Car Clubs

It's a Friday. The afternoon sun brightens the day as people return home from their Jumma prayers. The roads are relatively empty. Some view the empty roads as a blessing after the jam packed chaos of the weekdays. Some, however, view the roads as ripe with potential.
An earth shattering mechanical howl breaks the calm. A golden blur passes by, the shriek of the VTEC kicking in reverberating across the buildings. Jaws drop, old people complain loudly, and the women try to contain their excitations.

Photos: R3V; ClubGT

In the distance, more can be found: a huge procession of spoilers, rims, and loud exhausts and vibrating engines. Toyotas, Hondas, Nissans and Mitsubishis. Here and there, one or two examples of German engineering from the likes of BMW and Benz. A banner flaps at the front of the long line of cars, proclaiming the cars to be of some car club or the other. The blinkers are everywhere, shooting out warnings: hold the line.
Eventually the long line of cars comes to a stop. Their owners get out and walk about, admiring each other's cars, suggesting, learning and expanding their knowledge on all things automotive. It's a brotherhood, and their t-shirts proudly announce their solidarity as part of a car club.
In recent years car clubs have started to sprout up everywhere. WheelsBD fizzled out and went from being the biggest and most recognized of the car clubs to being a mere shadow of its former self. Club GT was always steady and is now on a steady climb in popularity. R3V are newcomers but if the popularity of their site and Facebook page, not to mention their frequent meets are any indication, R3V is going to be very big indeed. In between the larger clubs lurk small but richly populated clubs like Drivetime BD and Asphalt Grinder.
Which brings us to the question, why join a car club? Most of the people we asked said people with an interest in cars naturally flock together to discuss about their motoring passions. Saurin A Rahman had this to say: "if you love driving, and love cars, you'd definitely be interested in hanging out with people who at least have the same enthusiasm towards cars as you do; a good car club should have such mature people, a club isnt about spirited driving and doing stunts every weekend."
When news of an Allion driven into a tree by a teenager comes up, one of the many car clubs in Dhaka get blamed for it. Talking to the club members however, think that this kind of moronic driving is unsafe and paints everyone else in a bad image, even though they have no part to play. Everyone knows about Gulshan FFC and the Dead End Tree's grief, famous even among non-car geek circles.

Photos: R3V; ClubGT

So is it just about sharing an interest? As it happens, car clubs seem to be more of a social thing than simply a car thing. It's networking. How does networking help out? In a country like Bangladesh, where you have to know people to get even the simplest thing done, networking is as valuable as wheel nuts on your wheel. Need a part that you can't find? Ask a few car guys and one of them is bound to know someone who knows someone who can get you what you want. Need to know what mods work on your car and how you can pull it off? Fellow car geeks may provide valuable second opinions. Knowing certain people is bound to get you some discounts at places like Bangla Motor and Scout Market.
Some of these people even bring in parts and other car related goodies. Danny Siraji and his Streetdreamz project is helping quite a lot of people get the perfect look for their car. Wasil Hasan is bringing in everything from scale models to key chains, turning a personal hobby into a business and letting other people enjoy their hobbies. Since these are private projects and the “business” doesn't have a physical location, you only get to know these people if you're affiliated with a car club or dabble in a bit of social networking through Facebook. If knowing people saves you the hassle (albeit, very fun hassle) of wading through miles of junk at Dholaikhal to find a rare part, then it can only be a good thing.
In terms of what it takes to join a car club, all you really need is a hunger for car knowledge and a burning passion for cars. To attend rallies and shows you might need a car, but it's not like you can't call yourself part of a car club unless you bring your car to every meet. If you feel you connect with the people of a club, you can say you are a part of it. It's not only for guys, as one female car club member says these clubs are like “wikipedia, ebay, googlemaps, howtogeek and facebook put together”, only for cars.
Most of these car clubs have websites and Facebook pages which are more or less update regularly, with info on upcoming meets, more threads and forums that help out other people and documentation of their meets. These sites and pages are also the first sources of info about the shiny new “exotica” entering the country, plus car spotting's that will blow the minds of even non-car geeks. For example, the rumors of a Ferrari F430 entering the country first originated at the FB page of R3V.
There are some rivalries. “Our club is better” and all that. Within the clubs themselves, the solidarity is there. Car clubs are groups of people who get together to have some good, clean fun. Not by doing handbrake turns and frightening little kids and crashing into trees, but by simply being there with each other and their cars. Some car clubs do great, some fail miserably, some do fine with whatever little recognition they get. But as long as they exist and we have a lively car scene in Bangladesh, everyone's happy. Except for cops, the government, wives, dads, bank managers, Pakistani embassy diplomats, Gulshan FFC security guards, and a lonely tree at a dead end (although it might want to reject whatever company it usually gets).