Ordeal of my Lemon

I was a vehicle virgin, ready to buy my very first car. When I heard the encouraging words of Yusuf, a mechanic, I felt that thrill of excitement that all first-car owners experience. His words, spoken in a broken heavy Russian-English were “Found mashina, come look before gone.” That was all the encouragement I needed and I thought since he was a mechanic that I could not go wrong.
After making emergency baby-sitting arrangements for our newly born son, my wife and I hurriedly made it to Yusuf’s apartment later that evening to check out the car lest it was “gone”. Yusuf hastily ushered us to the parking lot where the “mashina” was parked. When I saw the car, I was disappointed; the light blue 1987 Chevy Colt had four wheels and that was it! Sensing my disappointment, Yusuf desperately pitched in “Gud crank, engine gud.” I guess the “gud crank” meant that the car could start effortlessly and true to his word, it did without a hitch. The short suspension did not make for a smooth ride but the car did run fairly well for a car its age. What really sold me was the 70, 000 miles on the dashboard; I was convinced that with such low a mileage the car still had life left to it. Again, I encouraged myself, that I was buying from “my mechanic.”
It was not until the following day that I realized what I had exchanged for my hard-earned nine hundred and fifty dollars. The exterior paintwork was actually not a true light blue but rather a blue that had given way to the harsh summer sun over the years. Under the clear direct sunlight, the interior was not pleasing either; the plastic on the dashboard was dry-baked and dusty while the seats badly needed repair. “I can turn this car around,” I thought as I burned the last jolt of self-encouragement, “Some elbow grease and the heavily advertised cleaning and polishing products will do the job.” Early that