Hello MPV

We received the delivery of the new Starex earlier this month, and since then Anita had been doing plenty of her own driving with it. In fact, she even drove all the way to Port Dickson last weekend!

It was an 11-seater "people carrier" with a diesel engine, spacious and hopefully also a fuel saver. And it was huge and took a bit of manoeuvring to get around tight spots and parking. I was also worry about blind spots during driving, but so far it had been handling very well. Much more nimble than the size suggested.

It did not have all the trimmings of the old Estima. The boot were manually controlled, and the power doors had to be installed as an extra. The alarm system was also pretty basic but it had the standard audio unit and a couple of screens, GPS - which was actually a Papa-Go unit - and nice seats. No sunroof though, something that I missed!

It had to be done however after counting the amount of money I had been spending on the old Estima doing repairs. The Estima was bought with limited warranty and it was not a brand new unit - one could not get one in Malaysia due to the good Government policy of protecting the local car manufacturers! So, even though it felt like a bit of a down grade, I was pretty happy with it! The main thing was the children and Anita loved it.