The other day my mother sent me a great big care package. One of the things that I really wanted was some shoes for my bicycle and I had no idea how to get them here. I ended up having her order me a pair from a store in Grand Blanc and then sending them. It was far from cheap, but they fit well and are exactly what I wanted. There is a guy here who runs a coffee shop, The Café Id. Lee speaks excellent English and he rides mountain bikes to a degree that I can’t understand. I immediately went to his café and he told me how to get some pedals to go with the shoes. He even offered to order me some if I didn’t find what I wanted at the best local bicycle shop. It is really nice to know people who can help you in a time of need. He also makes some of the best coffee I have ever had. He even roasts his own beans which is overkill to say the least.
In the “be careful what you wish for” department I followed Lee’s instructions and bought some pedals. I don’t know if you have ever seen “clip-less” bicycle pedals but, in essence, they are like ski-bindings. They are really difficult to use at first and there are a shit load of little warnings all over them which basically say if you mess with these, you do so at your own risk. As if I would ever heed any warnings!!
There is this crazy bicycle shop in the center of town and sort of reminds me of my father’s old shop as it is filled with stuff everywhere and the only person who knows where everything is at is the guy running the show. I bring in this piece of paper and show the guy what I want. He looks at my shiny new shoes and then, literally starts to dig around for a box that is buried under a bunch of other boxes all well hidden behind a bunch of bicycles. He pulls out the exact pair of pedals that I am looking for. Through motions and coyness I hint that I want him to put them on my bike. We wheel it in and that is where the fun begins.
First he lifts my bike and makes a face as if he has just smelled a fresh diaper. He then lifts my bike and places it on a hook to see how much it weighs. This stirs up a face like he just found out he had a terminal illness: lots of looking at the ground, lots of head shakes. He then motions to another bicycle and indicates that I should pick it up. I do so and it is as light as a feather. He then smiles as if I should trade mine in for that and that the world would be better for everyone if I made that move. On a box he scribbles the price of 6,000,000 won which is a little under $6k and I now make the new-diaper face. He then pulls out another bike, this very light as well, and seems to think that at 2,500,000 won I would be getting a steal. He looks at the components on my bike and seems to approve of them and then begins to switch out the pedals.
He then looks at the angle of my seat and then points to another seat which has an incline that goes more towards the front pedal. Then he sort of grabs his crotch and tries to indicate that the way my seat is set up would be nothing but a swift kick in the family jewels and that he had better go to work on adjusting that.
I then pick up my old pedals and hang them on the handle bar, figuring that they can stay there for my ride home. He HATES this idea, finds a bungee cord and hooks the entire thing up to the rack that I had previously used for my saddle bags. I don’t why it never occurred to me to use the rack for anything else.
Here it was that I thought I pretty much had my game under control and this guy was pointing out, sort of subtly, that I had no idea what the game was. In fact, the world would be a better place if I simply sat back and watched others play the game as I am simply clogging up the trail with my follies.
I get ready to leave and he offers me coffee. I gladly accept and then he points up towards the ceiling of his shop. Along a beam are framed photos of the bicycle team that he either sponsors or is on. They are all of these Koreans on what appears to some very high mountains and they all look fit, hard and serious. These are the ones who have a right to play the game. They have the proper tools for the job. The honed bodies. The drive. I am quickly learning my place in the world and my pegs have been seriously moved downward.
I finish my coffee and then start my ride home. It is at this point that the words of the guy I went riding with when I first arrived here, Colin, came swiftly back to mind: Be prepared to fall! I test the things out and I seem to get the general idea that you need to twist your foot get out of the pedals. This seems to be no big deal and I start to ride away, filled with confidence and the feeling that I have a new toy to play with. Perhaps MR. BIKE was wrong and I am I ready for the game after all?
Within three minutes of leaving Mr. Bike’s shop, a guy on a moped cuts me off and, try as I might, there is no way to escape the bindings and my ass is sprawled out in the middle of the road. The moped guy seems freaked as to why I would just fall over without a struggle – think cow tipping – he must of thought I simply had an aneurism or something. I shake it off, try to play it off and try again.
It is then that I realize my current geographic location and that in order for me to get home I need to ride though some SERIOUS traffic. There is no way to get out of this short of walking my bicycle home. Riding with the new pedals is a breeze. Stopping is horror as I can’t figure out how to escape these contraptions. I keep practicing, hoping that I can find some area that is people/car/bus free but that is like wishing for a big bag of money to fall out of the sky. I feel doomed!!
I make it home and only fall one more time. I stop at a 7-11 type place, buy a coke and a bag of chips and do the unthinkable: read the instructions. This makes me feel better as I have a understanding of the motion I need to break free, at least on paper. I practice my escape some more on some side streets where I only need to dodge pedestrians. My confidence is building. I then go to the coffee shop and wait for it to open to tell the owner, Lee, thanks for writing down the info that I needed and for offering to order the pedals for me if the guy at the bike shop didn’t have them in stock.
