Bicycle Rush Hour

This evening I got caught in bicycle rush hour. This rush hour is a bit more flexible than on Atlanta highways: there’s no gridlock, just general chaos. As I was threading my way through the crowds I started laughing because I remembered a game that my sisters and I used to play on our bikes when we were little. It was called “almost but not quite,” a game in which we would ride around and almost run into each other or other obstacles but “not quite.” Little did I realize at the age of seven that I was being prepared for bike riding in China.

In the narrower roads in the middle of town they don’t bother with lane lines or necessarily riding on a certain side of the street. The sides of the road are filled food carts and parked bikes, so all the traffic crowds into the middle. The pavement is bumpy so bikes are bouncing all over the place, narrowly avoiding people, bikes, and dogs. Every so often a car or bus will plow through the middle creating even more bedlam.

I passed a school where parents were crowded around the gate on their bicycles and motorbikes waiting to pick up their children. Little groups of kids giggled and played as they walked down the street toward home. I turned down a side street that was more like a little alley or corridor. The path was stone like the traditional Chinese, one-story homes and courtyards on either side. People sat on their steps or squatted on the edge of the street, visiting, preparing dinner, reading the paper, or just sitting. Dusk was just beginning to overtake the sunlight, and now was the time to relax. I passed by the old home where Hudson Taylor used to live over 100 years ago. This is old China. There are few roads like this left, and they belong to the past.