A Word to the Wise...

[Eimi]

If you ever plan to drive in another country that speaks a language other than your own, learn the word for DIESEL!

Some friends and I took a road trip this weekend to watch a great firework festival.  It lasted an hour and a half and was fantastic, except for the fact that it rained most of the time, and I had no umbrella or rain gear.  Ooops!  So I was soaked to the bone.  When we finally got into the car, I changed into my pajamas so I wouldn't freeze to death.  We jumped on the freeway (which actually is a rather expensive toll road) and were still about 30 minutes out when my friend noticed she was running low on gas.  Now there are no gas stations along Japanese freeways (makes utterly no sense!), so we had to get off.  It was late, so all that was open was self-service, which we rarely use.  My friend jumped out of her car and hit the button for the cheapest option, though she didn't actually know what the words said, and started pumping away.  She jumped back into her car, we drive two blocks and the car DIES.  We all look at each other knowingly.  It must have been diesel!

We walked back to the convenience store which we had just conveniently passed, and I changed back into my wet clothes.  We then called a tow truck, which had to come from a town 50km away since it was the middle of the night and was charging by the km.  We waited in the store for it to show up.  My poor distraught friend picked up a magazine to get her mind off of things, and what does she flip the page open to?  A full page colored add for Diesel watches with the words printed on the bottom: "Don't be stupid, buy Diesel!"  I couldn't make this up if I tried.

So, it comes, and three of us with some Japanese ability had to figure out just what to do with the car.  Keep it in the town and hope there was a mechanic and a cheap hotel somewhere nearby?  Or take it back to her town?  We decided to take it back to town, but three of us had to jump into a taxi to go back to her apartment.  All told, that one simple mistake cost us $100 for the taxi ride, and $400 for the tow.  Luckily, though, since she knew a girl who knew a guy, the actual fixing of the car cost only $50.

But, word to the wise - Don't be stupid, learn the word for diesel!

[Roxanne]

What an adventure.

[Paula]

And for beer... (my uncle was captain of cargoship. He once told us that you can survive in any country if you learn two words in local language: beer and harbour).

[emma]

I'm going to have to learn that when I get my new car - I'm going diesel. 57 mpg vs 37mpg on petrol.... No choice there. Plus I do an awful lot of motorway driving these days.

[Eimi]

I honestly didn't realize they were still making cars for diesel!  I thought only old trucks still used that.  And yes, the word for beer is very important, but luckily in Japanese it's just "BEERU"  

[Chelle]

there are alot of diesel cars in europe, especially since its cheaper. And actually, they have some of them in the US now like Volkswagen, but predominantly diesels used in trucks here. Especially since its more expensive per gallon in our case.

But yeah big fat bummer. the things you learn...but were the fireworks worth it?

[Eimi]

It was the towns River Opening Festival, which is an old superstition that fireworks can drive away evil spirits.  An hour and a half of fireworks shot off over a river and from 100 yards away (guess there's a lot of evil there!).  So, heck yeah, it was worth it!  No one does fireworks like the Japanese, let me tell you!  Except maybe the Chinese...

Oh, and while I was recounting this story to my English class tonight, it lead to discussing other accidents, annoying driving habits, which lead to tailgating, and finally I ended up teaching them the phrase "stop riding my a**"  :angel12:   Teaching English can be so fun sometimes...

[emma]

Actually diesel is about 3p/litre more than petrol, but as you get about a third more mpg it make it worth it.

[Paula]

We have diesel-car. Hubby does lot of driving at his work. The tax is higher but the actual fuel is cheaper in Finland. Next car is going to be flexi-fuel (whatever that means) since hubby is going to swich to new job and the new emplyer makes bio-etanol fuel...
(not to mention pays the car, as employment benefit.)

[emma]

It's about £200 more to get the diesel version of the car I am looking at, but as I get 14% of the list price through work it's going to work out cheaper in the long term to finance it and run it. Plus it's in a much, much cheaper tax band (free this year, £20 next year - road tax on the equivalent sized petrol car is £125 a year).