Goodbye, Bike

Only two things are ever stolen in Japan: umbrellas and bikes. Now, I've had plenty of umbrellas stolen from me (mostly ones that have been attached to my bike), but my bike itself had remained untouched. Of course, this was partly to do with the fact that it was old, and not much to look at. But sometimes old and clattery bikes can be fun... even if not reliable... and, at least for the last two and a half years, it was.

Last weekend it took me on my longest ride yet.


Sadly, the day was cursed from the start. I met Kym out the front of our apartments, and as I pumped the tyres in preparation for our epic journey, it became clear that something was wrong. One of the tyres just would not pump.

Already frustrated, I wheeled it to our local bike shop. The old guy there is really friendly, and he fixed the problem right away with a quick part replacement, and charged me just 100 yen. Anyway, once that was done, we set off on our quest to find "the path that follows the river" - a search which, we were to believe, wouldn't take long.

Two and a half hours later, we found the path. Definitely worth the effort, too! Away from noisy roads, winding through nature, with spectacular views of the mountains... If I'd known about the path sooner, no doubt I'd have ridden on it countless times already. We were enjoying it so much that we kept going. And going. And boy, my clattering, cobweb-covered bike kept going...


Four hours of riding later and we hit the city of Ueda. Now, that's three cities away from Nagano, for your information. It was 6:30pm, we were ravenous, and the chances of us actually riding back home that evening were pretty darn slim.

However, this presented us with a problem. How could we get our bikes back to Nagano without riding them? We went to the Tourist Information Center to make some inquiries. Train? No. Bus? No. Special taxi that carries your bikes? Doesn't exist, Brendan.

Sure, we could've found a hotel for the night and ridden back the next day. But the price of a hotel, plus the inconvenience of it all, wasn't very appealing. Hell, we might as well just spend the money on getting a new bike!

Hmm... a new bike...

I'd been thinking about getting a new bike for quite some time now. This clattery old thing was well past its best-before date. I'd only inherited it from God knows how many teachers before me. Besides, leaving it in a totally different city seemed like a good excuse to get a new one. It was the perfect plan.

And so the decision was made: Kym and I would return to Nagano by train, and our bikes would forever remain in Ueda.

It was still strange saying goodbye to the old thing. In the end, it had served me well. We parked them somewhere useful (outside Maccas, right next to the "no bicycles" sign) and left the keys in the locks, in the hope that someday a couple of drunk salarymen would find them and take them home.

I also said goodbye to my umbrella, still attached to my bike, and which I couldn't be bothered carrying home on the train. Ahh, it truly was a tragic night.


But alas! My story isn't over yet. Because the following day, I had the strangest urge to go check on the bikes, to see if they were still there. And hell, if my bike hadn't been stolen, I might as well ride it home, right?

The shinkansen took just 13 minutes - 13 MINUTES!!! - when it had taken us over FOUR HOURS to ride to Ueda the day before. I just find that insane. I'd called Kym to see if she was interested in the trip, but she'd happily moved on, and was already on her way to the bike shop to buy a new one.

Yikes! Both bikes were still there. They both had some kind of red parking violation ticket on them, but they were otherwise untouched. I felt kinda bad about taking my bike and leaving Kym's behind, so I tried the Tourist Information Center one more time to see if they had any ideas. The elderly lady there was great, and started making all kinds of phone calls to delivery services. In fact, she was busy making calls for 30 minutes. I stood there for ages, thinking that I was going to be riding home in the dark, when finally the old lady gave up.

"Whatever!" she cried, leaping to her feet. She grabbed her bag and her jacket and, walking out, said, "I'll drive you myself! I'll go pick up the ute, and you can put your bikes in there. Meet me here in an hour."

I don't know what shocked me most: the fact that she was prepared to drive me and the bikes all the way to Nagano, the fact that she just suddenly walked out on the job, or the fact that this old geezer drove a ute! Either way, I was quick to get on the phone to Kym. "Tell me you haven't bought a bike yet!" I blurted. "I'm coming back with both our bikes!"

By the time the old lady had returned with her ute and we'd secured the bikes in the back, it was starting to get dark. She bought me an iced coffee for the journey, and we set off for Nagano.

She was hilarious. I offered her money for the coffee and she said I was "boring" and refused it. She bought herself an ice-cream that she soon forgot about and which melted all over the top of her dashboard. She neither slowed her Japanese for me nor dumbed it down, but the conversation somehow lasted the whole trip. It took an hour and a half to get home. Of course, that kind of favour doesn't go unrewarded, so I arranged with Kym to pick something up.

Arrived home. Unloaded the bikes. Kym came out the front and handed the old lady her gift. And yet, she managed to dwarf our efforts at kindness still by giving us a whole bag of grapes in return, grown in her own garden.

"It was fun!" she yelled out the window of the ute before taking off. "I might be an old lady but I love adventure!"

Absolutely unbelievable. Kym and I stood there in the dark for ages after she left, just flabbergasted. Somehow, against all the odds, we had both our bikes back. We couldn't help but giggle at the randomness of Japan.

Then, as I looked at my bike, my giggling suddenly stopped.

My umbrella was missing.