The pedals that I bought were about $50 and as we were looking at them on-line, Lee described them as “middle class.” From what I gathered it is one of those things, much like bicycles themselves, and most things for that matter, where the entry level thing is about $30, then it goes to $50 and the limit is: what the hell are you willing to spend? When I finally see Lee he says that I got a very fair price on the pedals but he was wondering why I would put them on such a middle of the road bicycle. God knows what he rides but I am certain that there is no way I have any business riding such a machine and he then looks at my tires with disgust (they are street tires) and says that they would never make it in the mountains. It is on of those moments where what he is saying is: Well, that piece of shit you call a bike may be good enough for you but I wouldn’t let my little sister be caught dead on that rat-trap.
Believe me, I am far from embarrassed about my bicycle and have no desire to upgrade at the moment as for what I use it for (dodging cars, buses, mopeds and people) it is the perfect machine and pretty much overkill on all fronts. These guys see it and think that I want to climb mountains with it and I know damned well that I am in no shape for what they think that its purpose should be. It is PERFECT as an urban assault vehicle and that it what it shall be.
So now I am ready for a trip:
The next day I looked on a map and thought that I nice route towards some temples planned out. This proved not to be the case but the ride, as most rides do, turned out to be interesting.
At the end of town, the POSCO steel plant and the other industries start to fade and it becomes a land of little pockets of civilization cut into any area where the ground is flat. Everything else is simply small hills that are not really suitable for anything besides offering a pleasant view. The roads through this area are very smooth and the route I took was not very hilly at all. The only problem was that there was a great deal of traffic and with these new pedals I am forced to be rather cautious. There is added confidence with the fact that I can travel faster – sure, I’ll go between a bus and a car without fear – but now there is the added element that if something happens suddenly I won’t be able to break free from my bindings and I will be crushed by said bus and car as I lie sprawled out on the pavement. As I ride, I continually practice the “escape” motion so that my body will become attuned to it and it will eventually become instinct rather than a forced gesture. I have been told that it takes about two weeks of solid riding before this occurs. After that, there is no way that one would ever return to not wearing the shoes/cleats combination.
I decided that 10 miles out was my bench mark for the day and it proved to be nice as I can do 10 miles in about an hour or so with little effort. I can still stop and look at stuff without being too tired – I am old and frail. I wanted to do the return trip before it became too cold. It is not that I mind riding when it is cool out, it is just that anything below 45 is simply a pain and I really don’t enjoy the wind. Like anything, when it starts to seem like work it ceases to be play.
As I rode towards the edge of my known world I realized that traffic was starting to get heavier and that I was at a huge intersection with a couple of bridges. I looked at my map but it wasn’t really helpful so I decided to simply follow the road that I was on and see where it took me.
My route was sort of “L” shaped in that I had to come south from where I live and then head west along the river. The further I got from the center of town it became clear that I was entering a major highway. This was not really a problem as there were wide shoulders and there was still plenty of light. On either side of me were small mountains and it felt as though I was in a valley. Most of it seemed like natural terrain but there were many spots where it was clear that earth moving equipment had been used to tear down parts of the mountains in order to make the area hospitable. I also think that some of this area was used during the Korean War as a point of entry which may be why there is such an extensive inland road system coming in from the coast.
The ride along the highway was fairly uneventful and there really wasn’t much to see as it is like traveling on any highway: lots of cars, a few gas stations, some places to eat. On my map I saw that there were some temples but I couldn’t place myself on the map as it wasn’t very accurate and for some reason I misplaced my other map, a detailed one, which was pissing me off to no end. So I simply rode with a general idea of where I thought I was going.
I found out that one of the big reasons that good maps are so scarce is that there was a great fear that if maps were generally available, the North Koreans would use them during an invasion. Maps have only become available in the last few years and prior to that people simply memorized everything, which also explains why there are no street signs. I guess that this is sound logic but doesn’t help my cause one iota.
I finally came to an intersection and it seemed that it would be better to cross the road as going against the traffic is seldom a good idea. By now I was getting cold and, truth be told, a bit frustrated. I got to the other side of the street and, across the railroad tracks that ran alongside the highway, was a small hill. At the top of the hill was a structure that looked old and seemed out of place amid the surrounding buildings. So, as I was hardly pressed for time, I rode up the hill and decided to see what it was. There was a sign in front of it that was in both English and Korean but before I could read it an old man came up to me and said that it was a school from the Chŏsun period. There was a wall around the structure and the gate was locked so I couldn’t get inside the grounds. I took out my camera and held it over the wall to take some pictures with the hope that they would come out with something interesting on them. I shot some things from various places along the wall.
