Travel with Manfred

Travelogues from around the world

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Copyright © 1992 by Manfred P.. All rights reserved.

April 1992

Oregon versus California

Car Buying and Theft Experiences

by

Manfred P.

Keywords: USA, Oregon, California, tourist, travel trip report, travel log, travelogue.

One of the assumptions that I made when I left the Los Angeles/Orange County area was that I would leave behind the mixture of cultures and the pleasant influence of Orientals, Mexicans, etc. on my everyday life. I expect pretty much a bland all-white-American environment. But I was quite wrong; to my positive surprise I found Korean schools, Korean churches, a Chinatown, Oriental shopping malls, ... "Se hable Espanol" can be found on many ads and Mexican radio stations are available. I haven't watched TV since I came here, but I am sure that we also have foreign broadcasts. Nevertheless, the percentage of non-white (or non-pigmentally challenged [to be politically correct]) is by far smaller than in Los Angeles/Orange County. Believe it or not but most landscape workers are whites here!

State tax is nearly twice as high as in California. Despite that and despite the rain Portland has homeless which mostly stay in tents in undeveloped places. Sad.

Oregonians seem to get a kick out of California jokes. Once in a while I hear them on the radio on my way to work. Needless to say that I cannot identify myself w/ these jokes. But at least I also heard one good (well, maybe not that good) Oregon joke: What do you call a day after two days of rain? Monday. I even made up an Oregon joke myself: How can you tell if a car is from Oregon? If it has moss on it. So much about the rivalry between California and Oregon.

Another week passed by and after reading the clasifieds section of newspapers for 2 weeks, I decided to go out and get a little bit active. I went to a used-car dealer who had an ad with what seemed below-average prices. What a bad experience to deal with a car dealer. I -- innocently -- thought that all the bad stories that you hear about car dealers are stories of the past, and that the dealers have recognized the value of customer satisfaction by now and moved away from hi-pressure sales tactics. Wrong. I haven't heard that much b*llsh*t [excuse my English, but here it's really an appropriate description] for a long time. The cars advertised were not really drivable and he didn't even have a key. But I could tow it away, he said. Afterwards, I had to listen to statements from "You should be calling the governor and tell him about the good deal that you got." to "This engine last easily another 100,000 miles. This is the most reliable engine ever built". Right. Then they stuck me into their small talk rooms and the lies got worse. He made a copy of the Kelly Blue Book to show me the great deal. He carefully removed certain columns (those showing the low prices) before he made the copy. Then he showed me the prices of the model GLX, needless to say that the car he wanted to sell wasn't even the GL model, it was the absolute standard model. Then he spoke of the all the extras, like stick shift. I don't know much about cars, but I can read and even I know that a stick is not an extra. I guess he figured, foreign accent equals brain damage. This experience taught me a lesson. I learned something: I'll be staying away from dealers from now on.

Lateron, I went to an auto auction. They had a few interesting models there. Out the 60 models open for bidding, maybe 4 were of interest to me. So, the selection isn't great but the prices are. A similar car to the one the car dealer tried to sell me, went for half the price at the auction. Naturally dealers showed up at the auction too (easily recognizable at their portable phones). Anyway, that looks like a more promising approach and I'll be checking out more auctions from now on.

Something exciting also happened here at work. I was reading a management report in our common area. Suddenly a hi pitched shrill of a female voice breaks the silence. I look up, it was quiet again for a few seconds, as I was about to continue reading the report, a manager asks across our cubicle walls, "What's the matter?" and the response from the woman was "Hold that guy he stole my wallet." As you all know, I love to run. This combined with the opportunity to make myself useful, turned me into Superman-fred. Unfortunately valuable seconds had already passed, and the burglar was out of sight by now. Being on the top level it was easy to assume that he would run downstairs, so I dash down the stairs, and step outside the stairways in the 3rd floor according to my feeling. There I spotted a guy across the hallway, looking possibly suspicious; having no other person that could potentially be the suspect, I go after him. He starts running too, so I know it is him; but he had 150 yards advantage. He disappears on a different stairway again, I follow but take a wrong guess by running towards the neighbor building that's connected thru a glass corridor a level above street level. Thru the glass I see that he went all the way downstairs and is on the street now. I figure that my chances are better now, a) knowing where he is, and b) little objects where he could hide. I rush to the street level and run northwards, but by the time I was an the sidewalk I couldn't see him anymore. I kept running another 100 yard, but he was gone. I stop and a person from the other sidewalk asks what's going on. I shout back that I am looking for a thief. He starts running towards a car and yells "He's in there." Now, I see that guy working behind the steering wheel to get the car started. By the time I am close to the car, the engine is running, and I make a brief attempt to stop him from driving away by standing in front of the car. Then it got a little bit too dangerous for me and I dashed towards the driver's side to be out of danger of getting run over. In the moment he passes me, I briefly hold on to the car attempting to grab the guy (the window was rolled down) and I get a good look at the guy. While he drives away I try to remember the license plate (easy here in Oregon, only 3 letters followed by 3 digits). I run to the next intersection were a bystander was waiting, I assume she saw part of what was going on. To make it little bit more exciting I hop into her car and we follow the suspect. After a few hundred yards and the suspect leaving Tek property, I told the driver to stop. It's not worth a car chase on public roads. In the next hours (after immediately informing securities by phone) I gave my statement and license number to the cops. Other people also noted the number and it matched. Well, it turns out that the car was last registered 5 years ago when it was sold. Unlike California, Oregon's DMV has a law making its records accessible to the public. A friend of mine went through the effort to find out 2 unregistered owners that bought the car after it was un-registered. But the cops are working slow, as of today I have no idea whether or not the guy was found. I sure hope they get the guy and convict him too. Just another exciting day at the office. The next day everybody seemed to be talking about it and me. Looking back, it was not necessarily smart. I can be glad that the guy wasn't armed. Also, my hand still hurts from the attempt to grab him when he was driving by and I have not been able to do weightlifting workouts since then. The next time, maybe I should think more and show less courage.

So much from safe Oregon.