Wow you're lucky, the reason i didn't get the auto was because it's 2000 euro more expensive which the price difference can get me more than 1200 liter fuel which is good for 24000 km of driving!
On the driver and passenger part there's not much difference with bigger cars, I own a Galant as well and to be honest it does feels almost the same driving both of them except I sit very close to my passenger compared to the Galant and it sits a bit more comfortable in Galant (at the new price of exceeding 2,5 times the Mirage I don't have complaints about the Mirage).
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View my fuel log 2013 Mirage 1.0 manual: 47.5 mpg (US) ... 20.2 km/L ... 5.0 L/100 km ... 57.0 mpg (Imp)