The Creation of the Bicycle

God may have created mankind,
But it was mankind who created the bicycle,
As a result of mankind's intelligence, of mankind's ingenuity.
And, by the way, they created the wheel first.
The first bicycles were weird-looking, very tall, with huge wheels.
They already allowed, however, that with the sheer movement of pedaling their maneuverers traveled long distances quickly.
And as bicycles became more and more "humanized", that is, easier to handle, they could, at a certain point in time, be used even by children.
At that moment, man and machine seemed to have been born together, enjoying, like children, the same childhood.
The only particularity was that these little bicycles had three wheels, and were called velocipedes.
Since then, man and machine have become more and more inseparable,
to the point that there are those who claim that the humanizing of the bicycle is such that the bicycle is also God's creation.
This, however, has no grounds.
The most likely scenario is that God himself was somehow a cyclist, and, as such, enjoyed going out to pedal.
(photo Robert Doisneau)

The Bicycles of my Life

 The history of the bicycles of my life may be a little modest.
With the exception of the first one, a Monark, a relic that I need to refurbish and which I got from my father when I was only a boy, the others I bought second-hand or were “adopted”. Ordered in sequence, they were a Caloi 10, blue; a second Caloi, of aluminum, second-hand, which was stolen; and a third one, a modest Speed, adopted, which ended up becoming the bicycle of my daily use.
In truth, except for the Monark, I can’t say that I’ve fallen desperately in love for any of them, though, nowadays, I’m very fond of them all. The one that was stolen, for example: I always remember it, and have a jolt every time I see a bicycle that looks like it pass by in the street.
Maybe because of this, I still woo at the bicycle ads in the newspaper, but I always ask myself if I should jump into a new love affair. I confess that I’m a little biased towards the reclining and folding bikes, but I refrain myself.
I do it even because I realize, at these moments, that I should give more attention to my Speed, which got into my life donated by some relatives who didn’t want it anymore. After all, it has been my faithful companion these last years and, if I’ve never had some crazy passion for it, little by little I’ve noticed its dedication, its fidelity and, this way, an acknowledgement, a sort of tenderness mixed with gratitude was born in me, but I also have to admit that, little by little, a certain rapture, a certain attention to its simple charms is beginning.
Maybe they just have to be highlighted.
I don’t discard getting involved with other bicycles, but, right now, this bicycle already deserves an ultimate place in my life and, even due to a sort of commitment, I wouldn’t be surprised if I remained forever faithful to it.
Love has ways that we end up discovering only gradually, and through unexpected manners.

The Bicycle on my Corner

When I leave my house, I see this bicycle on the corner.

I see that it’s well-cared, showing signs, even by its model, of being a woman’s bicycle, but it’s alone, chained to the signpost by a cable with a padlock.

Its owner, as it seems, went away to do some errand, maybe even buy some medication at the drugstore across the street.

The bicycle, meanwhile, as a good companion, waits quietly, peacefully, till he or she returns.

It occurs to me that we may say that bicycles, like dogs, are men’s best friends.

They don’t demand much, which means we need little to keep them.

They have the capacity of, when we don’t give them much attention, remaining in a corner, always ready, though, to respond to us when we remember they’re around.

But, back to the bicycle, I liked it so much that I even considered waiting for its owner.

I wanted to congratulate him, tell him, “What a nice bicycle you have, so obedient!...”

But I was in a hurry.

I said bye to the bicycle and moved on.

A little ahead I looked back and noticed someone getting close to the bicycle.

Would it be a thief?!

While I stay watching the scene for some time, the person started to free the bicycle from the sign.

I tried to get closer to see better and only then, when I’m really close, I could see that it was a woman with a cap and tied hair.

I still tried to get even closer, intending to say something to her, but the moment was gone.

With the bicycle free, she set herself in motion with firm pedal strokes.

And, as she came towards me, I found out that not only was she a woman, as I had noticed from the distance, but she was also very attractive.

I almost jumped in front of her to say, “I’m a cyclist too!”, but it was too late.

She passed by without noticing me and quickly moved away, dropping out of sight.

A bit disappointed, I promised myself to look around more carefully next time I found a lonely bicycle waiting to be picked up.

Also, since then, I can’t help myself from peeking at the corner, just to check if the bicycle hasn’t come back again…

Bicicletería

I’m back to Buenos Aires, but not physically.

My return happens by my pedaling along the cycle paths on the border lands of reality.

The truth is that Buenos Aires is most definitely an exercise of memory and of imagination, and also of oblivion, of life and death.

