My blog

My first car was a Wartburg. Bought from a junkyard for the price of a few bottles of vodka. It was basically useless, but who cared in the early nineties. It was perfectly visible on the road thanks to its reflective yellow paint, with countless rusty spots peeking out from underneath, leaving no doubt that its youth was long gone.

As a marvel of East German automotive technology, it was exceptionally pleasant to drive. An austere dashboard - an early Gierek, gears changed with a lever on the right side of the steering wheel, stylish seats filled with hay and that feisty two-stroke engine, thanks to which we gave no chance to any Polonez.

At that time, I was intensively looking for ways to earn extra money to supplement my scholarship in gastronomy and for a few months I found a job at the Telimena café on Krakowskie Przedmieście. I was taught the trade by an old waiter, probably over forty years old, from whom I heard during my first training: "When a customer orders Perrier water, you always serve it with my assistance. The moment you unscrew the cap, I will make a delicate psst standing right behind you, so that the customer will not realize that they have received an ordinary Nałęczowianka."

When one night I was driving back from Telimena in my Wartburg to my home, to Goworka, at the exit from Puławska, I got my first flat tire in my life. I couldn't have guessed that I would never get back on my two-stroke, because when I lifted it with a jack, it simply broke in half.

My next car was even more exciting. A Citroen BX. An elegant, yet ancient Frenchman. Everything about it was designed the wrong way round, and that was probably why it gave me so much joy. The girls liked the hydraulic suspension the most. When I turned the key in the ignition, the body would start to rise majestically, and the passenger would become convinced that she had made the right choice.

Once, the four of us went skiing in my BX to Slovakia. The road conditions on Zakopianka were terrible. It was snowing heavily and it was dark. Somewhere near Lubień, I saw two lights of an overtaking car coming straight for a head-on collision with me. It all happened as if in slow motion, because we were moving at no more than twenty or thirty kilometres per hour. I had nowhere to run, because on the left side there was a line of cars and on the right side there was a three-metre slope. I tried to somehow fit in with the oncoming car, but I couldn't hold the steering wheel and that's how I had my first rollover.
The only casualty in this collision was my Citroen. I returned for it after three weeks with a tow truck, which turned out to be unnecessary, because when the highlanders helped me turn the car on its wheels, I turned the key in the ignition and despite spilled hydraulic fluid, a broken windscreen, broken roof pillars and a lowered roof, I somehow managed to return to Warsaw on my own.

But the biggest thrill I got was from a car I couldn't say anything good about. It was the Fiat Cinquecento.

In 1996, my son almost gave birth in that car. My wife was nine months pregnant, and my brother had set his wedding date a week before the due date. The wedding took place on Saturday, in Międzyrzecz Podlaski. My wife went there the day before, and I was still finishing some kind of training in Łódź. Late in the evening, my wife called me to say that she had a feeling that it was about to start. I got into the Cinquecento, and in the early morning, in the clinic in Międzyrzecz, we learned from the doctor on duty that there were about six hours left until delivery. We decided to take the risk of giving birth en route and set off for Warsaw. And although the Cinquecento made it, I will never forget that fight against time on the Białystok - Warsaw route, interrupted every few minutes by labor contractions.

I made my first mobile phone call in Cinquecento. On January 1, 1997, we were implementing some important functionality in the banking system, and something went wrong. I was sent to save the situation in one of the banks. I got into my Cinquecento and the president, for the purpose of contact, threw a heavy as hell brick of Centertel into my car. As soon as I started, I dialed my wife, who didn't want to believe I was calling from the car.

The Cinquecento was also my first family car, but it was quickly stolen from outside a block of flats in Warsaw's Stegny district.

But the greatest love of my car life was the red Toyota Carina II. A model produced from 1988 to 1992, one of the most reliable cars of its time. I drove it in the early nineties. It was the first Toyota model with rounded shapes and it stood out with its roundness among other brands. I traveled all over Europe in it, from Madrid to Corsica to Athens. After the Carina, I have never felt such a passion for any other.