in review A VISIT TO THE SHOWROOM After lunch last Saturday, fortified by spaghetti and prosecco, I found myself outside the very swish showrooms of Maserati and Ferrari in Sydney’s inner suburbs. In I went, full of bravado, entering this haven of the rich and powerful (everyone except me). I easily located the Maserati Quattroporte (that it was labelled as such was the clue I needed) and was taking some photographs when a voice from a partitioned room boomed, “If you’re looking for some good-looking blokes to be in your photos….” I walked towards the “good-looking blokes” who were leaning on a bar that served, cakes, pastries, finger sandwiches and coffee (from a real barista’s coffee machine). I’d been in a car showroom like this before; they ply you full of goodies to keep you there and keep you occupied until you buy a car. So, would I like a cup of coffee? No. I would not – I’m not falling for that one twice. What could they do for me? “I’m interested in the Quattroporte,” I said. (It wasn’t a lie - I never mentioned buying it.) Alas, they were ‘Ferrari’ men; they’d have to get (let’s call him) Charles. HALLO CHARLES… Charles arrived…he wasn’t happy. Even wearing my second-best jeans, I clearly didn’t look sartorially splendid enough to be a real customer (all this attitude from someone who was wearing a baby-blue knitted vest too!) Charles answered my questions - albeit briefly and with an air of incredulity that I didn’t already know the answers. I learned that the starting price for the base model was a whopping quarter of a million Australian dollars, (according to Charles – I didn’t tell him that I knew where to get one cheaper) and that it was a performance car – “…a real driver’s car,” he said. “So why would people buy it if they had a chauffeur?” I asked. (All you people in APEC Land can see where I was going with that one, can’t you?) He spluttered a bit and said, “Because it’s a Maserati!” “What does that mean?” I asked, “is it about image?” He claimed not to know what I meant by “image”…so I helped him out. “Well what sort of person buys a Maserati,” I asked? “Successful business men,” he said without missing a beat. (He may have said “business person” but I don’t think so – he certainly didn’t mention women.) There was no stopping me now, I was on a roll: “What do they find attractive about it?’ I asked. “It’s a Maserati,” he answered once again shaking his head in disbelief. Stupid question, apparently. And there were more where that one came from. “So, how does it handle potholes?” I asked. (Still with me?) “Potholes?” he repeated, as if I was talking Swahili. “And what about if you lived in the Pacific – in a country such as…well… Fiji?” I said, trying to steer him off the scent of the controversial <strong>PNG</strong> Maseratis. “Where could you get it serviced?” (Are you keeping up?) “We have a service centre here,” he proffered. Yeah, but not much use to Port Moresby buyers, hey? Other than that, he didn’t have a clue. The nearest Maserati dealership to Port Moresby is in Brisbane - FYI, I left it at that – he was becoming visibly anxious. ACCORDING TO THE BROCHURE AND IN RETROSPECT The brochure tells me that the Maserati was designed to take advantage of the vast network of motorways in Europe. In Italy, home country of Maserati, there are 4,200 miles of motorway alone, with Spain topping the bill at 10,500 miles (I’ll leave you to convert that to kilometres.) It maybe makes sense then for someone who is driving large numbers of miles, and has more money than s/he knows what to do with, to drive a car that can perform at speed on a made road (the Maserati can do between 270- 310 KPH.). Still, with speed limits now at 130kph (tops) on these roads, does it really make sense? In <strong>PNG</strong>, there are no roads to speak and of the few that exist, they are normally in a state of ill repair – both in the capital, Port Moresby and elsewhere. Potholes are a fact of life. With the sporty Maserati having a chassis close to the ground. I’m wondering how long it would last driving from the airport at Nazdab into Lae? However, in Port Moresby, they do have a lovely new road named ‘Independence Boulevarde’ but dubbed by you folk, very wittily, as the ‘Road to Nowhere’ because from APEC House, it leads…well… nowhere. It was built by the Chinese at great expense and is variously reported as being either one kilometre long or 300 metres - with six lanes. At 300 KPH – this road would, at 300 metres, take the Maserati only 3.5 seconds to travel its distance, or, at one kilometre, it would take about 11 seconds. On the bright side: driving those distances, I guess it wouldn’t use much petrol. But hang on: I hear the <strong>PNG</strong> Maseratis are diesel models with the pollutant factor too great for Australian omission laws. A bit of impediment if Minister APEC’s target market for the cars was ex-pats who’d import them into Australia. So to my question: “Who buys Maseratis?” Does the answer begin with ‘w’ end in ‘rs’ and have ‘nk’ in the centre? Just asking! Oh, and does <strong>PNG</strong> have 40 of them? Ok, Boss, is this what you were looking for? • JUST SAYING... Someone should have organised drag races down the length of Independence Boulevarde as entertainment during APEC. They had the cars and the track. What’s more, there’s a birds’ eye view from up there at APEC House and the splendid sidewalks would have made good viewing platforms for the public too. Port Moresby could have held the Inaugural Port Moresby, Maserati, Independence 300. And why stop at APEC? It could become an annual fixture of national life - like the Monte Carlo Rally did in Monaco. Whoo hoo! 6 <strong>PNG</strong> ECHO
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