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I went to Dubai. All God-fearing Mallus go there at some point of time, right? No, I didn’t have to try hard not to behave like scores of my brothers from Kerala. And that means I didn’t hide my post-graduate degree and work in a marble polishing firm to earn 3,000 dirhams a month. I didn’t survive on kubboos for five years to collect enough dirhams to build a house back home. I didn’t surrender my passport to an employer. Best of all, I didn’t buy lots of dirhams’ worth of gold before I returned.
Instead I flew in business class, stayed at the famous Jumeirah beach resort overlooking the seven-star Burj Al Arab, which certainly is the most magnificent erection in Dubai yet. Then, dear readers, I drove the first ever SUV from the Audi stable over sand dunes. And, mission accomplished, I shopped for some chocolates and a bottle of Bailey’s Irish Cream (no Red Label for me) and returned home to file this copy. Trust me, a few nasty stars ten years back would have meant joining my friends and cousins in building the glittering oasis in concrete and glass that Dubai is today.
Now, Audi could have launched the Q7 at the Nurburgring to prove its handling prowess; they could have entered a few cars in the Paris-Dakar complete with trick underpinnings to prove its off-road cred. Heck, they could have airlifted a few to Antarctica if the point was to prove that it can counter inclement weather. But why Dubai? Because this is the natural habitat for a machine that has all the right to address the QE II as ‘mom’. If you still have any doubts, let me tell you that the Q7 is big. It is as big as the Porsche Cayenne and the Volkswagen Touareg, and it can bully a bunch of Hummer H2s till they give up their packed lunch. Did I mention that it is big?
Design wise, Audi had its work cut out thanks to every known SUV since the original Range Rover from 1972. I can imagine a very short design brief pinned on the design room softboard at Ingolstadt – it would have read ‘wir un bigger’. Once the designers built a mammoth machine, someone gave it a contemporary and corporate ‘dropped jaw’ and we got an SUV that looks perpetually surprised. The proportions are not what we are used to and that means a longish bonnet and lumpish greenhouse. The slimline headlamps are typical Audi but look like they were meant for LED technology that is obviously not ready for mass production yet. The new Merc S-Class-like wheel arch flares neatly hide the massive tyres. The signature forked-out five-spoke wheels alone can trigger a new jewellery trend amongst the bling set. You can’t call it handsome, neither can you label it pretty. Instead the newest Audi is somewhere between imposing and overpowering. Looks like the designers got a pay hike at the end of it all.
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