Isabella and I have been in a car accident this afternoon, but to tell you right away: Isabella and I, and the other involved people also, are unharmed.

It happened this afternoon with Michelle’s car. Michelle took my car to her job, and I would gas her car up as that one was getting pretty dry. And on our way to the gas station, it happened.

On a T-crossing (is that the right name in English?) I wanted to go straight, while the lady coming from the opposite direction wanted to turn left. She stopped, drove a bit further and stopped again, which gave me the impression that she had seen me and that I could go on (mind you: there are no odd signs or anything on that road, so I had the right of way) until she, all of the sudden, continue to drive and I couldn’t avoid her anymore. I braked with all my power, threw the steering wheel to the right, but I was unlucky, the car didn’t want to stop on time and we hit each other.

I made a quick drawing in MS paint (I have nothing else on this netbook right now) of how things went:

I drove the blue car, and the women in the other car drove in the gray/silver car.

Michelle’s car has a pretty bad looking damage:

As far as I could see, the other party is the one who was wrong, and her insurance should probably have to make up for the costs on Michelle’s car. The woman also admitted that she had some problems with her eye (she went to the doctor for that, she said, but it was still causing her problems), and that she didn’t see me because of that. Either way, it is not exactly fun.

Right, I will go to the ‘after-hours clinic’ in the hospital with Isabella to do a check on the both of us. I don’t think anything is wrong, Isabella smiled and laughed after the accident and didn’t appear to be in any pain and I don’t think anything is wrong with me either (except for some muscle pain in my right arm), but they advised me to go anyways, just to be sure. I’ll let you know what their findings were

If you don’t know Servco Auto Leeward, then I can tell you that this is the car dealer where Michelle bought her Toyota Matrix S last wednesday. Servco Auto Leeward is a dealer of Toyota, Suzuki and Chevrolet in Waipahu, Hawaii, and is part of Servco Auto Centers, a group dealers which is spread all over Hawai’i. They used to be called ‘Waipahu Auto’.

Normally I would not easily write a post about bad service, but in this case I will make an exception for Servco Auto Leeward because both Michelle and I think that we received some bad service here, especially when you think about it that we spend thousands of dollars last week. And it wouldn’t be so bad, if someone just apologized to us for the bad service at Servco Auto Leeward during the last few days, but that did not even happen. I hope that, with a bit of luck, I can prevent some people from making the same mistake as we did.

So what happened? Well, as I wrote in my previous post about Michelle’s new Toyota Matrix S, the dealer, Servco Auto Leeward in Waipahu, would tint the windows, and they would install a car alarm. So they called us last Friday for an appointment, and they asked us if we could bring the car on Monday morning so they could do the window tinting and install the car alarm on that day into the Toyota Matrix S.

However, because I also had to bring our BMW X5 to some bodyshop (because of some minor damage earlier), and because Michelle had to work that day, we told them that this would be a bad timing for us. Tuesday wouldn’t be a good idea either for Servco Auto Leeward, so we decided that we would bring the car on Sunday already. It had to be done around 2 pm in the afternoon.. why this had to be at 2 pm remains unknown to us, they’re open until 6 pm. Oh well, we did as they asked us to do.

We didn’t hear anything from Servco Auto Leeward in Waipahu on Monday, so we decided on tuesday, around noon, to call ourselves as we thought it was taking a bit longer than expected (I will tell you a bit below why we thought this). They told us that nothing had been done yet at that moment, and that they did not know when the car would be done, they would call us. This is something they told Michelle, so I called directly back again to ask some questions about it, because why did we had to bring our car on Monday already if they wouldn’t do anything? The man to whom I spoke at that moment told me that the car was scheduled for that afternoon and that it should be done at around 5 pm. About an hour later we received a call that we could pick up the car at around six pm. The feeling of service started to become quite low at that time, as you can imagine.

