[UberGoober]

Well that's what pissed me off. There is one VW dealer on the whole island and I had to brow beat him into even opening the friggin' hood. He didn't even want to touch it until I told him that "VW is an international brand and I expect that no matter where in the world I am a VW shop would at least show me enough respect to look at it"

He did a radiator pressure test, which helped convince me it wasn't a leaking EGR heater (another common problem for these cars.) He wouldn't do an actual compression test though.

I'm going to run it over to the base repair shop and see if they would take on something so serious. I think they are going to tell me to screw off though, they mostly do oil changes and other simple bs. Barring that I might just tear into it myself - I'm basically going to have to throw it away one way or another, if I have a 25% chance of repairing it, those odds are still better than they are now.

I will say, however, that I have worked around Japanese people for a long time and have found the myth of them being hard workers up to any challenge is bullshit. the second you step outside of their normal zone of operation and ask them to do anything different they get glassy eyed and start dreweling. They'll also fuck you over in a heart beat - they're polite while they do it, they are fucking you just the same. Nothing pisses me off more than having someone smile and look me in the eye while they are screwing me.