Its obsession to relive the past and to resist its own disappearance is a permanent challenge to the present.

One dives into Buenos Aires as into an abyssal world. The doubt concerning this dive is not only if you will come out of it alive, but also if you are alive when you launch yourself into this venture.

Regardless, even Buenos Aires, attached to this obsession and disposition to be timeless, cannot prevent its face from being worn out by age or by the savage actions of men, as well as from showing transformations here and there.

I leave, then, for a walk around the city and, like an explorer, I’m gradually faced with these facts.

I had already planned an incursion beforehand.

Early in the morning I head to the Bicicleteria. The image I have of it in the picture above, by Alexander Jung, is amazing. In fact, it is a true artistic creation that resembles a canvas painting, a picture worth being kept there, preserved, intact, as if in an open air gallery.

But what I find is its countenance, already changed, covered by ads. 

Of its original form, what is saved from this commercial vandalism is the name printed on the top part of the facade.

Before this scene, I lean against the wall of the building across the street and let myself stay there, catching my breath, astonished by the mutilation of the façade, and take the pictures above. I still investigate around a bit, and learn from the man in charge of a newsstand nearby that the Bicicleteria had been closed recently, a matter of just a few months.

Without anything else to do, I walk away through the old streets of San Telmo, afraid of losing myself in their gloomy lines and maybe, as in the terrible days of the military dictatorship, of disappearing forever into thin air.

Homeless Bicycles

It’s not only human beings or animals that can have precarious conditions of existence.
Bicycles, as working tools and means of transportation of less well-off people, can mirror, through their state, their owners’ poor lives.
Once in a while we meet one of them, sometimes tossed in a corner, as if abandoned.
We could even call them homeless bicycles.
A few times, however, they manage to call our attention.
We usually pass by them quickly, pedaling in our shining and expensive bicycles, fast and dressed in our impeccable cycling wear, and we move on, sometimes in happy smiling flocks, almost always on a leisure ride.
How could we pay attention to such plain, almost destitute vehicles that cross our way?
So we don’t stop, we go ahead.
Back home, we take a warm shower and, immediately – because instead of feeling tired, we have our spirits renewed – we go out to get together with friends in a bar.
Our bicycles, if we don’t take them with us, stay well guarded at our comfortable homes.
After all, bicycles can’t give up the world to which they belong, the world of men. And unlike men who still have this possibility, bicycles can’t – being machines as they are - get themselves organized to change their condition.

La Uruguaya

There’s a sort of allurement and beauty in her that distinguishes her from what we, in Brazil, have gotten used to see and praise as gorgeous.
She displays neither the exuberance so celebrated by us nor any wild, sexy side.
But she does have a charm that transpires from her simplicity and that makes me stop in front of her and, for the brief time of a snapshot, want to make her eternal, to register her classic, smooth, deeply feminine forms forever.
And I find her there, on the other side of the border, in Rio Branco, Uruguay.
She characterizes an aspect of the Uruguayan way of life pretty well, one which has an European tone of discretion, of simplicity, as well as a hint of parsimony, of practicality.
I only regret not having the time to wait for the owner of this bicycle and to watch her pedal away along the streets of Rio Branco.
I am sorry for that, but I comfort myself. Any other vision but the one of a beautiful Uruguayan lass, a brunette with long dark hair, wearing a skirt no shorter than knee-length, could be a huge disappointment.
That’s why I move away and cross the border back to Brazil, wondering what the lass would be like, if besides these physical traits I had imagined for her she wouldn’t have other gifts.
Maybe she played some instrument or devoted herself to singing. Or perhaps she studied drama, astronomy. I don’t know why I picture her as an artist, a painter perchance, but she could be a scholar studying the stars or botany. At least that’s what this bicycle inspires me, and I prefer to go on believing that everything is exactly like that.