Right, at around 6.15 pm, we arrived at Servco Auto Leeward in Waipahu, and we received the keys to the Toyota Matrix S again. When we were inside the car, we started to inspect a few things as we wanted to know if the tint was done nicely and that kind of things…

Well, I can tell you, there were bubbles everywhere. There are a couple of small bubbles but also some pretty big ones. When we asked about this, they told us that it should be looking ok in a few days. Ok, that’s possible, but when we had a few small (really small) bubbles at the BMW after tinting, they told us the same. But after a week they were still there, and they had to redo it again. And while that was only minor, this is pretty big, so I will be surprised if we don’t have to go back.

So we went back again to the car, a bit unsatisfied with the answer but willing to wait a couple of days. When we came to our car again, we noticed that one of the panels of the interior was not closed by the one who, we think, installed the alarm into the Toyota Matrix S at Servco Auto Leeward in Waipahu. So we could go back inside again because I couldn’t get the panel back on again, and I didn’t want to have the risk of damaging the car already, I rather have them do it.

When we showed them the open panel, they (some salesmen of Servco Auto Leeward) tried to reattach the panel to the car again, but they were not able to manage this either. They then told us that it would be best that we left the car another day, so they could show it to those responsible and that they could reattach the panel again. We went back home again, very unsatisfied about the service at that moment (you might expect that they would fix something like that right away) and without the Toyota Matrix S.

This morning, however, there was the well known ‘last straw’. We received a call from someone at Servco Auto Leeward, and he told us dead serious that he could not see/find the panel and that we had to call him back (he spoke into our voicemail). I called him at around 10 am this morning and told him where the panel was (I bet he just looked at one panel, because it was very easily visible). At that time I really didn’t feel like arguing about it again, so I just left it at that. He told me that it would probably be done somewhere today but did not know when. I don’t know why he didn’t just say “We’ll fix it right away”, which is something you might expect. Anyways, after a while we received another call from Servco Auto Leeward, telling us the car was ready for pickup.

Finally.

And is it all ok now? I doubt it… there are still some big bubbles in the tint of the windows (it is some form of film) and I highly doubt these will be gone in a few days (actually tomorrow already, like they said). We will wait until the weekend, but then we might have to call Servco Auto Leeward again. I expected it will happen.

The reason, by the way, why we thought they took their sweet time, was because when we left our BMW X5 at the dealership for tinting and all that, it all went a lot quicker. They did it in a few hours, and it looked a lot better than at Servco Auto Leeward in Waipahu. I’ve also seen the installation of a car alarm a couple of times, and this goes a lot faster also, it does not take days.

No, when you have an appointment for something, then you can also expect them to make the car on the same day as they tell you they will do. If they don’t do this, by whatever reason, they should at least call you to inform you about it. And when something is not done right, they should’ve just fixed it right away if that was possible (and I just know it was possible in our case). It really feels like ‘asskissing during sale, but not giving in after the deal has been closed’. The service feels bad for us, and it is the last time we will spent our money there, or that we will redirect someone to Servco Auto Leeward (this is something Michelle’s mother used to do, they sold a lot of cars there thanks to her, but this wont happen either anymore).

Today something funny happened, though: Michelle had to wait outside for a bit at Servco Auto Leeward, while I was inside, and a potential customer asked Michelle how the sale and service went. Michelle told them the story and before I was outside again, the potential customer had left the terrain. So this joke might already have cost them a customer. Sorry, but it seems to me this is their own fault for it all.

You know what is the worst thing of it all? That they did not once apologized to us. I think that this bothers me most of all. That no-one tried to undo the mistakes right away and apologized for it. This is not something a customer, who pays a lot of money, should be treated. If they want me to speak good about them again, they really have to try hard.

So, if you’re thinking about buying a car at Servco Auto Leeward in Waipahu, Hawai’i, I can only say: don’t do it. The sale goes nice and all, but the service, as we experienced it, is just bad. I would not recommend it.

Michelle bought a new Toyota Matrix S, like I also said in my previous messages.. well, actually we bought it together as my name is also in the papers, but ok, Michelle is the only one driving it hehe.

