You never forget your first love. That’s why we look back with enthusiastic car owners at their first car. As a student, Joost Hoebink longed to have his own car, but after his driving lessons, the money was almost gone. By polishing cars, he got his hands on a silver Ford Escort that moved him to tears.
As a nineteen-year-old public administration student in Nijmegen, you wanted to have your own car, how did you end up with this Ford Escort?
“What I found so brilliant about that Escort, and I still do, is that it’s a car like a toddler draws. Nowadays, cars are more streamlined, but this was a rather angular car. Furthermore, my father also used to drive a Ford, so I somewhat had the idea that this would be a nice car to start with. The Ford was for sale for €500 at a car dealership in Groesbeek. Nowadays, that’s cheap, but it was back then too. However, as a student, I had paid for my driving lessons myself and failed my driving test once. Then a few more lessons and an extra test were added, so after that, I had almost no money left.
How did you manage to acquire the car in the end?
“I went to the car dealership on my bike and explained my situation there. I asked if I could take the car for €350. That was absolutely not possible, this was the fixed bottom price. Then I proposed on the spot: ‘If I come and polish cars for two Saturdays, then after that second Saturday, I’ll take it with a full tank for €350.’ I did that, so I really worked for it. On that second Saturday, I then got into my own car; that was a magical feeling. It was also the first time I was in a car alone because I had just gotten my driver’s license and had never driven alone before. My first drive in the Escort will always stay with me.”
Immediately after purchase, it was almost the end for the Escort. What happened?
“I’m a bit of an emotional man, and the feeling of: ‘Wow, that I managed this at nineteen,’ really overwhelmed me. The freedom of literally having the wheel in my hands. If I wanted to drive to Paris, I could do that. I didn’t, because I just drove from Groesbeek to Nijmegen. I took a bit of the highway, came to a cloverleaf interchange, and then the turn was sharper than I had expected. I couldn’t see well because I literally had tears in my eyes. I had to hit the brakes hard, which worked, but in the end, I could just barely keep it on the road. That would have been painful.
You were so happy with the car that you even slept in it on the first night?
“I was a bit involved in student life, and we had a party with the group of friends somewhere. I had just gotten that car, so I really wanted to show it off. Everyone had sleeping bags and went to sleep at someone’s house. But I thought: ‘I have a car, why don’t I sleep in it?’ So I folded up the back seat and went to sleep in the car. That actually didn’t fit at all because I’m 1.92 meters tall. It was a hatchback, so I was half-folded in the back. Around five in the morning, I woke up because condensation drops were falling on my face from the rear window.”
After a few years, you were ready for something else. What happened to the Escort?
“During the period I had the Escort, it was always good to me. I never had any problems with it, and it never left me stranded. But at some point, I just wanted a car with more comfort, so I traded it in at a car dealership in Zevenaar for a Citroën Xantia with an automatic transmission. That was also nice, but very different. For that Escort, I even got more back than the €350 I once paid for it.”