She Wants Girls To Have Fun

It's hard for us to believe, perhaps, that in the early days of cycling, a woman astride two wheels was seen as provocative or even transgressive almost everywhere.

These days, it's hard to picture any major European city, and even a few American cities, without women pedaling to work, to school, or even for fun--sometimes alone, other times in the company of friends and, often, with a baby or toddler in a rear seat or trailer.

In much of the world, however, the situation for women and bicycles isn't much different from how it was in the western world in the 19th Century.  If anything, in some places, the sight of a woman on a bike can incite outrage, revulsion or even violence.

Pakistan is one of those places.  It's one of the more conservative Muslim countries, where women aren't even welcome to sit at tea stalls, congregate in parks or ride a bike for fun.  In fact, a woman in a public space without a purpose--like going to the market or school--is viewed as a threat to public morality.  It's uncommon even to see a woman riding a bike for a purpose, as straddling a seat is seen as a vulgar and sexlike act.

One woman who dares to challenge this social taboo is Zulekha Dawood.  The 26-year-old activities organizer at a community center organizes and leads rides through the streets and alleys of Karachi.  A year ago, when the weekly rides began, only a few young women participate; now as many as 30 women and girls join Dawood.

Zulekha Dawood leading a ride in Karachi.

What makes her efforts all the more remarkable is the part of the city in which the center is located, and where most of the rides go.  It's not a leafy enclave of professionals who were educated in London or New York or Toronto; rather, it's Lyari, a gritty working-class area in the southern part of Karachi.  

This illustrates a criticism that's been made of women's equality movements in Pakistan and elsewhere:  They're usually led by affluent or upper middle-class women, who have access to the education and networks that make it more possible for them to bring their visions into reality. On the other hand, the girls and women who participate in Dawood's rides face more opprobrium because their poorer and less-educated families tend to be more religiously and socially conservative.  

And, to be fair, many such families see marriage as the best hope for their daughters.   They believe that a woman who isn't "modest", or is simply "too independent", will make her less desirable to the "good" families of young men who could provide for her.

Although Dawood's rides are for the sake of riding, she understands that for participants--some of whom she herself has taught how to ride--riding a bicycle is mobility, pure and simple.  If a girl or a woman can ride just because she wants to, she is also more likely to ride to the school or job that will allow her to live a more independent life.  

Surely she understands something my favorite Woodhaven native sang in her best Queens English:  Girls just wanna have fun.  And her critics are upset that she and those who join her rides are doing just that.

The Shadow I Saw

Last week, I wrote about the coldest cycle-commute I've pedaled in many years.  The temperature rose gradually during the week, reaching the freezing mark on Friday and the 10-15C (50-60F) yesterday and today.

We didn't get much snow during the cold spell--the squall we experienced brought more wind than anything else--but the fallen flakes stayed on the ground and froze until the thaw.

The result has been mud everywhere.

Neither Punxsutawney Phil nor Staten Island Chuck  saw his shadow.  According to legend, that means Spring will soon arrive.  But I still anticipate more cold weather before the thaw becomes permanent (at least until next winter):  After all I saw this shadow

of a bare tree.  

The Morning After--A Game And A Guy Losing His Shirt

While out riding yesterday, I stopped in Recycle-a-Bicycle's Brooklyn shop.  I left a few things with them that I know I'll never use but they might need some time.  They were happy for it.

Then I told them the real reason why I stopped there:  I figured it's one place where I might find people who care less about the Super Bowl than I do.

Turns out, I was right. Two of the fellows working there didn't even know which teams were playing.  And I was so proud of myself for knowing only that the game pitted the New England Patriots--who, it seems, everyone outside of New England hates--and the Los Angeles Rams, who used to play in St. Louis and before that in Los Angeles.


Today I'm hearing about how "boring" the game was and that some guy took off his shirt during the halftime--and why it was or wasn't OK for him to do that fifteen years after Janet Jackson's "wardrobe malfunction".  Interestingly, I've heard nothing about the advertisements during halftime, which are usually among the most creative, or simply oddest, to be seen on TV.

Me?  I didn't watch, didn't listen. And I rode to work this morning, refreshed, on my bike.  I hope not sound smug, but I thought it ironic that I was getting healthy exercise on my way to the college on the morning after a game when a few dozen guys pounded at each other's bodies for millions of spectators who ate and drank the most unhealthy things imaginable.

Fitness And Birth Control In One?

If you peruse the listings on eBay, Craigslist or other selling sites, you'll find bikes for sale from sellers who have no interest in cycling or no idea of what they're selling.  Those bikes might be part of an estate sale, or they might have been left behind when someone moved.  

Most of the time, the ads read something like "I don't know anything about bikes, but I know this is a good (or expensive) bike."  The bikes usually are misrepresented, though not deliberately, and are often overpriced because, as an example, the seller knows the bike is a Peugeot but doesn't know a PX-10 from a U-08 and tries to sell the latter for the price of the former.  

Then there are those ads in which the seller tries, unsuccessfully, to describe what he or she is selling.  Parts are misnamed; brands are confused with other brands, and wheels and frames are mis-measured.  

Rarely, though, does one find so much disdain expressed for a bicycle and for cyclists as I found in this Irish ad:

Description

Do you want to spend several hours of your day staring at a man's spandex clad buttocks? Do you want to preplex co-workers and family with details of how you spend most your weekend in uncomfortable, sweaty, silence? Or do you just want an excuse to escape from your significant other for large periods of time? Then look no further, for I have a racing bike for sale!

