Lenin Owned Nine Rolls Royces

A hacker who was ordered to repay the £6 million he stole from RBS has raised funds by selling his Lada.

You could sell every Lada ever made and not raise that much.

Read the full article:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-14989264 

I am not a motorist but when I read the above article it seemed like the ideal moment for me to write about the worst automobile I've ever been a passenger in. A car even worse than Downey's, which itself was a decrepit little box that was notable for having Burzum blaring through the one working speaker on the tape deck while balancing precariously on two wheels.

The car in question was a Lada that belonged to my now deceased neighbour, a rather large fellow who struggled to position himself behind the wheel. No doubt his extra bulk added to the car's ailments, it was already on it's way to collecting it's pension by the time he acquired it and previous owners hadn't exactly kept it in showroom condition but the sound of an engine stubbornly refusing to start was of no concern to him, he was going to twiddle the key until it jumped into life.

A nicer Lada than the one in this story.

Myself and my father were his passengers that morning, our destination was the bog with the intention of stacking turf in order for it to be dried and then burned come winter. It is not a pleasant way to spend a day. It was made even more unpleasant by the mode of transportation we would be taking once the jewel of the Soviet Union's auto industry kicked into gear. To my despair it eventually did and off we trundled down the road. It hadn't taken long for my ten year old senses to pick up on the faults with the Lada, you don't need to be a mechanic to know that a car shouldn't smell like a mix of years old orange drink mixed with damp and driver frustration. When I started noticing the rust holes in places carpet should be and a lack of basic features such as door handles and seat belts I started to relish reaching our destination.

It was only a short drive, no more than half an hour I recalled from previous trips but then the Communist Titan topped out at 25mph, rattling and creaking as if the wheels would drop off at any second. When we reached the motorway my slight worry became a real fear as we crawled along at the mercy of articulated lorries who I doubt even knew we existed, roaring past and blowing us across lanes. Only with the appearance of a road side potato stall (this story is very Irish, isn't it?) did we reach safety as the added weight of a bag of spuds in the boot meant the little engine that could with a lot of patience and encouragement no longer couldn't. Help was summoned and the car abandoned, we had fuel to secure. It reappeared on next door's driveway days later, the removal of the 4 kilos from the boot acting having given it the kiss of life.

It outlived it's owner if I recall correctly and then disappeared, never to be seen around these parts again.