In Mitsu we trust

There are Honda fans. Toyota fans. Nissan fans. And then there are Mitsubishi fans, and there is such a group called Club Mitsu. It’s composed of regular people with regular jobs and regular incomes. Except – just like any other car club is about – it’s about regular folk with a somewhat irregular enthusiasm for the one of the oldest car makes in the Philippines.

At a time when the in thing is to be seen in a sharp-looking Honda or a stylish Toyota— especially among the young – it’s refreshing to see a rather large group of enthusiasts dedicated to the three-diamond manufacturer. Call them cool contrarians (Mitsu owners by choice) or "acquired tasters" (fans who became so because they didn’t have any other car in the family anyway), Club Mitsu’s members get a sweet thrill whenever they get the chance to make a non-Mitsubishi car eat their dust.

Club Mitsu is presided over by Rodolfo "Rufi" Parpan, a youngish car-guy brimming with ideas for the club and positively oozing with enthusiasm for just about any Mitsubishi. He’s the guy who started it all a few years ago, the one who set the wheels rolling for once-a-month breakfasts at nearby Outback restaurants, regular fun runs, intra-club parts swaps, and hot maintenance and performance tips among members.

What began as a simple sharing of ideas on www.kotse.com’s message board for Mitsubishi owners back in the bad old ("or good old", if you like) Erap days has grown into a real group, an organized barkada with more than 250 members on the club’s Yahoo e-group ([email protected]). Realizing that there were enough Mitsubishi owners out there with the potential to create something more organized for their brand of choice, Rufi took it upon himself to gather them all together and see what would happen.

"I said [on the Kotse.com message board] that on this particular night (January 15, 2001), I’d be at the open parking lot of Shangri-La Mandaluyong. Whoever shows up (kahit mag-isa lang ako doon), okay lang. Sixteen people showed up," says Rufi of the Club’s inauspicious beginnings."

Word got around, the club’s numbers grew, and the group was incorporated with the Securities and Exchange Commission (Club Mitsu of the Philippines, Inc.) to formalize the club’s structure and events. So, it’s an organization you might want to be part of if you own a Mitsubishi and need to know which repair shop knows its stuff when it comes to fixing Mitsubishis, where to get hard-to-find parts, and how to dress up or speed up your car.

As locally available cars go, Mitsubishis can either be plain workaday vehicles or scintillating exotics. Some club members have regular Galants and Lancers and the like. Others have hot rarities such as a Lancer Evolution VII and a box-type Lancer with a rally-spec turbo engine.

Rufi has himself met between 120-130 of these people, with a few dozen regularly showing up for their once-a-month breakfasts and private exhibitions. Members on the Yahoo e-group even include Filipinos in countries such as Canada, America, Australia, and even Guam. A few foreigners are also part of the e-group in order to cross-reference information for their cars.

One thing the Club does wish it had is some official support from the manufacturer, Mitsubishi Motors Corporation. Apart from marketing representatives of the company showing up during the club’s first ever gathering to give away merchandise, ask a few questions for a database, and simply say hello, Mitsubishi has yet to really support the Club besides giving this writer Rufi’s contact number for the interview.

Support either financially or logistically from the manufacturer for the Club’s projects would be most welcome, they say. Even little things like those nice Ralliart calendars and car accessories could mean a lot, says Rufi as he shows me some rare Mitsubishi items he brought along for the interview such as Japan-spec manuals and brochures.

Even so, one can assume the Club is doing okay these days. Surplus MIVEC, Evo, GTi, and other high performance engines are readily available for Mitsubishi owners who find the stock engines lacking. So are parts such as Euro-spec appearance kits. Club members know exactly where to look and what’s the fair price.

The venues for their once-a-month meetings vary, but lately they’ve been meeting at Outback Libis, which even gives them discounts and preferential parking spots. Discussions are mostly shoptalk. Once in a while, a member comes in with a pocket-rocket car that they look over and try out in the area. "We applaud each other’s little projects, help each other sourcing parts, and the core group organizes projects like fun runs and plant tours", says Rufi. They even have a basketball league, "para hindi naman puro car events", he says.

As for other cars, the Club (or at least represented by Rufi) has, well, polite indifference. They consider Mitsubishi cars the most exciting to dress up, and the engine range is wide enough that even lackluster cars like the 1991 Lancer ("lousy chassis, lousy suspension, lousy engine", say a lot of people) can be beefed up and made respectable. "For us, the Honda-Mitsubishi thing is like Crispa-Toyota [during the early PBA days]. Club Mitsu guys like to smoke all those SiR’s. Personally, I wouldn’t be caught dead in a Civic", concludes the fan who started it all.