VW 1, Heddles 0.

Yesterday things weren’t looking so hot for mine and David’s future relationship.

The 3-year warrantee is about as useful as an ashtray on a motorbike. Yip, looking back on those crucial pre-purchase visits where I enquired about the full service history of the vehicle, I now distinctively recall the salesman (let’s call him Shabir Shaik for their shared truth-manufacturing abilities) doing the Dubai Head-Wobble [impersonating of one of those annoying ornament dogs accountants or admin personnel have perching on their desks, which if tapped or bumped, will wildly begin bobbing/nodding their heads. When people do this, it usually means they’re lying].

Anyway when Shabir’s head started dipping and bobbling around on his neck, I should have seen the writing on the wall. ‘Yes it has a full service history’ should have translated as ‘you clueless chump, I’m taking you for a ride and this yarn I’ve been spinning you is TEXT-BOOK stuff’. The fact that he could only deliver me the service book weeks after I’d purchased the car … inexcusable schoolgirl error on my part.

On the phone with Shabs yesterday, he assured me that VW’s repairs would be covered by Warrantee and that he was straightening the whole thing out with them over the phone. ER, WRONG. Man alive did I look like a tool when I arrived, indignant, at the workshop, confident in the knowledge that Shabir had sorted it all out for me. Truth is, he did a runner and bolted for Sharjah yesterday.

So I fumbled for the next grand in my wallet (freshly drawn for long-awaited purchase of Faithless concert tickets) and, through the tears (yes, I pushed out a good few salties in front of the service manager, service assistant and new arrival, the head of Customer Services). All my emotional breakdown got me was a 10% discount.

Tears and feelings associated with martyrdom morphed into white-knuckled anger as I sped down Sheikh Zayed, driving like I owned the fast lane, and no BMW with tinted windows and flashing headlights was going to stop me.

Next errand-call was Mall of the Emirates, for Faithless tickets and Sheikh al Snake (dad)’s birthday present. After a Jumeirah Jane behind the wheel of an SUV with her cellphone grafted to her ear almost ripped off the side of David’s face, I finally got a parking after circling ground-floor car park for a solid 20 minutes.

Now here’s the amazing thing. On entering the air-conditioned, marble-floored sanctum of MOE, my tension headache began to diminish. Walking past Mango, D&G, Louis Vitton was like a balm to my anxiety. In fact as bling levels in the window displays increased, so the debilitating effects of my strangulating vile mood lessened incrementally. Like a horse-whisperer, the Mall was calming me, with the same effect as 30 minutes of meditation, or an hour of deep breathing whilst listening to pan pipes.

It wasn’t an illusion. In fact I was in such a good mood by the time I reached the Virgin Megastore that I smiled at the ticket man. And then bought the Madonna Dancefloor Confessions CD.