An always cool Suzuki Alto Happy Prince, seen in a Beijing hutong back in 2011. The good Alto was in a great shape and looked like it was recently washed. Well, I hope it wasn’t washed too hot because the Alto was a very small car to begin with.
The Suzuki Alto was made in China by the Changan-Suzuki joint venture from 1988 until 2008. The Happy Prince was a special variant, fitted with a body kit, roof rails, sporty alloys, a fake hood scoop, and weird ladder-like things on each side of the rear window. The Chinese name of the Alto was 奥拓 (Ào tuò) and Happy Prince was 快乐王子 (Kuàilè Wángzǐ).
This particular example was painted in pink. Yes, painted, not wrapped. Changan-Suzuki didn’t offer pink as a factory color (they did have pink on the next generation Alto), so somebody took the time and trouble to paint it in pink all by him or her self. They sure did a good job, it really looked factory standard at first glance.
Got to love the big round red fog lights in the bumper! The Alto Happy Prince got power from a 0.8 liter 3-cylinder gasoline engine with 36 hp and 61 Nm. Horses went to the front wheels via a four-speed manual gearbox. It had a top speed of 120 km/h. You never guess the official 0-100 time. 15 seconds maybe? Nope. 20? No way. 25..? Neither. 35? Close. What?! It was 37 seconds. Really.
Specs via Autohome. Owning an Alto was not for the hurried at heart. But it was cheap! In 2008, the Happy Prince sold for only 39.800 yuan, and that was a good deal for a 4-seat car with such a fuzzy name. A pot of pink paint would cost some 100 yuan at most, so this whole car wasn’t even 40 grand.