Like I also wrote in those messages, I would still show some pictures of the car, so here they are:

looks like a nice car, right? Michelle wanted a bit smaller car, and the Toyota Matrix is a bit smaller, especially when compared to the average car over here. I have to say, for me it is a bit too small, it is still a Japanese car I guess. I can not get my legs in the car right and the seat is also a bit too small for me. But oh well, like I said, Michelle has to drive in it, and she is small than I am

As the car looks in these pictures, it will probably not look the next time you see it. It’s currently at the dealership because they’re tinting the windows and installing a car alarm. I think this car, the Toyota Matrix, looks pretty sporty and Michelle seems to think the same, she is currently talking about adding a spoiler, drop the suspension a bit and add a different exhaust under the car. I looked a bit around on the internet, and there are a lot of nicely modded Toyota Matrix’s, and Michelle’s Toyota Matrix S will probably also be modded later on. We’ll see, I’m ok with all of it

It has been a while since I last wrote something, but that was because I was pretty busy, and since some things have happened that prevented me from writing. So here’s a little update.

About two weeks ago, Michelle got sick. After a few tests, it turned out she was negative for Influenza A and B, in other words: She did not have H1N1 (swine flu/Mexican flu). Fortunately it was like that as the complications can be very bad for pregnant women. The flu was very mild for her, her temperatures were not that high, the most she did was cough a lot.

A few days later, I fell ill also. It started with a pain on my chest (or actually more like some pressure, like someone was pressing on it.. I was painting the babyroom earlier that day, and so I was really sweating when I walked into the bedroom, where Michelle was with the airconditioning on. So I got the cold air right on my wet chest, I think the pressure was caused by this because it happened almost directly after this) and after about an hour, my temperature went straight up to 102.7F (39.3C). We called the (after hours) clinic and they told us that we should come by, especially because of the pain on the chest earlier.

In the hospital (the after hours clinic is in the hospital), they did all sort of tests, and they also made an EKG and X-rays of my chest. Fortunately there was nothing special (besides the fact that I had a high bloodpressure and a small anomaly in the EKG (probably something caused by me being scared for what it might have been, I was really afraid)). It was nothing to cause any worries, they said, it was very likely that I got what Michelle had earlier.

My fever went up to 103.5F (39.7C) the day after, even after I took Tylenol. The fever did not want to drop anymore, and so we contacted the clinic again with the request if they could test me on influenza A & B (which was not yet done by them). If this test was positive, then at least I could get something like Tamiflu to have the fever drop. The test was done, and turned out to be negative, so I just had to wait until the fever would drop. I did as they told me, and fortunately the fever dropped in the evening and it stayed around 101.3F (38.5) most of the day (only when the Tylenol stopped working, it went up again).. the fever was gone a few days later and slowly, but surely, I could start to do some things again. Now, about one and a half week after the start of the fever, I still feel very weak. It really got me well, whatever it was.

Anyways, last weekend, Michelle and I went to the post office to mail my tax return (also nice, I received the return at the end of July, and they expected it back before August 1st. The mail takes at least a week to get in the Netherlands, so that was pretty much impossible.. smart people there lol). After the post office, we went for some lunch and when we tried to drive off, from the parking lot, I wanted to cross a four-lane road. I looked left, nothing, I checked right, there was something but I could easily make it, I hit the gas and all of the sudden, out of nothing, there was a Honda Civic, coming from my left side, which I hit Fortunately we have a good insurance, the Civic was pretty well damaged, the whole side was smashed in. Our car received some damage also, in the right front of our bumper, but that was nothing compared to that Civic. Thank god there only the cars were damaged, nobody got hurt, and that’s maybe the most important thing.

But ok, these weeks were a few weeks that I don’t want to do over again. Who knows, there might be another week, next week, that we don’t want to do over again, I will write about that a bit later today.

We decided today to go for a different car after all.. again we chose for a BMW and again one of the 5 series, but now a sedan..

This is a second hand car, but since there is only 450 miles on the counter, you might as well say that it is a pretty new one.  Anyways, we got an even better deal for this one..