This site was located next to a small house and while I was taking pictures, my bike and backpack lying haphazardly on the ground, a man came out of the house. He was smoking a very thin cigarette and he walked towards me, pointed to the building and said “school.” I nodded and he then asked if I was an American. I said I was and he smiled, motioning me to follow him. He then took me along the wall and up a small set of stairs. This allowed us to enter the school grounds from the side; something that one could not see if it wasn’t pointed out as the passage was along side of his house.
The school was actually a complex of small buildings and he let me wander around as long as I wanted. There was no real communication between us and I simply snapped pictures while he watched, leisurely smoking his cigarette. The architecture was fascinating with wonderful wood work, exquisite joinery and colorful paints applied everywhere. There were signs over various archways in Korean and I am supposing that they indicated the school’s charter or something similar. Photographing them, perhaps I can one day read them.
After we were done I saw some fish drying on a bamboo pole outside of his home and took a picture of them. It was set up almost like a clothes line. This time of year is for a special fish which is a delicacy in
He then took me to a machine under an awning and it was here that he showed me what he did: he straightened bamboo. The poles were inserted into this machine which was like a kiln. The bamboo was heated and then there was device, similar to what an electrician would use for bending conduit, which he would use to form the poles into straight pieces. He had a huge pile of bamboo that still needed to be straightened and in the back of his truck was more bamboo that was ready to ship off somewhere. I was impressed with his set up, even if I wasn’t certain what it was for.
As it was getting cold and a bit darker I thanked him for his time and prepared to continue on my way. He asked me if I would like some coffee and I naturally said yes.
We sat on his front porch and he said something to someone inside the house. I never saw who it was but I assume that is was his wife. I offered him as cigarette, which he gladly accepted, and I then took out my dictionary to see if I could figure out what he used the bamboo for. He didn’t like the words “building” or “furniture” so I basically gave up. He went over to the fish drying on a pole and seemed to indicate that the bamboo was strictly used in the process of drying fish but it sure seemed like a great deal of bamboo poles simply to dry fish. I was in no position to doubt him and by that time the coffee was ready. I still didn’t see who made it for us.
We drank coffee in silence and watched the sun set in the mountains. He then told me that he was 64 years old and that he had three sons, the eldest being 39. If I understood him correctly, he was from
He threw the butt of the cigarette down on his dirt driveway and went to his truck to get me one of his business cards. He told me to call him but what I would I say and how would I say it? By then we both had finished our coffee and it was time that I went as I still had a thought that I could see some kind of temple if I continued up the road. We said our goodbyes and I headed back down the hill.
I went further along the highway and the traffic started to pick up. It seemed that I was riding along a big highway, something akin to I-69, but the traffic doesn’t seem to move as fast. Off to my right I saw what I was looking for: a sign with a swastika on it. Yes, the fact that the Nazi party borrowed a sacred symbol for its flags and other decorations simply compounds the reasons that one should think that they are a bunch of complete assholes. Here it means that there is a temple nearby and I thought that this was a good thing. I exited the highway and began to ride along a two lane road that curved out towards the north. This time the mountains were further away and the valley was filled with newly harvested fields. It looked like they were growing some kind of straw. It may have been rice but I didn’t think so. At various intervals were small fires but I had no idea what they were for or why they were burning.
There was no temple in sight.
Venturing right, I took a small single lane road that went along the fields and came to small village like compound near the edge of the mountain. As I rode along this road I only saw two people: an old woman pulling a cart loaded with small bundles of sticks and a man coming home from a tavern. He was popped and he said something to me but I have no idea if he was being friendly or hostile. He simply staggered towards a walled house, opened the gate and staggered in. I looked down at my odometer and I noticed that I was right at the 10 mile mark. I decided to simply call it a trip and head back.
The ride back into town was a non-event. I just pedaled away and when I returned to some familiar scenes I looked for somewhere to sit down and eat. I ordered food, as usual the only westerner in the place, and ate in silence. The TV was showing some kind of dating game and I had no idea what the point of it was. The food was good and it keeps my streak of not having a bad meal since I have been in
So that is the story of my first outing with my new shoes. I admit that they did make a difference and that so far they seem to be a fine addition to my life. This will remain true until I end up locked into them and crash hard; another reason to always wear a helmet.
I hope all is well and that everyone is keeping warm. The weather there looks dreadful. It turns out that there was one thing that they forgot to mention before I took this job. I guess it was a slight omission on someone’s part: the building where I work doesn’t have central heat. When my lovely coworkers started to keep their coats on and I was asked to go to the third floor and start bringing down space heaters I knew that this would be a long winter. I can’t believe it. I mean, I don’t really mind as it is not THAT cold, but still.
So I too will try and stay warm.
Peace,
sh
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