I am in love with the concept of smoked headlights! Gina, my Philippine Hyundai Getz, will look… wait for it… LEGENDARY!

This thread on the Hyundai Getz Philippines forum - the Getz Club - features the work of a Tagaytay-based Philippine car detailer who goes by the name Hanzander. He’s popped several threads in several local car forums, including www.kotse.com and tsikot.com, and, judging by both the number of jobs he’s had and the photos he’s placed online, he’s one of the best.

I contacted Hanzander yesterday to inquire about his services. He was easy to talk to and his rates are very reasonable (Php1,200 for both headlights). A sample of his work on a Hyundai Getz is reproduced to the right; it’s a shame that the outside lighting reflected too strongly on the headlights, and obscured our opportunity to view the quality of Hanzander’s work.

The only kink in the arrangement is that this Philippine car detailer lives in Tagaytay, which is a three-hour drive from where I live. Hardly the most convenient of arrangements. If I were to ask him to meet me up in North EDSA, where I live, I imagine I’d have to shoulder his gasoline, which could be an additional cost of anywhere up to Php1,000.

I played around with Photoshop to see how Gina would look with smoked headlights. I’m terrible at this kind of thing, though, so Gina comes across looking a bit like an insect more than anything else. But then again, three factors come into play: 1) the color of the paint for smoking (black is a sleek color, but is it appropriate with a golden beige Hyundai Getz?); 2) is it still fair to call my Hyundai Getz Gina when the smoking of the headlights make my Getz look more like a boy than a girl; and 3) the idiocy of Ganns as a Photoshop dweeb.

At any rate, I think I’ll think about this a wee bit more before I launch into any further dreams. I actually am toying with replacing the steering wheel with a Type R steering wheel, and possibly installing foglights. In the midst of all these pipe dreams, though, the immediacy of my two kids’ tuition fees loom imminent, and I look precisely like a middle-aged man trying to recapture his youth by pimping his Hyundai Getz.

(Any startup Philippine car detailers out there wanna do business with me? Send an email to ganns at gannsdeen dot com and let’s see if we can come up with a handsome ex-deal that’ll have us both end up winners.)