It has a carbon fibre fork but the rest of the frame is aluminium. It has those pedals that clip your feet in, this is apparently good for cycling but it sucks if you need to stop suddenly because you'll probably fall over, to much pain and embarrassment. It also has a saddle that goes up ridiculously high. This is also good for cycling, I'm told, but I think it really goes up that high so you can present your posterior to other, similarly engaged cyclists as a form of mating ritual. 

The seat is also designed with racing in mind, by which I mean it's light, by which I also mean that it's not padded a huge amount. It can't imagine it does much good to your reproductive health, but maybe that's the point. Fitness and birth control in one.

It has many toothy wheel things, which I am reliably informed are called 'gears'. My brother says it has 20 but I count 12, but I never was any good at maths. There is no combination of switches you can press on this thing to make climbing hills any more pleasant, unfortunately.

It's got twirly handles, I haven't got much to say about those. Probably aerodynamic or summat. It also has kevlar tyres, which I assume makes them bulletproof. Now, I'm not the biggest fan of cyclists but I would draw the line at shooting at them.

Comes with a free helmet to protect your brain when some braindead Irish driver inevitably knocks you into a ditch, despite the fact that your colour scheme is so fluorescent that you could be radioactive.

(In all seriousness, my brother gave this to me as he spent god knows how much on a new carbon-fibre bike, and I have no interest in it. Here's more details on the bike:

http://www.roadbikereview.com/cat/latest-bikes/road-bike/trek/1000/prd_290760_5668crx.aspx )

Shipping: To be arranged

Payment: Cash

Justice Pursues And Is Pursued On A Steelman

What do you do when you realize you can't achieve some youthful dream of yours?

Well, if it involved the creative or performing arts, you can teach them and, perhaps, practice them on a smaller scale or stage--say, in local theatre or gallery exhibits.  You can also teach if you wanted to be the Great American Novelist or a poet--or you can do some other kind of writing like, say, blogs (not that this one makes any money!)

Now, if your dream was an athletic pursuit, you might find a career as a coach or in one of the industries that serves the sport to which you'd devoted yourself.  Or you can keep yourself in shape and become a trainer, or go (back) to school and become a nutritionist or some other professional who helps athletes maximize their potential.

Of course, many people who don't realize dreams with long odds enter careers very different and far from the ones they'd envisioned for themselves:  They might become everything from insurance salespeople to social workers to engineers.  If nothing else, those occupations can provide long-term stability that is lacking in  most of the things we envision when we're young.

Then there are those who simply don't get over not having "made it" and drift from one thing into another--or try their hands at metiers that are dangerous, foolish or even criminal.

When he was still pursuing his dream

One would-be Olympic sprinter made a list of occupations that, he hoped, would offer him thrills or at least satisfaction for the instant gratification he got from pumping his pedals on the velodrome.  He compiled that list after--get this--washing out of the French Foreign Legion.  On the list were jobs that were dangerous, foolish (for him) or criminal.  He tried to enter a couple of them before finally settling on the last one--which was dangerous, foolish and criminal.

As for the foolish (for him), he applied to a Catholic seminary. From what I read about him, he's about as religious as I am, but it seemed, as he said, like a "fresh start."  The admissions officer, however, knew better and advised him to do some "soul searching."

As for the dangerous (and possibly foolish), he talked his way into an informational interview with the Drug Enforcement Agency.  The interviewer, like the seminary's admissions officer, quickly sussed him out: "You don't seem like the kind of guy who's going to kick down doors fighting the war on drugs."

Finally, he got involved with something illegal--ironically enough, dealing cocaine.  To finance it, he would embark on a career that was dangerous, foolish and criminal:  bank robbery.

Not surprisingly, to make his heists, he used one of the skills he honed while trying to achieve a dream of his youth.  You guessed it:  He escaped on his bicycle.  Because he could mount and take off with a burst of speed, he could ride just far enough into some alley or parking garage where the cops couldn't follow him and peel off the neat shirt,tie and slacks he'd worn into the bank. Then, in his billboard jersey and spandex shorts, and with is messenger bag slung over his shoulder, he looked like any bike messenger.  

He actually spent three years robbing and dealing before he was finally caught.  And, as was the case with many serial criminals, he was stopped because someone noticed a detail others might not have seen.

That someone was a police officer whom the rider-turned-robber eluded.  And the detail he noticed was the bicycle itself.

Officer Sean Dexter of Walnut Creek, California might not have been a bike aficionado.  But he knew that the bike--which the thief abandoned when he fled across a creek--wasn't some commuter's Schwinn.  "This bike is special to somebody," he observed.  "We gotta find out who."

It's no surprise that an Olympic aspirant and local champion would ride a bike better than the ones sold in Wal-Mart.  But the bike stood out even on the club training rides our rider-turned-robber did to keep himself in shape. It wasn't only the frame's bright orange color, or the matching deep-V rims that distinguished the machine.  It was the frame's pedigree:  custom-built by Brent Steelman.  

The getaway vehicle

Since he only built about 50 frames a year, it was relatively easy to trace the bike--even though the bank robber who was using it as his getaway vehicle bought it second hand. Dexter and other investigators followed a trail from Steelman to the shop that sold the bike to the person who ordered it and ultimately sold it to the pedaling pilferer.

Now, if it isn't ironic enough that someone was pulling bank heists on a bike built by Steel-man, the name of the racer-turned-robber seems like even more of a cosmic joke:  Tom Justice.

Maybe he should have gone to law school.  I imagine that winning a case can be quite a thrill--and lucrative.