Changing Lanes

So at around 7:50pm, me and my friend got to the venue. I was not looking forward to another dinner in a hotel as I find hotel food to be quite mediocre. We entered the hall and realized there wasn't any space left for us to sit which was unusual for such an event. While waiting for the hotel staff to find some space for us, I moved my focus to the stage where 4 Chinese (or Korean?) women were performing the fan dance. Their synchronization was poor and one of the them even dropped a fan. The performance ended and they found two empty seats for us. By then we had already missed the starters (no hummus for me...). Some speeches were made about how great Hyundai is. Now I'm not being sarcastic, Hyundai has come a long way and honestly they make fantastic cars especially for the money you pay for them. Surprisingly, the speeches were made from the table the officials were sitting on and not from the stage. The main announcement made during the speeches was the Fifa 2010 promotional campaign where some Hyundai customers will get a opportunity to travel to South Africa to watch some of the best matches. Pretty cool in my opinion. The last speech of the lot was from the South African ambassador I think, who choose to speak from the stage instead. His speech was by far the best. One point he highlighted was that South Africa is as safe as any country can be and that the government has put every effort to make sure everyone visiting is safe. Good to know.

And then the people (2 men and 4 women) in skin tight clothes came on stage to perform Acrobatic moves with exercise balls. It was the most indecent/vulgar act I have seen live. Urgh!! I had no interest in watching men or women in tight clothes doing weird moves so I started counting the bulbs in the room and admiring the hotel decorations. Performance over and then a short award ceremony took place where they were thanking various government organisations.

Another short speech (from the stage) was made about the new Sonata. This is were I got interested. The car seem to come with a lot of standard equipment like automatic headlights, paddle shifters, fog lamps, leather wrapped steering wheel, Cruise control, CD/MP3 stereo with 6 speakers, USB and AUX ports with iPod cable, steering wheel buttons etc which is more than what you get in other similar priced cars. The only let down was the 176 hp 2.4-litre 4-cylinder engine which is less powerful than the engine this car is sold with in the US. Options for higher models include panoramic glass roof, intelligent keyless entry with start button, power-folding mirrors, HID headlights, driver’s power-adjusted seat, stability control, six airbags etc Quite an impressive list. For more information you can visit drivearabia.com.