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Was reminiscing with my father about the first family car today... Thought it might be interesting to retell the story here.
It was 1997 and we were still living in Belarus at the time. These days it is quite easy to get a car there (if you have the money), but 10 years ago it was a bit trickier. Now, in ex-USSR countries cars are split into two subgroups - domestic and imports. This is ingrained in peoples perception and is also reflected in price, quality and other parameters. One of the problems with owning a foreign car is that when its imported you have to pay import duty, which depends on the engine size - its a significant amount to pay even for a cheap old car. Added to that is the deficit of such imported cars, partly brought by new legislation which restricts how often a person can import a car for themselves. So while you could buy a car at a car market in Belarus it would cost you a lot more than you'd pay for one here. The solution is to bring a car over from somewhere like Poland or Germany yourself.
At the time my parents were still training for their driving tests, so they couldn't import the car themselves. So we hired someone to go to Poland and buy a car at a car market (where cars are brought from Germany, mainly by Lithuanians and Latvians). Due to the aforementioned import restrictions my father needed to be present when it was crossing the border so that it would be registered in his name. So we gave some instructions on the type of car we wanted (something the size of a golf or an astra (well kadet since it's opels on the continent)) and waited for news.
Finally there was a phone call saying that the car is at the border and my father departed for Poland (the border with which is on the other side of Belarus from where we lived) to meet the car. Once he arrived at the border he was informed that he isn't allowed to cross it on foot - so he had to hitch a ride over the border. Then he found our car in the queue of traffic and had to wait a further 6 hours or so until it was their turn to cross (seeing as it took him more than 12 hours to get there you can imagine the length of the queue). Then they had to drive a further 12 hours to bring the car back (by the way it was March, and that meant snow on the roads).
When it arrived it was a site to behold. An Opel Ascona (Cavalier of the old shape, 1989) with light green/blue metallic paint, alloy wheels and a little spoiler. It was a 1.8 with 115 bhp and had knackered springs and shocksBut it served us well (after my father sorted s few problems) and I still remember it fondly.
So next time you go to your local car supermarket and ponder whether to take it in burgundy or metallic red have a thought on what buying cars can be like elsewhere.
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