[Roodra]

Hello everyone, I am Rudra(24) from Delhi. I am a dentist by profession I just got graduated few months back. This is my first time on a platform where i have been given a chance to talk about things i love like cars. I got introduced to this forum/ platform many years back when i was in 8th-9th grade when i was new to the world of youtube, social media. I was an avid reader of autocar India and reader digest. I learnt driving when i was in 9th grade my mother taught me. For first few months she never let me touch first 4 gears only gear was allowed to use/ to learn on was reverse gear because she thought it's far easier to run away with car using forward gears than reverse, speaks about the trust my parents had in me lol!
Coming to the vehicles or cars which we as a family have owned are as follows:

1. 1997 Maruti 800 with sequential gas kit and ac retrofitted. We have so many memories in this car and many road tripped were undertaken to different parts of our country as my father got relocated every 3-4 years due to work. I still remember the first day our 800 got fitted with an air conditioner, it was one sunny afternoon summer of 2004 we paid 6000rs for the same and my father got windows tinted as well, i couldn't contain my happiness as now we can travel in peace with windows rolled up with cold air blowing on face. But that happiness didn't last for long as within one year our Maruti got stolen on the night of 25th December 2005(yes Christmas!). My sister who at the time was very small and she fell sick very sick and my father was out of station due to some work and she was missing him a lot, he was supposed to reach Delhi on 25th afternoon and in evening it was decided we will go out for dinner. I won't name the restaurant name from where our car was stolen but same night it was gone. I still miss that car a lot maybe because it was the first set of wheels i grew around. Little off topic but i would like to share one anecdote: the night our car was stolen my parents called up their colleague to pick us(kids) up and take us to their place for time being while my parents went to file a F.I.R, uncle who came to pick us up also had the same Maruti 800 in same color white body with black bumpers we went to their place and guess what happened within one month their car also got stolen from Delhi albeit from a different location. My sister was shattered she was such a small child she thought it was all because of her. The car has ran about 65000kms.

2. 1998 Daewoo Cielo Enters the beautiful black on black Daewoo Cielo till date it still resides in my heart as one of my favorite sedans. This car was the one who made me realize there can be a car which has a boot to carry an entire gas cylinder, a dismantled bicycle, sacks of onion and weekend's worth of luggage with 4 people and ac running all the time. Mind you it was fitted with lovato's gas kit(if recall correctly it was lovato). We paid 55000 in January of 2006 the car had done around 52000-54000km at the time of purchase. It was not in best of condition and Daewoo officially had left our country for good few years back hence maintenance and upkeep of the car was an issue back then. It had stone cold air conditioning(i don't know why i fancy AC so much), it also had 5 speaker with one sub woofer and jvc head unit with a roof mounted screen, our first car with power windows, fog lights and all the jazz. That was also the car my father and mother both got to know about dynamics of a sedan not that cielo was a great handling car but it could do 100-120kmph with ease all day. We have gone from Naliya(Gujarat) to Chandigarh-Delhi- Ahmedabad-Bhuj-Pune-Mahabaleshwar-Lonavala without breaking a sweat it was that good of a car. It never left us stranded partly because my father really made an effort to procure all the genuine if not new near about new parts for the car. When we were in Naliya there was a friend of ours who had Daewoo Nexia 3 speed automatic in sea green colour or is it turquoise? He used to service his own car be it engine oil change, brake job, replacing bulbs everything till this date he owns the same car from new and they only have one other small car for city duties. Sadly as life would have it all great things comes to an end when we got relocated to Pune we got the car driven down from Gujarat to Pune from the same transporter who was supposed to transport our home. On the way near Dhule car met with an accident where an eighteen wheeler(the one with an extended trailer behind) tried overtaking from the opposite direction and collided with our car head on. Luckily, the driver got out safe with little to no injuries and he fled the scene leaving the car behind as it is and did not inform anyone, later after many calls and tracing we found the car in a very sorry state with wheels and tail lamp stolen and windows broken. The damage way beyond than car's worth and unfortunately we had to scrap the car. (I have the photo in my PC when I'm home i shall update this thread with the same). It was genuinely heart breaking to see it like this. We let it go for 16000. The car has ran about 1,75,000kms the day it got scrapped.

3. Brief entry another 1996 Maruti 800 (square headlight) This was the car i learnt driving on and got my drivers license. This was no nonsense fill it shut it and drive it scenario car. Reliable to the core and abuse friendly so far so few of my mother's friends also learnt driving on this car as it was so forgiving and easy to manage. It stayed with us for 3-4 years until it got replaced by 2007 swift zxi.

4. 2007 Swift zxi petrol Another hatchback but way better than what i had experienced earlier, bought for 80000rs had run about 70000kms currently it sits at 148000km (approx). This is the car i sharpened my driving skills on and i feel very confident when I am driving this car i cannot comment the same about other car which we currently own. Many road trips Delhi- Udaipur-Jodhpur-Chandigarh many many trips were done with our furry friend as well. I will keep this short as i feel i have spoken a lot for introduction. It is still with us in Delhi but as NGT ban is closing we might plan to sell it.

5. 2017 Hyundai Verna sx petrol This and swift are two cars which are currently in our garage, while swift is for city driving and Verna is for highway runs. We bought this at 23211kms for 635xxxlakhs currently at 33000kms. I will try to pen down an ownership review soon.
All the cars are pre-owned except for the first car Maruti 800.
I guess for an introduction post this has been quite long as i really went down the lane of nostalgia plus it's 3 am as i type this. I appreciate all the patience and forgive for any grammatical mistakes if any. Every feedback is appreciated. Thank you. One question? Is it okay/safe for the number plate to show in pictures? if there's an issue kindly let me know I'll keep this in mind.

[TheHelix0202]

Hi, and welcome to the forum! That was quite a nice introduction. And to answer your concern about the number plate showing, it is totally fine; as long as you are fine with it and it is your car.

[Roodra]

Originally Posted by TheHelix0202

Hi, and welcome to the forum! That was quite a nice introduction. And to answer your concern about the number plate showing, it is totally fine; as long as you are fine with it and it is your car.

Thank you so much! Yes I am totally okay with number plate showing.