 100 km/h too.
Granted, it was spacious, rode comfortably, didn’t handle too badly despite the steering being as numb as my legs after sitting cross legged in the school hall for too long, and it could cram a lot of stuff in the boot too.
But, this was my first time experiencing a car with a continuously variable transmission (CVT), and dear god did I enjoy it one bit. For daily driving, it was fine-ish, but if you wanted to have some fun and push the envelop a little, the gearbox just got really confused and didn’t know which gear it should be holding on to.
It might be just me, but I feel that this era of cars from Honda was the start of them skimping out on the quality of its lower end cars by cutting corners wherever they could. For the Airwave, it would be the amount of sound deadening material they put in that thing because it was a bloody echo chamber while at expressway speeds.
And for a car that was supposed to be reliable, it wasn’t. My guess was that the previous owners didn’t maintain the car properly, despite the low mileage the car had when it entered my family. One would assume that a 6.5-year-old Japanese car with 98,000 kilometres would provide a few more years of fuss free driving until it turns 10, but that was sadly not the case with this car.
Like the Chevrolet Vivant before it, the Airwave also spent a fair amount of time in the workshop. Thankfully, parts are plentiful for this, but the problem wasn’t the parts, more of like the same problems kept recurring. I’m not sure what the issue with the engine was, but it kept on coming back to haunt the car even after repeated visits to the workshop. The original gearbox wasn’t any better, it failed. A refurbished one was swapped in, but with significantly different final drive ratios. What was originally 2200 – 2300 RPM at 100 km/h increased to 2700 – 2800 RPM, greatly increasing the NVH levels.
Sometimes I do wonder if my family has been hit with some misfortune that causes the cars we have to develop problems prematurely and makes us become drinking buddies with our mechanics.
Overall, the Airwave wasn’t a bad vehicle when it wasn’t languishing in the workshop. The black paint did give the car a sleeker silhouette, and the previous owner did fit a set of aftermarket rims on the car, so it did look marginally better than stock. The lower ride height of the Airwave also did have a positive effect on the handling, so I guess the car wasn’t a total bonfire after all.
Do I miss it? Short answer, no. Out of all the cars in this article, it has left the least impact on me mostly because it didn’t play too significant a role in my life while it was in my family. Still, it did show me how irritating it can be to maintain a black car, because my god do cars with black paint show dirt on the paint surface really easily.
Lastly, the final car for this article, and the current family car, a Honda Vezel, in Midnight Blue Beam Metallic.
Look, I’m no Larry Chen, but I try to be. Keyword is try. Whether or not my imitation is successful is a completely different matter
Finally, a car that actually has a paint colour that actually looks good. Fun fact, there are 2 other Vezels in the same multi-storey car park that are in the same shade of blue. Does occasionally make looking for the car a bit of a pain, but I shouldn’t be surprised considering how good the paint looks, especially when the flake sparkles under the right light
So far, the car has been problem free, and I do hope it stays that way. This is the first family car where I am given a say on how things should be done to it, much to my surprise when my dad actually agreed to my suggestions. That does mean I also have to spend some money on the car, but I feel that it will be worth it if it benefits the whole family.
Opinions on the Vezel? Well, it is a Vezel. the stock suspension is really firm, borderline uncomfortable at the rear, and I do plan to do something about that in the future. I believe enough has been said about the Vezel in local publications, and my opinions are roughly the same. One thing I do wholeheartedly appreciate is just how bright the LED headlights on the Vezel are. Compared to the halogen headlights on the Airwave, the difference is stark, even more so when driving in wet weather.
Ultimately, all the cars on this list have belonged to my family. What’s next? My own car, hopefully. And if possible, with a manual too. I haven’t been utilising what I learned in driving school on ow to properly drive a car with a manual transmission, so if I could get one of my own, that would be really desirable. One more goal to work towards to, I guess.
Still, I do hope to cultivate some good memories with the Vezel. So far, its been good, but here’s hoping it will get better.
Until next time.