Ever since my second trip to Korea in 2004, I have been in love with a Korean car made by Daewoo called the Matiz. One of the most popular colors this car has come in since its release into the Korean market is green... and y'all know how I love green.
There were green Matizes (Matizi?) in Russia in 2005, and I arrived in Korea in 2006 to discover that my friend Gwen had bought herself one (here's her husband posing with it). I even found a green Matiz in Osh, Kyrgyzstan in 2008 (click here and here to see!), namely due to the fact that there's a Daewoo plant just across the border in Uzbekistan. [Check out the wikipedia article for more Matiz info!]
I utterly adore the newly redesigned Matiz - which comes in not only normal colors but green, pink, and light blue as well. There's a green one that belongs to someone in my neighborhood. Check it out:
And best of all, this model Matiz is now being sold in the USA as a Chevrolet! They're calling it the Chevrolet Spark, not the Matiz, and it comes with the Chevy logo as opposed to the Daewoo logo, but otherwise, it seems pretty damn identical. Check it out!
A couple of things bother me about this, however. For starters, the name. What was wrong with the name Matiz? Not to mention that the name Spark evokes images of an electric car, which it simply isn't.
The main thing that bugs me though is this quote from the official Chevrolet website: It's 100% Chevrolet from the ground up. Ok, so General Motors owns Chevrolet. General Motors owns Daewoo (now officially called GM Daewoo) - but the Koreans began making the Matiz several years before GM joined the party, and they'd been making its predecessor, the Daewoo Tico [see wikipedia], since 1991.
To say that the Spark is 100% Chevrolet from the ground up is completely disingenuous. Not that it makes me want one less, mind you, but it totally bugs me.
2 comments:
Actually, you are a year early as it won't be available until the final quarter of 2011 in the United States.
As for the name, I used to own a Daewoo Nubira before they were taken off the market by GM when they bought a good chunk of Daewoo back in the early 2000's. I had no idea what the name meant then and was only impressed by the price of the car ($8,000 for a new one back in 2001 -- no wonder GM wanted them out of the U.S. market). Personally, when I hear "spark," I think of a fire and not of electricity, and I think GM is hoping that this "Spark" will light a fire in their sales as the term "Matiz" would probably be only hinderence on sales as it wouldn't make much sense to an American public who can at least understand what Soul meanns when buying a new car.
I'm not going to be in the market for a new car any time soon... so perhaps I'll be ready to buy one when they go on sale? Actually, I'm not sure I would be willing to leave Toyota behind in favor of any other brand, simply because I have had no problems with my car (well, now my mom's car, as I'm in Korea), and I bought it in 2003. Still, I've been obsessed with the Matiz for so long, it would be nice to actually own one. Or at least test drive one.
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