Dubai: It took 3,000 hours, 33,000 coins weighing 160kg and 10kg of glue to decorate a commemorative car, ‘Pride of the Emirates', to mark the 40th UAE National Day.
The total cost of the coins of all denominations — Dh1, 50 fils, 25 fils, 10 fils, 5 fils and 1 fils — is around Dh21,000, probably more than the value of the 1998 model Chevrolet Camaro, which has been completely plastered over with coins
"I conceived the idea of bringing the Pride of Emirates to reality some 20 years ago and I am very happy that my dream has come true with the help of my colleagues and friends," creator of the car Tarek Javaid told Gulf News. Javaid, a Pakistani, has been living in the UAE since 1999 and works in the automobile industry. He wanted to decorate a car in a unique way which has never been attempted before. Now he has done it and is ready to enter the Guinness World Records.
Gift to people
Javaid said the car would officially be launched for public viewing at Al Ghandi Auto on Shaikh Zayed Road. "It is my gift to the people of UAE and I want this car to be permanently on display for people and tourists either at a museum or any other prominent place," he said.
The project started in October 2010 as he decided to decorate his son's car.
"After a thorough study and test I selected the best adhesive to attach the coins. I planned to fix coins to cover the whole body of the car in a way that it would look absolutely uniform from each corner," he said.
"Making the UAE map on the roof, the graphics and writing names of all the emirates in Arabic and English on the car were a challenge. Every moment of coin-embedding was recorded from start to finish," he said.
Javaid is proud of the fact that he pasted each and every coin with his own hands. The first coin was pasted on the hood on October 15, 2010 and the work continued daily. Every coin pasted on each part of the body was documented, along with the time involved.
Occasionally, he had to remove a few coins and re-apply them in order to achieve the same effect when the vehicle is viewed from either side.
Destination
"I am happy that it is the first car in the world decorated with UAE coins. I dedicate this car for the 40th UAE National Day and I wish that it should stay forever as a symbolic car to be shown all over the Emirates," he said.
The car will be on display for the public from Tuesday until it finds its final destination — a museum.
