The year was 1985. Little did I know my prayer would be answered 40 years later!

We had new neighbors down the street. Mike and J.J. Vigil had moved out of state. In their place were new Filipino neighbors, Malcolm and Douglas MacLean.  Malcolm was my younger brother, Eric's age. Douglas was younger and the first one to start the Tamiya obsession in our neighborhood when he bought the Grasshopper, a 1/10 scale remote control buggy. These were the types of R/C cars that required you to build everything from boxes and bags of parts and required lots of tuning and you painted them yourself. They would take easily 6 hours to build with a father's help.

Some of my brothers friends, Scott and Jeff, also got Grasshoppers. But Malcolm eventually got the Hornet, which came out later that year, which was a supercharged version of the Grasshopper. Eric followed, as did some others. 

I watched and learned, and I fell in love with the Frog, known as the Mighty Frog in Japan, where Tamiya originated. It came out in 1984 but was more expensive and more complicated than either the Grasshopper or the Hornet. Unfortunately, it was too expensive and I never got the Frog. Instead, eventually, when visiting my cousin, Dana Genereaux, in 1985, who was my brother's age and also had a Hornet, I got the Pajero, pronounced Pah-Hair-Oh, but I mistakenly pronounced it Puh-Jer-Row. Looking through my cousin's catalogues and magazines, I still wanted that Frog, as it was the best looking RC buggy in my eyes. 

Forty years later similar things happened again. Tamiya still makes these rc cars but have updated the technology over the last four decades. My youngest son, Cyril, wanted the Candy Lime Green Edition of the Grasshopper, and it was a hit. My younger son, Daniel, soon decided that he wanted the Black Edition Grasshopper II, which was a reimagined version of the Grasshopper, that was the equivalent of the Super Hornet, a souped-up version of the original Hornet. Watching the enjoyment Cyril got in building and bashing his car, he wanted to have that same enjoyment. I got them all the best hop-ups to make sure they had the best of the updated features available from both Tamiya and small third-party companies.

Then the moment came. My boys wanted me to get an RC car too, so I could race with them, against their new rc buggies. I eventually agreed, and got a Tamiya Frog re-release as an early birthday and Father's Day gift. I took my time building it over 3 weeks and finally got a chance to drive my dream buggy, forty years later! 

Sometimes God says no to your prayers, but it is, "No, not now, but maybe someday later." I am thankful for this blessing that came 40 years later and is even more appreciated than it would have been back in the day. 

You can see more photos on my instagram page at https://www.instagram.com/vhaidrasaga/