Of course we made some pictures. They are taken in our carport though as it is raining almost the whole afternoon already and I kind of doubt that it will get better today (it will probably in the evening or at night):

Doesn’t look so bad, right? What do you say? You liked the X5 better? Well, so do we and that’s why we will bring this car back tonight and pick up the X5 again

This car is not ours, we received it for today from the BMW dealer as a loaner because they are going to tint our front windows, so they become a bit darker.. it should become the same as the backwindows.

I have to say that this car is also great to drive in, but yeah, I guess that’s to be expected, it is a pretty nice ride.

But ok, nice ride or not, I still can’t wait until we receive our own ride back again

edit: No worries, we got our X5 back again and it sure looks better with the tint on the front windows.

Since we have a baby coming, we decided a while ago that we could better trade our car in for a car that would also be more aimed at a family. The old car was a BMW M3 (for those who do not know what kind of car this is, this is a sportscar) and I can tell you that we felt pretty bad that the car would have to go, especially Michelle, because, well, it is a special car. For those who didn’t see our M3, here’s a picture:

As you can see, it is a pretty cool car.

But yeah, we didn’t feel it would make up as a family car. Problem is the backseat.. It does have a backseat and you are able to sit there pretty decent (as long as you sit behind Michelle, my legs are too long haha) but to put a baby seat in and out constantly, and to put a baby in and out the car, that wont be the most fun to do. It is, like said, not really spacious in the back but the car is also lowered so you will have to dive into the car if you want to do whatever you need to do with a baby. Not the most ideal thing.

Now you might say “but you guys also have a Benz?” (although, you will be able to say that if you read the previous posts also haha), but yah, we don’t think this will be the best thing to do. That car is older and I don’t like driving in it, it is a bit like a ship, so to speak, because it will go left and right in the corners and on roadbumps. Not really my taste. And besides that, the car is also contaminated… it has some pest in it which is almost impossible to get out of the car (we already had a chemical warfare but we cannot reach in the parts where we need to be)… during the day it isn’t much of a problem but the critters come out when it gets darker.. brrr… no, that is not something where we want to put a baby. That car is more like a car to transfer things or when we go to the beach and get dirty feet and want to get into the car.. that car is bound to get dirty. No, for the baby we want a good, clean and safe car.

Right, so we knew that we needed a new car and we’ve been looking around for a while for different cars. We also went to a carshow in Honolulu about a week and half ago where we could see almost all current cars at once and one of the few cars in which we really felt in love with was the BMW X5, what a beauty of a car that was, to see and to sit in it. We also looked at different brands, but we weren’t too fond about those other cars, we really liked the X5 a lot better so when we left the carshow, we already made some sort of a decision. As for the American car models, we don’t really like those models, even if they might have been suitable for our needs also.

We went for some test driving last monday and, well, the BMW X5 was a winner again, with everything that it had, it was just a beautiful car. It sat right, it drove ok and it looked great.. yeah, everything was just right with that car.

Sooo, as you might understand, we decided to go for the X5.. but yeah, only if we could get a reasonable deal, also in regards to our trade in… And we did!

I can tell it even better, we’re already the proud owners of a new BMW X5. We were so content about it and decided the BMW X5 is really the car for us, and it was even better that they had a few on stock (which saves in the costs and wait time, we could easily wait up to 3 months if we had to build it specially for us).

“Stock? Didn’t they drive with it then?” you might ask, and, well, they did of course.. 5 miles on the counter… in other words: Brandnew!

From all cars that they had in stock (which they had enough) we picked one that would especially be good for the baby. We decided that the car should have a rear climate package, which basically means that the back windows are darker tinted, that it has retractable window shades and that it is possible to heat or cool every part of the car per seat.. the other options were not so important and so the next choice would be the color.. the color we choose for was ‘Platinum Bronze Metallic’ with a beige interior and bamboo wooden accents. When we saw him in real (you can hardly make a choice from a booklet), we were sold for real..

Here it is:

Looks good, right? The tailgate is very simple to open en close, by the way, it is fully automatic. You press a button and it opens or closes, whatever you want, ideal.

