Having Fun All The Time

I made what I now consider an excellent decision yesterday, which was to buy a mountain bike.

The bike is epically cool, shiny red with Shimano gear shifts and brakes and front suspension. I paid 790 RMB for it, which is about $115, confirming my theory that bikes in the U.S. are conspiratorially expensive (my guess is that the same bike in the U.S. would cost $500+).

Of course, as soon as I took it out into Chinese traffic to drive home I crashed. It didn’t help that the rear brake on Chinese bikes is apparently on the left-hand side, versus the universal right of the U.S.

So I started riding home and of course a gray SUV literally launched into my lane, driving straight into traffic from the perpendicular road on my right without slowing down or stopping, and then stopping directly in front of me.

I had about 15 feet, which would have been enough if I hadn’t instinctively hit the right-hand brake (my knee-jerk brain had not yet learned that the brakes were switched), which launched me directly over the handle bars and the bike cartwheeling over me.

I immediately unleashed a storm of profane English on the driver of the SUV, who looked at me and held out his hands and shrugged in a half-apologetic way, and then cruised away.

Of course, I know that this kind of driving is so common in China as to be de facto or maybe even actual law, as is taking a right-hand turn on a red and not yielding to pedestrians, which everyone just sort of accepts, even though it is totally dangerous and makes the pedestrian traffic lights pointless.

But it still totally pisses me off, because at the end of the day the logic seems to boil down to pedestrians, motorcycles and bikes basically all have to look out for cars, and the fact that the whole arranangment is incredibly dangerous doesn’t seem to register for anyone.

Also, the other day I saw this clip from China Smack that included a pretty interesting/rather depressing photo of the aftermath of a car/motorbike accident: A day in the life of a member of the “ant tribe”

After the crash, though, I quickly pulled myself together and realized that I, and my bike, were OK, and then after lunch I went on a four hour bike ride into the mountains. Lately I have been hiking almost every day and have been realizing that getting out into the mountains pretty much makes everything better. And it turned out the bike ride pretty much did the same thing.

Except with the bike ride, once you get to the peak of your journey, it’s all downhill from there. You just have to watch out for cars.