How To Pick The Fastest Road Car

THE LAMBORGHINI, THE QE2 & ME. For three years back in the 1980s, the Republic of Haiti was a client of mine for tourism public relations. Baby Doc Duvalier was still in power and, despite being the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere, Haiti was nonetheless attractive to tourists. It was safe then, and the people were friendly. Besides earning a fee, my thinking was that if my work could increase tourism it would help the economy and trickle down to the people by creating more jobs at existing hotels and even perhaps from new hotel construction. In 1984 I had the good luck to stumble into a situation whereby I was able to put one of the most powerful men in Haiti together with his newly bought Lamborghini V12 Countach 5000s, and come out smelling like roses. When you do business in a dictatorship it doesn’t hurt to have someone close to the throne indebted to you. Only 321 Countach’s were produced from 1982-85. Once referred to as the “King of Supercars” the Countach is said to be the most photographed and most well known car in the world. With an estimated top speed of 182 MPH, at times it has also been the fastest car in the world. Permit me to digress briefly and explain what it was that I was doing there: Among the several things one does when promoting tourism to a country or destination is organize and escort “group press trips” as often as possible. I conducted nine back-to-back group press trips to Haiti in the calendar year of 1984. Each trip had between six and ten magazine and newspaper travel writers. The obvious idea is that by bringing the media to the destination and showing them what a country has to offer, the writers will write favorable articles, and more tourists will come. The Caribbean Tourism Organization noted recently that my nine consecutive press trips in 1984 still remained as the most productive and sustained PR effort ever in a one year period to any Caribbean island. During these trips, one of my favorite hotels to stay at with my group of writers was The El Rancho Hotel in Petionville, which is about five miles outside the center of the capital, Port-au-Prince. I liked the place because it had a sprawling, attractive layout, a free-form swimming pool, and a casino where you could play Roulette with twenty-five cent chips. It was modern looking and, in my opinion, a few notches above the rest. One afternoon as I was having a cool drink at the patio bar with the manager, Willie Wichert, and chatting about anything and everything, I asked about owner Albert Silvera, whom I had not seen so far on this trip. The two men had married sisters, so Willie was Albert’s brother in law. Willie said Albert was upset and depressed and moping in his office. Before I could ask why, Albert himself struts onto the patio. He indeed did have a long face and was not his usual cheerful self. He joined our table and, with a little prodding, told me why he was so glum. Albert Silvera was one of the wealthiest, and most influential people in Haiti. Easily a millionaire by any standards. He had a penchant for beautiful and expensive cars and a small collection including at least two Rolls Royces, a Ferrari, two Corvettes, and , according to Willie, a rare Jaguar prototype (which I never saw). Silvera had recently returned from a European trip during which he had purchased a new 1984 Lamborghini V12 Countach but he was now beside himself with grief because he was unable to make arrangements to get the car shipped here, now, so he could have it for his birthday. You have to understand who Albert Silvera was and that he was someone very use to getting his own way. He had been Haiti’s Ambassador-at-Large for as long as anyone could remember. No matter who was in power in Haiti since the 1940s, Silvera used his wealth to charm his way into their circle and survived. During the German occupation of Paris in World War II, Silvera spent almost a year in the City of Light on a “diplomatic” mission and had a Wehrmacht chauffeur and a Mercedes at his constant disposal. After the war Silvera was keen to explain his chummy relationship with the Nazis by telling anyone who would listen that he had been “a spy-agent” working with Wild Bill Donovan and the O.S.S. (predecessor to the CIA). The bottom line is this man was accustomed to getting his own way, always. No ifs, ans, or buts. But now he had not been able to get his new Lamborghini loaded on a boat and shipped to a U.S. port so it could then be forwarded to Haiti. As it turns out, the new car was in England, not Sant’Agata, Italy. It was a resale. The owner dies shortly after it was delivered to him without ever driving it. Albert purchased it from the family at a very good price. Since it was in England, I asked the obvious question: had he contacted Cunard Line about having it shipped over on the QE2. Both Albert and Willie gave me disgusted looks. I felt silly for asking what was obviously a dumb question. Willie explained that Albert had spoken to somebody “high up” in Cunard and there was nothing they could do. The waiting list time for vehicles wanting to cross the Atlantic was more than a half year. I casually mentioned that a woman whom I had worked with in PR at an agency before I started my own business was now the PR person for Cunard in North America. We were good friends and I offered to make a call and see if anything could be done. To make a long story short, and to once again prove it’s often who you know that helps grease the wheel, I was able to get Silvera’s Lamborghini on the very next transatlantic crossing to New York. From there it went by rail to Florida, and thence on a freighter to Port-au-Prince Haiti. Elapsed time from the conversation at the patio bar of the El Rancho Hotel to the day Albert Silvera sat behind the wheel of his Lamborghini V12 Countach 5000s was less than a month, and in time for his birthday. Oh, and that remark about doing business in a dictatorship and how it doesn’t hurt to have someone close to the throne indebted to you? It paid off in spades. Albert Silvera came through for me big time. But that’s another story for another time. 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