And I’ve lost a wheel.

Did I ever tell you the story of how my bike got stolen? I don’t think so. Well, here’s my bike, chilling out at the bottom of the stairwell in our apartment building. It’s awesome. Well, maybe not that awesome . . .

It’s a Puch, and once it was yellow, with electric blue mud guards. That was before it was stolen. I bought it from a bike messenger at the old, and now demolished, West Balkan for about $90 (diesel lock included), which is still on the expensive side for a used bike in these parts. It had a bent back fork from when he got hit by a car and was pretty banged up in terms of paint and handlebar tape, but it was light and still worked fine and had some “history”, so I took it. While the brand name is Puch, the previous owner had added an “i” to the end, making it “Puchi”. My bike has a name, and that name is the same as Garfield’s teddy bear (different spelling).

I began to think it was a bad luck bike when I got hit by a car too - sideswiped by an idiot making an illegal turn and not even having the gall to signal. I was ok, and Puchi made it through fine, though I was more than shaken up. This was all in the summer of 2006.

While usually we would bring our bikes into the stairwell of our apartment and lock them there, which is out of sight from the street and relatively safe, we occasionally got lazy and left them locked to the lamp post outside. I was confident that my 2cm-thick cable lock would be enough of a deterrent.

I was wrong. I walked out one morning, a bit late and needing to jump on the yellow streak that Puchi was in order to get to work fast, and was shocked and appalled that it had disappeared without a trace. I was crushed. We tried reporting it to the police, with little confidence that they’d do much of anything about it, and listed it on a stolen bike forum. This is the description I wrote:

The bike is an old, bananna yellow Puch, 10-speed, with electric blue mud guards, narrow street tires, an old and cracked black seat, with half handlebars (I don’t know how to explain these) and a Shimano gearshifter. The bike looks old and beat-up, with many scratches and marks all over the frame. The Puch logo has been modified to say “Puchi”, and the same thing is engraved on the vertical seat support strut. There is also a bit of hose or tire attached to the top horizontal support, held in place with plastic ties. The right rear wheel strut is bent inwards slightly from a car accident by the previous owner, who is a bike messenger named Tonja. He also did all the other modifications.

About a week later I was getting pretty sure it was gone for good. We had called several shops to see if it had turned up anywhere, and even gone to an awesome flea market to look for parts. I kind of felt like that part in one of the Star Wars flicks when they find C3-PO all blasted apart, except I didn’t find Puchi.

Then my co-worker Anna’s bike got stolen. She had left it locked up in the courtyard at the office over the weekend (exactly where E’s bike would get stolen, many months later, in broad daylight, which is another story), which is easily accessible and less-savory types are known to come and go as they please. We commiserated.

A few days later, Anna went to the bike shop just a few doors down from the office to look for a new bike. I had been there a couple times to get miscellaneous repairs done on Puchi, and Anna had accompanied me there to ask about where to look for stolen bikes the day after mine disappeared. This time when she arrived, it was there being repaired, and the repair guy recognized it, despite the fact that the mud guards were gone and it had been hastily spray-painted black. The thieves must have screwed up the brakes while tearing off the guards. She called me, I went down, and sure enough it was Puchi, looked abused. A few minutes later the chump who brought it in returned, saying that he had paid 3,000 forints (about $14) for it, which I was hesitant to reimburse but I felt was a small price to pay for such amazing luck.

I was mad as hell that I got my bike stolen and desecrated, only to be sold for a mere 3,000 forints, but I was amazed and happy that things had taken such a fantastic turn. My coworker’s bad luck was my own fortune - if she had not gone to the bike shop during those few minutes in which it was there being repaired, it would have ridden off under the chump’s ass never to be seen again.

I still ride to work every day, but this time it’s on Puchi II.

We recently took a bicycle trip around Hungary’s Lake Balaton, the so-called “Hungarian Sea”, which I feel ashamed to even propagate here, as it is so far from being a “sea” that it’s not even funny. Nevertheless there is a great deal of lore and legend about the temperament of the lake, which, at an average depth of about 2.5 meters, is pretty much a puddle for the Jolly Green Giant.The pictures from the trip are HERE.

So, we started by taking a Thursday evening train from Budapest’s Déli train station to Siófok, on the south-eastern end of the lake and stayed at the Camping Ifjúság, rated at two stars (who even knew campsites got starred ratings?) but really deserving of none, as it was a) not really close to the water, but really close to some amusement park rides, b) infested by noisy brats and obnoxious German-speaking tourists, and c) located exactly between a railroad line (on which endless freights clacked and clanged all night long) and a busy roadway (on which endless motorized vehicles, apparently ignorant of a concept called “common decency” rode up and down all night long). We had packed:

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If you’ve come to Hungary as a traveler or as an expatriate, you could probably chalk up some of your impetus to “wanting to see the world.” Meeting the local peoples, sampling local cuisine – these are the things that we revel in. The jet-set hops from place to place by plane, students take the slow route by train, poets hop freights or hitchhike, and those on a mission might ride in a plastic car.

Keiichi Iwasaki, however, is doing something else entirely. He’s going around the world – by bicycle. Currently 6 years and more than 30,000km into an estimated 10-year trek, this air conditioning repairman left his native Gunma-ken, Japanin 2001 with 160 yen (USD 1.25 / HUF 235) in his pocket and a vague notion to yes, see the world. Since then he’s traveled through more than 25 countries and reached unimaginable highs and lows.

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Have been meaning to post this beautifully-produced video of San Francisco bicylcists doing their most excellent thing, the achievement of which should be the goal of any serious rider (along with winning the Tour de France 7 times in a row, a la Lance). These guys bomb hills with no brakes, skidding to maintain some control and just cruising through cross street traffic like they had a death wish. Of course, skateboarders have been doing this since, well skateboarding started, but these guys deserve respect. As my sister might say, in Chinese, “you are crazy in head, question?”

50,000. Fifty-frickin’-THOUSAND. That’s how many people came out for today’s critical mass ride. This was the biggest turnout for a CM in the world. Ever. I’m speechless.

Pictures here (click on the picture for more).

The weather has finally gotten just lovely, and we spent a very nice Saturday afternoon plodding along in another slow-but-fun Critical Mass bike ride. This was my second time participating in the event, the first being upon my first arrival here as resident in September 2005. Like that one, the crowds (estimated at 32,000) made the riding quite slow, but we got to cruise up and down the river and over the chain bridge for a really enjoyable day. Later on we had dinner with blogger-buddies Eszter and Balazs (who also rode that day). Here are some of the pictures.

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