How to decorate your car Peruvian style!

So, you’ve come to live in Peru and you’ve decided to buy a car because you just can’t face the manic driving, and the squashed and frequently smelly conditions in the public bus.

If you don’t want to stand out from the crowd (and so risk attracting the unwanted attention of the local police force looking to extract a little donation for their daily intake of chicha – corn beer), you should consider buying an older car. A reliable make and model would be best, as the usual potholey state of the roads and the crazy antics of your fellow drivers will almost certainly generate a need for numerous repairs and a plentiful supply of spare parts. And there are no friendly AA servicemen here!

Given their reputation for dependability and economy (fuel prices are high here), I’d recommend a Volkswagen. As there used to be a VW manufacturing plant in Brazil, little old beetles are common in much of South America.

Next, you need to decorate your vehicle.

On the outside, long strips of red and white stickers should be stuck to the sides and rear of your vehicle. I used to think these were used to indicate which cars were taxis but they are, in fact, reflector strips. As Peruvians drive extremely close to their neighbouring vehicles, I doubt these make the slightest bit of difference. Maybe they are seen more as a local version of racing stripes!

You need to adorn your little VW with stickers of various sizes, shapes and designs. These can range from images of that iconic hero, Che Guevara, to comic strip characters like Bugs Bunny, from bright glowing flames to roaring lions – almost anything that appeals.

A dedication to your girlfriend, mother or dog is essential, usually plastered right across the back window.

I go with God ... if I don't return, I am with Him

A dedication to God, a saint or some other religious personage is also a good idea, or perhaps a message professing your belief. Insurance is almost unknown in Peru, so asking for protection from an almighty being is about as close as you’ll get.

You must also decorate the inside of your vehicle. Although most Western countries prohibit the attachment of dangling objects to the inside of your windscreen, in Peru these are essential fashion accessories. Once again, something religious may work magic, but you should also add a colourful air freshener and perhaps a small soft toy.

On the dashboard, a religious banner will help with protection from the sun. And a baby’s or young child’s shoe is a great addition, either as another dangly or just sitting on the top of the dashboard. Just one shoe is needed and it must be a found object, probably picked up off the street, definitely not from your own child. This is for good luck.

Now, fill up your car with gas and drive like a crazy person and you’ll fit right in!

This is going a little too far!

A tribute to the Beetles!

Wiki tells me that:

‘The Volkswagen Type 1, widely known as the Volkswagen Beetle and Volkswagen Bug, is an economy car produced by the German auto maker Volkswagen (VW) from 1938 until 2003. With over 21 million manufactured in an air-cooled, rear-engined, rear-wheel drive configuration, the Beetle is the longest-running and most-manufactured automobile of a single design platform anywhere in the world.’

I think a great majority of the beetles that survive from that original 21 million are here in Peru, as these photos show. They come in all colours and all states of repair.

The blue beetle in these first two photos seems to be following me around. I believe it lives in the next street. I saw it first in that street, facing off against the white beetle. The next morning it was perched outside the shop on my corner, and that evening I saw it lurking up a neighbouring side street. It’s shabby but it has attitude.

I like the snazzy metallic blue of this beetle – its shiny skin shows it is obviously well cared for, though the rear bumper shows signs of a few scrapes and scratches. The words on its back windscreen, ‘solo nenas’, mean ‘only girls’. Does that mean the owner is a woman, I wonder, or maybe the owner is a playboy who only admits women to his vehicle. The orange beetle is rather garish and has on its front windscreen ‘Paz Con Dios’ – ‘Peace With God’ – perhaps the driver is hopeful of divine protection on the roads. Given the crazy drivers here and the frequency of shrines at the roadside to those killed in road traffic accidents, his plea is certainly wise.

This blue beetle was snapped quickly amongst passing traffic, while the pale green one has been parked opposite my bus stop these past two days. The woman wearing the fluorescent green vest appears to be some kind of parking warden – she collects money from the cars parked in the middle of the road. Whether this is an official position, or she is just guarding the cars from random thieves, I haven’t figured out yet.

Here we have two shades of dark green. I prefer the one on the right – it’s almost British racing green. It has a lumpy front bonnet as if it’s been in a smash and has ‘volkswagen’ on its front windscreen, as if it’s forgotten its name and needs to be reminded. The beetle on the left is parked outside the supermarket where I do my weekly grocery shop. There’s not normally such a long queue outside – I think someone was giving something away for free.

These next two beetles were photographed in the streets as I walked to my bus stop. Note the advertising posters and graffiti littering the walls behind the blue one – no city in the world seems immune to such rubbish. The red beetle reminds me of a car we had when I was a child. I liked its cheery colour but we didn’t own it long – it proved impractical for our family – when my granny accompanied us on road trips, my brother had to sit in the little space behind the back seat.

This white beetle looks pristine but white is an incredibly impractical colour in a city perpetually plagued by red dust. The beetle on the right is a jaunty Rudolf red, though its tyres look too worn to be safe.

Red is obviously a popular colour as here is another. Perhaps it belongs to the Notaria, whose sign it sits beneath. The colour does resemble the red of a notary’s seal. And the colour of the beetle at the left seems a cross between the colours of the boy’s jumper and the man’s shirt – a pale greenish-yellow. Note that most of these beetles have roof racks – a functional solution to the limitations of the beetle’s storage capacity!

The Volkswagen Beetle must be one of the most recognisable cars in the world, and I find something comforting about them. I hope you’ve enjoyed looking at these blasts from the past as much as I enjoyed photographing them.