After my horror experience with a rental Honda fit last time, another dealer this time round offered me a rather clean fielder. It was the famous “mataa kwa boot” version that has since time immemorial received praise and scorn in almost equal measure along these streets. I was hesitant at first due in part to its KBT registration which meant it was older and therefore (theoretically) less mechanically sound but the owner quickly allayed my fears by promising a full refund if any mechanical issues arose that were not of my doing. That’s how confident he was in the car’s mechanical soundness. How he would have determined whether any issues arising were linked to me or not however was quite frankly beyond me but I accepted the offer nonetheless.
He charged a non-negotiable rate of 3k per day so I paid 12k for a four-day sojourn upcountry with the car from the 25th to the 29th. I also made sure that his promise of a full refund in case of a mechanical breakdown was included in the agreement form to which we both assented to. The other qualm I had with the vehicle was it’s complete lack of a music system. Only an unresponsive screen inscribed in what appeared to be mandarin or Japanese with a cd changer was available. Not entirely a deal breaker but a decent aftermarket music system would have been a nice addition.
I left for up country early on the morning of the 25th with a cousin of mine and the fuel tank full to the brim and hoped for the best and boy did it live up to its reputation. Acceleration was remarkably fast for a 1.5litre car and the engine barely made any discernible noise from inside the car (with the windows up) except when I floored the throttle. It was light years ahead of the Honda fit in terms of acceleration and overall comfort though in the spirit of fairness, I had just one passenger in the fielder while I had hauled along 3 passengers in the fit therefore it’s not entirely a fair contest. It wasn’t as good as my friend’s Lexus though but it came really close.
Suffice to say, I was in the village in just over 3 hours due in part to an initial traffic snarl-up along the Nairobi – Nakuru highway but once i took the exit at flyover and onto njambini road I was constantly at 100km/h through no fault of my own.The engine was yearning to be pushed to the proverbial brink. I was gentle on the throttle but I would check on the speedo momentarily only to realize I was fast approaching 100 while the fit I had last time struggled to even manage a paltry 80km/h. The accelerator pedal was of course very light while the brake pedal was quite heavy and “sharp.” One needed to only slightly depress the brake pedal to achieve the required braking power and bring the car to a grinding halt. It’s a bit like the brakes on an Isuzu FSR lorry for those who have driven one.
I made it just in time for the goat slaughtering event with a tad over half a tank of fuel left. This might just have been Toyota’s engineering at it’s finest. I immediately called the owner and informed him that the the car had exceeded my expectations and promised him a pack of hard liquor when I made it back to the city, an offer he laughed off and politely declined citing his religious beliefs that strictly forbade indulgence in alcoholic beverages.
At some point when I neared the village, I had to scale a long, winding hill that was quite steep with the steepest point being a 30° incline. Whereas with the fit I had to hold the gearbox into the “L” position to avoid loss of power if the gearbox decided to upshift halfway up the hill, the fielder made short work of the same hill and I didn’t even need to limit the gearbox to a lower gear. It was in “D” all the way.
During my brief stay in the countryside, it rained occasionally and at some point I had to drive through a muddy road. The fielder being a FWD vehicle was an added advantage since a tailspin was a distant possibility. With the lever in the “2” position to reduce torque to the wheels and therefore minimize wheel spin, the car again made short work of the terrain albeit with a few swings to the right and again to the left followed by desperate counter-steers to keep the car from getting bogged down in the ditches on either side of the road. My skills here also played a pivotal role.
Over the few days i was in the village, I put the car into hard use ferrying drunk old men to their homesteads, women, children, goods and at some point two full sized goats went into the boot but no matter what I threw at it, the car never caved in to pressure. It performed admirably. At some point I felt like I should empty my bank account and auction a piece of land given to me by my dad in the outskirts of Joska town just so i could relieve the owner of this gem. My dad would have exploded in anger but at least I would have this beauty outside my home in the semi-arid Utawala area. I however decided that the cons of this move would far outweigh the pros and lead to an acrimonious fallout with my dad thus putting my entire inheritance of his vast fortunes in limbo.
I however immediately regretted not tagging along a random wench to impress the village boys and draw the ire and distaste of the village girls. I feared a repeat of the misfortunes I endured with the fit so I shelved the idea fearing total embarrassment and humiliation if the car broke down in the middle of nowhere. One must hide their shame, or so they say. However seeing as it had lived up to it’s reputation, I wished I had invited at least one desperate girl to tag along pro bono.
The long and short of it is that driving the fielder “ya mataa kwa boot” felt about as good as wanking off to erotic pictures of Dakota Fanning, my all time crush, in the wee hours of the night.
On my way back yesterday, I hauled along 3 more cousins each with a bag of potatoes, green peas and milk all of which went into the boot including my own luggage. The boot was full to the brim and some of my passengers were disturbingly obese but there was no noticeable increase in fuel consumption. The car consumed just under Ksh.4500 worth of premium due in part to the many errands I had to run within the village.
Though I’ve not had the car long enough to give it a proper review, I can confidently advise anyone considering purchasing one to do so as long as the unit is well maintained. This is one of the few cars that are unlikely to disappoint. The fellows who have been heaping praise on this fielder model for months on end have not been playing the game of musical chairs with us. It turns out that their praise is based on fact while the “haters” are probably wingroad drivers who can’t fathom how on earth a 2007 fielder is better in every possible way compared to their 2011 wingroad.
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