After 20 years or so, my father managed to get in touch with one of his old American friends, who used to work with him back in the good old days, in Iran. They corresponded for a few weeks and recently, he sent my father some old pictures that he took, back in the end of 1979 early 1980.

One of these was a picture of our old beloved BMW 2002 car. This car back then was only a few months old, and it was like having the latest 3 Series BMW with all the bells and whistles in 2005. This car was my favourite car, even though I was only 11 years old.

With this car we travelled 90% of Iran, from Tehran to Bandar Abbas, from Ahwaz to Esfahan and all the way to Mashad and Zahedan. So you can tell we did a lot of travelling in this trusty German car. She never complained or let us down. Just kept on purring away at the Kilometres (we don’t use Miles in Iran).

Unfortunately, one night, returning from a long trip from Ahwaz to Tehran, my father had an accident in her. Two 18 wheelers decided to overtake each other on a 2 lane narrow mountain road, and my father happened to be coming round the bend at that moment. With no place to hide from these 18 wheelers (one side being the cliff and the other being the side of a mountain) my father did the best he could.

The tail end of the overtaking 18 wheeler smashed into the front of the car, squashing it into the side of the mountain.

Thankfully, my father escaped with only a few broken ribs and some stitches to his forehead. Considering that the steering wheel (which was the tough sporty kind) broke in his chest.

I later saw pictures of the BMW after the accident, and I was very sad to see her in that shape. As much as I begged and pleaded with my father to fix her up again, he told me that there was no point, as the car looked like it had been put through a scrap yards compactor.

So this long post is dedicated to our beloved trusty BMW 2002 (which I still miss to this date) and the wonderful German engineering that saved my father from any further harm.