The Belgrade Phantom

The Prelude:

The year was 1979, in the cold dark hours of the Serbian winter nights, a white car whizzed past the slow moving Zastavas. The speed of the car sent chills down spines of fellow drivers and bystanders equally. The phantom appeared every night astonishing everybody equally, so much that people started gathering at the Slavija Square (Belgrade) just to watch the car. Nobody dared to find who was behind the Phantom, until a photographer captured the picture of the man at the wheel.

The Phantom:

The Phantom was a white Porsche 911, driven by a young man named Vlada Vasilijevic, also know as Vlasa Opel and the Human Key, since he could unlock any car in a matter of seconds. Another fact that needs to be noted is that Serbia in the 70s had cars like the Trabant and Zastava that barely crossed the 50mph speed limit and a Porsche on the streets of Belgrade was a rare sight in the Socialist state of Serbia. 

Vlada who used to be an expert in stealing cars  used to steal cars only to return them to the owners after a joy ride, but this time around the true petrolhead in him awakened when he touched the Porsche. He instantly fell in love with the car and began driving the car like how it was designed to be driven. This began pulling people from corners of Belgrade to watch the Phantom in action. Just as things started escalating, the Phantom himself calls a local radio station to inform about his next appearance, which got the police and the people's attention.

Vlada gave the police a run for their money, who in their sluggish Zastavas would barely be able to keep up with the G series' 150HP. This cat and mouse game with the Police continued for long until the then President of Serbia, Tito was made aware of the Phantom. The Phantom continued his joy ride infoming the local radio stations of his planned routes everday, which caused some people to believe that he was doing this to impress his long time crush as he left a rose in a specific location every time.

Ford Granada similiar to Fangio's car

Regardless of Vlada's intentions, the police were getting  seriously annoyed and orders now started coming from  the president to take him down. The Police force was left  with no choice but to bring an external investigator named Fangio in to put an end to the Phantom. Fangio was'nt given a measly Zastava but a modern Ford Granada that matched the likes of the Phantom Porsche. Yet there was no stopping for the Phantom. Fangio then devised a plan to spill water at the Slavija Square which will cause the car to slip. This plan worked, the car slipped just as anticipated and slammed into a bus parked along the road.  Vlada's crush arrived at the scene only to find the car empty, but she left a kiss for him on the car. 

But things don't end their. To everybody's surprise, Vlada had escaped. The police arrested multiple car thieves and interrogated them until one of them let the cat out of the bag and revealed the Phantom's real name. The police swiftly arrested him and during the interrogation Vlada said he did not know what motivated him to steal the car but when he was in it, he never wanted to stop driving it. It was also noted that Vlada's heart rate increased when he was shown pictures of sports cars. Vlada was sentenced to two years in prison. 

People claim that Vlada was a revolutionist and Vlada did it for  love and so on, but for me, Vlada was much more than these simple humanly cravings,  Vlada for me was a true Petrolhead, he could hear the car interact with him and when he was in the car, he was one with it. 

Unfortunately, Vlada was killed in a staged accident ten days after he was released from the Prison. 

In memory of Vlada Vasilijevic, from the petrolhead in ME...