RUNNING INTO THE PEOPLE WITH THE BOOT POWER. I was parked today on Wilhelminastraat and received a yellow warning sticker from bored and under-employed inspector #8003, because I was “out of parking line.” I was probably out of parking line because when I parked, the vehicle in front of me was out of parking line. Yes, my car’s backside was sticking out 10cm, over the white line, so the under-employed #8003, had nothing better to do, but sticker my window. They’re really a bunch of boot-happy people. Why? Because they bought some expensive vehicles that they have to pay for. Did they go to the bank and borrowed money against their future boot income? Is that possible? “Hmmmm…my dear Javier Wolter, we expect to boot fifty tourists at $43 a pop, that’s $2.2 million over three years, there should be no problem paying back the tow-truck car loan.” I also think they are somehow in cahoots with the car rental agencies, because the car rental people should educate the tourists about paying for parking and they don’t. In general there is no effort to inform the tourists, besides the AruParking FB page is in Papiamento, exclusively. So, no grace period after the period expired, slow to respond and malfunctioning machines AND the office clerk cannot make change for a $50. But you gave ME a yellow sticker?!
FIGO MEANS COOL. Yrausquin & Sons invited press people to take a test drive in the FORD FIGO. I dropped in a few hours before to inspect the new car, and found out it is cute and smart, and available in four models starting at Awg 27.950. The car has sufficient leg room and huge trunk space and the feature I liked most in a docking station for my phone, on the dashboard, which would allow the passenger, not the driver, to skype, watch the news, use FaceTime, and answer the phone. The new Yrausquin showroom is gorgeous, and I hear it will be officially opened at the end of the month, I hope to get an invitation. I was welcomed by two of Marcilla’s kids at work, both adult, and cute and well informed, contributing to a family-business-with-solid-succession.
The FORD FIGO was introduced five or six years ago, outside the US, and it was a big hit, competing with the Toyota Yaris and the Kia Rio. I thought the name was funny, related to the fruit, fig, and to figa, the equivalent of the finger, nah, the thumb squeezed between two fingers, the sign of rejecting an offer in middle-eastern countries, but “cool” in Italian!
