I have been waiting for the VW Golf GTI, because the boy – it would be a stretch to call him a man – I liked in 1991 had one. He used to drive me round Regent’s Park in his Golf GTI, and although he went to St Paul’s Boys School and was a religious Jew, I thought this made him seem dangerous. I knew nothing. Behind the ambivalent smile his secret was this: he really cared about maths. My sister has a Golf now.
The Golf is the bestselling European car of all time. Globally, only the Toyota Corolla (compact) and the Ford F-Series (truck) beat it: 37 million Golfs have been sold since 1974, which is the equivalent of every single person in Poland owning one, including the babies. It’s 52, as I am: the defining car of Generation X’s good fortune and hope. The Golf GTI – Grand Touring Injection (or ‘Gran Turismo Iniezione’: it sounds better in Italian) – is only 50, so this is a birthday drive.
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