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Six months of planning and organization will come to fruition on Saturday March 25 as the showground at the Asia Hotel on Pratumnak Soi 4 will be opened to the public for the 2nd Pattaya Classic Car Show, featuring approximately 80–100 collectors’ vehicles.
Event organizer and project chairman Jo Klemm told Pattaya Mail that he has been addicted to classic old cars since 1981 when he purchased a 1959 edition MGA 1500. It was a “rusty project with a rotten engine” said Jo, but he never gave up and after 3 years it became a beauty.
In 1982 in Australia, Jo joined his first classic car society, the MG Club in Sydney and 4 years later he founded the MG Club Berlin (today the 3rd biggest MG Club in Germany). In 2009 he created the very fashionable Gasolinera Bar on the Costa Blanca in Spain, a very popular spot for hundreds of classic car owners who met there each weekend for more than 3 years.
Later, Jo decided to make the move East but he was disheartened by the amount of red tape and bureaucracy involved in taking his cars with him. “I was very sad when I found out that there was no way to bring my beloved classic cars from overseas to Thailand,” said Jo. “It was hard to say goodbye to all my toys when I moved here from Spain.” But in the end he sold his collection as Thailand was calling!
After arriving in the kingdom, Jo started his car obsession once again and soon discovered a 41-year old VW Kombi Bus T2, which became his first ‘classic’ vehicle in Thailand. A little later he came across a 43-year old red Alfa Romeo GT and this “bella figura” from Italy is the reason he is now addicted to only one car brand in Thailand – classic Alfas.
Jo says his Alfa GT is the real deal… original wooden dashboard, fine leather seats, aluminium door handles, wooden steering wheel, no fancy electronics or orgies of plastic. “When the engine turns more than 4000rpm you must switch off the radio because the typical Alfa Romeo twin-cam engine provides a musical quality all of its own,” says Jo.
In March last year, Jo and his classic car loving friend Martin Koller decided to organize a classic car show here in Pattaya, which proved to be a great success. One of Martin’s cars is an Austin Healey 3000 from 1969, the only one of its type in Thailand and it will be of the most interesting cars at this year’s show.
Both Jo and Martin aim to use the Classic Car Show to help raise funds for charity and to this end they have co-opted the help of Radchada Chomjinda, the director and soul of the Human Help Network Foundation of Thailand, and children from the Pattaya Orphanage will play a big part in this year’s event.
The Classic Car Show on March 25 starts at 12 Noon and the vehicles will be on display all afternoon at the hotel’s beachside showground. In the evening there will be charity BBQ dinner including performances by children from the Orphanage, a charity auction, the awarding of the winners for “best cars on show” and live music until the late hours.
At 10.30am the following morning, along with a police escort, a parade of the cars with the Orphanage kids onboard will take place along Pattaya Beach Road before finishing back at the Asia Hotel.
Tickets for the Classic Car Show cost THB 150 (payable at the door) and as a bonus to our readers, the Pattaya Mail has free tickets to give away to the first 100 people to drop by the office on Thepprasit Road anytime between now and March 25.
For the evening dinner (including free-flow drinks), show and auction, tickets cost THB 1,500 to members of the public and can be purchased by contacting Jo at Email [email protected] or call 092- 753 9309. All proceeds from the show and dinner will be used to help underprivileged children in the community. For further information of the event, visit Facebook/classic-car-friends-pattaya.com.
