... notable events : My love affair with Lady Green bicycle

Everyone cycled on campus.... well at least almost everyone cycled on campus. The campus was too large without some form of wheeled transport especially if you were in the faculty of engineering as engineers had to take classes and electives from all over the place, the arts, the sciences, mathematics, and of course engineering.

I used to have a bicycle and it was one of the first things I missed upon arriving on campus. I looked at my new timetable with trebidation as I identified first one building then another where I was to have classes on the campus map. As a poor student on a university scholarship I hardly had enough money to do anything more than to pay my tuition and residence lodging/food bills, let alone buy something as expensive as a bicycle.

It started simple enough. I noticed many abandoned bikes or parts of bikes were simply left on bike-racks with rusted locks and rusted chains. None were in serviceable condition with many parts missing as other students would scavange them for spares. But on occasion, you would find a gem of a part, especially the new alloy rims or an aluminium frame. That was how it all started. I started my bicycle part collection and stored the various pieces into the basement storage of my residence building.

Old locks were broken, rusty chains were sawn and abandonned parts were simply collected after what I considered an appropriate consideration of abandonment. It soon became an obsession, scouring the university bike parks for unwanted pieces. Even when the school term began and garage sale posters from outgoing students began appearing offering second hand bicycles at ridiculously low prices, I persisted as it had become more than just a need to obtain a mode of transport but rather a mission in itself.

I would go around campus with a screwdriver and a pair of pliers in my pockets and I would collect multiple pieces, comparing and modifying pieces to fit together, often discarding older or less desirable pieces whenever a better one came along. Hours was spent in the dark basement by the light of the single flourescent lamp, grinding, hammering, screwing and twisting bicycle parts into shape. It wasn't long before I had found enough components for a complete bicycle. A frame, 2 rims, a handle bar, two brake systems, a working gear, 2 tires with decent treads, a comfy seat, and even fancy racing pedals. The parts I had were even of the new quick-release system which unsurprisingly, were more common than the fixed types.

It wasn't long before I rolled out my LKM Mark 1 Duo-wheeled transport otherwise known as "my bike". With new inner tire tubes and fresh breakpads, it was my exit ticket from a groundbased existence! No more ground slogging for me. Come rain, snow or sun, I was now cruising.

It was a red bike, the colour not by choice by rather limited by availability of undamaged frames. It was clunky and the brakes were prone to slipping but it was mine, and best of all, it was free... well almost free. It lasted the whole winter, taking me to and from classes, tutorials, laboratories, exams and just about everywhere. But the honeymoon didn't last. It was a whirlwind romance that ended when I found another.

LKM Mark 2 Duo-wheeled transport was a sassy dark green lady. I had found the dark green frame one day propped on the side of a bike rack, unlocked, without wheels, without a seat and without handlebars. But it was love at first sight. All thoughts of Red were abandonned despite the fact that I was riding Red when I first spotted Green leaning there in the pale winter sunlight, the sheen of her beautiful polish catching my eye and lighting the fires of desire in me.

Lighter and slightly smaller framed than my old Red, her parts soon began to replace those of Red. Back into the lower reaches of the basement I went, slaving away, tinkering and slogging through every nut and bolt until it was almost entirely replaced by "newer" components. I continued my relentless search for better components and soon found two "new" aluminium rims to match my new classy lady. The day I rode her out into the glorious spring sun was the day the smile on my face matched the singing in my heart as I proudly displayed her to her world. Mine. Red was abandonned, forgotten, relegated back to one of the bike racks from where she came from.

Unlike Red, the love affair lasted the full term. For the next 3 1/2 years, she was my constant companion, going where I went, faithfully carrying me as far as the next city of Burnaby on more than one occasion on some of my mad-capped adventures to woo fair maidens. She withstood everything I threw at her, racing down university hill at breakneck speeds, skidding on the sands of Kitsilano beach, rumbling down the steep cliff treks down to Wreck beach or blazing the forest trails of the university forest reserves. During exams she would faithfully carry me to exam centres and wait patiently while I struggled against faculty placement quotas and professors' attempts to weed out poorer students. Even the strong winter winds which rendered cycling a 45 degree angle affair with the ground didn't deter her. But even that love affair couldn't last. It was 1995 and it was time to graduate and she couldn't go where I now needed to go... home.

The last day spent in Canada was heartbreaking partly because of the farewells I needed to make with good friends, some of whom I've never heard from or seen again, others like my friend Steve I've had the good fortune to retain contact with but tentative are the links which once bound strong and close. Parting was also heartbreaking because I now had to abandon Green. No one would take her as most of the friends I knew were also graduating and leaving to return to their homes around the world. I contemplated selling her to a newly arrived student but I couldn't bring myself to set a price on her.

The last I ever saw of Green was her standing proud by the bicycle rack in Fairview residence, shining in the summer sun, her tires pumped, her handlebars freshly polished, her lock left hanging unlocked with the keys dangling open for that lucky student without a bicycle to come along and claim her for his or her own. She was back where she started so many years ago when she first caught my eye, and I've often wondered what happened to Green and who she now belongs to, but I know that she would be dutiful and serve her master well as she had done for me for so many years.