What Killed Terranosaurus Rex?

“The extreme cool air up in the mountains, the blazing coastal heat, the treacherous steep hills, the impossible off-roads, the uneven city streets: nothing is impossible for Terrano. This tough guy is in need of a constant new challenge. Fully powered and more rugged, furnished with new amenities, now Terrano is ready to accompany you to a whole new terrain, a more challenging journey ahead.

Nature inspired, Nissan Terrano, reflected your active, driven and confident personality. The strong performance will enhance your image in any situation. Impressions will last on any spectator.

No boundaries. Nothing stopped this monster. Now with a more affordable price range”.

Whoever wrote that line for Nissan was a genius. A drop of flattery here, a boost of ego there, fill-in a guy with what he wanted to hear and you got a perfect client. That was three years ago. When the floods were our eminent enemy, everybody wanted a tough vehicle that would walk on water pretending that he was Jesus. On top of that, this baby was so my type: Strong and rugged. Nothing sweet about it. No nice curves or cute bells and whistles. “And with more affordable price range!” Don’t you just love it? Just me and my Terrano. My pick-all-up truck, my security-blanket tank, my masculinity enhancer and my personal penis extension.

Those were the days when SUVs were the “it” boys of the Indonesian automotive industry. I remembered those glossy covers with reports from the lower end test drives such as Isuzu (Panther) and Toyota (Kijang), to the never-ending head to head battle of utility trucks between Opel/ Chevy/ GM (Blazer), Honda (CRV), Nissan (Terrano and X-Trail), and Ford (Escape). The market was ready even for the softer side of them with the luxury touches from BMW (X5 and X3), Range Rover (Vogue and Disco), Porsche (Cayenne), VW (Touareg), and those ultra smooth Lincoln (Navigator, insert hip-hop music here), Lexus (Lx), and Toyota (Landcruiser). Even Mercedes-Benz didn’t feel like they need to change anything on the face of their G class for almost three decades.

Then shit happened. As if the earth was hit by an astronomical size meteor, the sweet life is now officially over. Once these giants walked the surface of this planet and now their days are numbered.

Even trying to sell one of these sweet machines to the used-car market will break your heart even further. Today's prices are dropping lower and lower day by day:
1. Oil prices are extremely high today. People want a vehicle with a very cost efficient kilometer/ liter oil consumption ratio.
2. Street conditions are getting more packed with cars. They wanna have something smaller and easier to maneuver with in the tightest spaces available (esp. to park on).
3. Bank loans on auto ownerships are more available and forgiving now with attractive rates. Suddenly installing new cars in your garage became hipper than purchasing (quality) second hands.
4. Starting in early 2007, a new tax-raise will be applicable on anything that runs on a 2.0 liter and above engines. Yikes.
5. Finally people realize that image alone won’t keep your rice bowls warm on rainy days.

The above factors killed my expectation on a better price for the dark-blue devil. I will be extremely lucky if still manage to get half the price of what I spent to take this thing home that day. If this can happen to me, it will definitely kill the SUV segment soon. Yes, those gas-guzzling monsters.

With age, I hope I grew up more mature and wiser (and graceful!). Hikes on salary are very incompatible with hikes on standards of living. Ask anyone from Hanoi, KL or Manila. They’ll totally agree that living in Jakarta is already more expensive than in their hometowns. Bear with me: Spending $10 a day on gas is insane. Driving through daily traffic jams in stick-shift (manual drive) is also insane. Perceived to be someone-you-are-not behind these wheels is even worse.

Fuck image. Better break my heart now to part with this dearly beloved ogre, than to break my bank account later on.

And for the epilogue, for once I will try to blend-in with the more wiser fuel-economy conscious group. Maybe something affordable, low to maintain, low in gas consumption, but still cute to sit on. Remember to save me some for, of course, shopping and café hopping with a clique of friends. Teteupp.