//beconfused

Previously in //beconfused, I mentioned that I can’t ride a bicycle so I don’t really enjoy myself as much as the others when going to the beach with my classmates (now ex-classmates). [By the way, I watched too much The Apprentice (Season 3), that's why I am beginning my blog entry with "Previously in..." as would in The Apprentice.]

(I think) I have learnt how to bike. Not a motorcycle – which is one thing I would never ride in my life – but a bicycle (which, by the way, is one thing that I never thought I’ll ride again).

I always have this laziness when it comes to learn sports. I am not interested in riding a bicycle because I don’t want to fall. I always have the impression that if you want to learn the bicycle, you just got to fall. Perhaps it is true to most, but my girlfriend’s lesson didn’t include falling in the package. Yes, I took bicycle lessons from my girlfriend, herself a reknown cyclist in her apartment block.

I am skeptical that she can teach my how to cycle actually. She is not going to be strong enough to stop me from falling; she doesn’t conduct bicycle lessons to anyone before too. This afternoon, we just have nothing to do. We can watch Last Exile (Japanese anime), we can play squash, we can play Etherlords (which is not my type of game but hers) or we can just go to my place and both of us would be watching Desperate Housewives. We did none of those usual things, she had a suggestion – learn how to ride a bicycle.

I simply have had one too many bad experiences with bicycle. Let me give you examples:

• I got hit by a bicycle.
• I got hit by a bicycle on a pavement – a place where Human beings travel on.
• I got hit by a bicycle on a pavement – a place where Human beings travel on – and then got scolded by a fucking middle-age man who rides on that bicycle.

My blood boils when I think of it. It is by far my worse experience in bicycles and I ain’t riding on it. I just had to tell everyone this, lol.

Anyway, I went down, my girlfriend lent me her bicycle with flat tyres. [No air-pump.] She demonstrated how to ride a bicycle by riding on one herself. Alright. It’s my turn.

It really sucked in the beginning but I found myself learning more and more at a remarkable speed. Perhaps she is a good teacher, perhaps I am fast-learner, I really don’t know but you guys knows it’s the latter. I start putting my legs onto the pedal. It took 45 minutes I think. I find myself having enough skill to more or less ride around.

After this lesson, I learnt how to:

• Ride on a down slope (because the lesson conducted is on a down slope).
• Ride on an up slope (because the lesson is later conducted on an up slope).
• Ride on a road (because the lesson is conducted in the carpark).
• Make a U-turn with the bicycle (because the lesson is conducted on a road that needs me to U-turn or I’ll be kissing the tree bark).
• Stop the bicycle (with my hands on the wall as I almost crash into one).

What an accomplishment isn’t it? I think I know how to ride it more or less already. I can ride it myself but I am still very careful as I still lack the experience required to control the bicycle well enough to ride in parks. But it’ll be a sooner-or-later thing. I think I am getting the hang of it already.

Throughout this lesson, I did not fall (although I almost crashed). I had an injury though, my leg has a blue black as the bicycle pedal hit my leg too hard. It’s a good lesson. I find myself enjoying bicycle-riding already. I still don’t like the up slopes though, the down slope is lots of fun though.

Sadly, there is no more outings with my classmates I believe.

Possibly related:

1. fucked//up
2. class//outings
3. Picture: Turn your head and look again

Tags: anime, personal, sports