For those who wonder why we don’t have any plates yet (especially the European readers), these are ordered and will come in a few weeks. When a car is new here, you can drive without plates, as long as you have a paper on the back with some standard information and the date when the first registration is.

A bit weird, I agree, but yeah, back in the Netherlands you would have had to wait a few weeks before you can actually drive and here you can go right away… so that is also pretty cool I think =)

I think you want to see the interior also, here it is:

As you can see on the photo in the middle, there is a little screen. You can see everything of the car through this screen. You never have to check your oil or your tirepressure, or what ever there is that might need to be checked, the car checks everything for you and it notifies you through that screen (which is connected to the main computer) whenever there is something wrong… you can also set everything in a certain way and still have it all different per person (if Michelle drives, she will have different preferences and when I am driving, my preferences will be loaded, it sees this through the key that is used when you open the doors.. well, that means if you use the key because it has a keyless entry, even starting can be done without key (but you need the key inserted to make the different settings per key so it knows for which key it needs to change it)). You can also forward some of the functions to some knobs on the steeringwheel, whatever function you want can be used from the steering wheel after you set it, it is completely adjustable for ones wishes.

Here are some pictures of some of the screens (but  not all of them, there is too much haha):

You see a few menus on the first picture where you can choose for several settings, the second picture shows that everything is ‘ok’, and on the last picture you see the phonebook (which is loaded through bluetooth from you normal cellphone, you can also call handsfree and such like this (I deleted one number as it is our dealer’s cellphone number and I am unsure if it would be ok to post it).

On the first picture you see some information, the middle screen is for the temperature and ventilator settings, which is also completely electronic, and the last screen shows the parking distance to objects and as you can see, there is an object on the right front side of the car.. when it becomes red, you should stop (but there is still a foot space left, so it is pretty safe).

The first picture shows a view of the radiostations.. there are not many stations set yet, that will be done later haha. It is, by the way, a HD radio so the sound is pretty good also. The middle picture shows the tire pressure.. everything is green so the pressure is ok. And the last (a bit vague, sorry) picture shows the screen where you can set the height of the tailgate opening (imagine you have a low garage, then you can set it in such a way so it doesn’t hit the ceiling) and like said before, the tailgate is completely automatic.

On the first picture you see the lighting of the door as you will see it in the evening when you get out, on the middle screen you can see a red light in the door (which is a bit less bright in real life, this is always cool to find something in the dooropening) and on the last picture you can see the lights below the door handles in the dark (the picture is a bit vague, sorry for that).

By the way, on some screens you see the word ‘lolipod’, this is the name of Michelle’s ipod, she gave it that name once so you see it on the screen also as the ipod has been connected to the sound system (for which we have a connection for in our car, also ideal).

And there are a lot more other nice things available on our car, for example the steering wheel which can be set to a certain height and distance and that is completely automatic after it has been set. When the car is turned on, the steer goes to the specific settings and when you turn the car off, it will go back to the normal setting. A glass panorama moonroof. BMW Assist. All mirrors dim automatically, so when it gets dark, they get darker also so you won’t get blinded from other cars, this works also like this with our interior. There is a compass in the rear view mirror (why, we’re not sure haha), it is the letter you can see in the picture above, it shows an S which obviously means South. Chairs that you can set in many different ways, also with lumbar support and such, Active Steering, which basically means that, depending on your speed, you can steer more easy or hard, also ideal. It has an USB and AUX port and in the trunk we have a power supply which is also easy when you want to vaccuum the car.

And there are so many more options available… the car is a four wheel driven car, when we steer in the dark then the side we steer to gets extra light (at slower speeds), it has a hill decent control, cruise control.. umm.. you know what? You should look for those things on the BMW website, it is too much to name it all

The car is also really safe when it is about impact and such (the safest at the moment), I think this car is really suitable to transport our baby in.

I think you can imagine that we are really happy and pretty proud of our new car.. I cannot wait until I can drive it again and it is even harder to wait to the moment that we can transport our baby with it.