Bike

The American photographer Aref Nammari has dedicated the picture above – named “Bike” – to me, confessing to be motivated by my interest in it. I’d written about it: “I’d like to understand better why bicycles are so attractive. Would it have to do with their simplicity, with their elegance? Bicycles are always so “thin”, as if drawn with a quill pen… In this particular case, there’s still a refined touch of abandonment, of mystery, contributing with these elements…”

Aref wrote in reply: “Bicycles are marvels of engineering. Not only that but who can forget the childhood thrill and sense of accomplishment and freedom when finally we master riding the bike? One day bicycling from work I was caught in a rain storm – no lightning just rain. Initially I was dismayed because I got all wet. However, this dismay very quickly dissipated and I was taken back to the times when I was a child riding the the bike and not caring much at all if it was blazing hot or pouring rain. Maybe that is why as adults we love bicycles? "
(photo Aref Nammari) 

Matters of the Heart

The cyclists I admire most are the ones who pedal many miles a day, a mileage that, at the end of a month, reaches astronomical values.
These cyclists don’t have my admiration, they have my respect, a huge respect, by the way.
No, my cyclist heroes are the ones who don’t have cars by choice or, a supreme act of heroism and love for their principles, who sold their car or, to mark even more this separation, abandoned it somewhere.
These ones I regard as initiates in the long way of the pedal priesthood.
We should follow their example, trying to learn their teachings and gather strength to take this essential step, the step towards freedom.
I confess I’ve already tried. Some time ago I took heart and advertised my car for sale in the newspaper. A Beetle 68, my first car. This Beetle also belonged to my father, and I considered leaving it to my son.
In my desire for purification, however, I came to the conclusion that I couldn’t remain attached to this emotionalism. In the name of the new order that should be established and the new life that I would start, getting rid of that car was mandatory.
Something inside me reacted, though.
I started to feel a traitor of the trust that I had put on the Beetle and the Beetle on me for so long. My God, how many things had we lived together, how could I abandon it in the name of the cycling faith? I decided, then, fearing that some buyer might show up, not to answer the phone for a week. This didn’t prevent that, after a while, someone interested in buying the Beetle appeared:
- Is it there where a Beetle is being sold?
- No, you might have the wrong number.
- What’s the number there?
I had to lie and gave him a different number
Since the phone rang again, I spent another week without answering it.
After some time, I started using it once more, but this didn’t take away the feeling that at any moment, maybe even in the middle of the night, someone might call:
- Is it there where a Beetle is being sold?
After that, I decided to live with my bicycles and my cars. Yes, cars, because I ended up buying others. All of them old, because I don’t look for anything in a car but what a bicycle can’t offer me. I’d say, thus, that it’s a settled matter: I don’t feel guilty for not being always on a bicycle. Maybe it’s even because of this that I feel so much pleasure when I get on one.
(photo: Gustavo)

Pedaling in the Rain

I wake up feeling an uncontrollable urge to pedal.
Motivated by the reading, the previous night, of bold adventures of cyclists who outdo themselves after overcoming all sorts of obstacles, I get up determined to join this sort of crusade of courage, physical resistance and fearlessness.
However, right from the start I encounter the unforeseen realization that it’s raining.
But, then, I tell myself, “That’s the challenge!” I’ve already heard the defense of pedaling in the cold, I’ve already commented on pedaling on the water, I constantly read reports of pedaling in deserts, on mountains, under the hardest conditions, so pedaling in the rain is a piece of cake.
Comforted by this thought, I take my hooded rubbery cape, put on some waterproof shoes and voilá! I feel ready to enjoy some pedaling in the rain.
I take my bicycle and get to the gate of my house whistling “Singing in the Rain”.
In the street, maybe because it’s Saturday and the day is cloudy and rainy, there’s little traffic.
A few cars, just some sparse pedestrians walking under their umbrellas.
Even though the rain isn’t heavy, the humidity is high, typical of our town, and, as always, it’s unpleasant.
Well, all that I can do is to get on the bicycle and pedal away.
It’s at this moment that I realize that I don’t have a definite destination.
What had moved me, till that moment, was simply the desire to pedal without further consideration.
Now, however, the lack of a clearer goal paralyses me.
I also start to notice that my bicycle doesn’t have any kind of protection. It’s going to get wet and, since it doesn’t have any fenders, the wheels are going to splash water up.
Maybe I should install some proper system.
None of this, I try to convince myself, can stop me.
Not even the smell of percolated coffee that comes from inside the house, or the recollection that the fireplace was still lit.
On the other hand, I can’t move, as if I am frozen.
I start to deal a very short route with myself, a ride around the block perhaps. Just to feel the taste of pedaling in the rain.
That’s what I’m ready  to do when, taken by an impulse as sudden as the one that made me decide to go out, I give up the idea and go back inside.
Of course I’m not very comfortable, a feeling of guilt running through my thoughts.
But it doesn’t last long.
When I get to the kitchen I hear:
- Where were you? Coffee is ready, it’s going to get cold… and I cling, at this moment, to the certainty that I had done the right thing.
Cold coffee, let’s face it, is not tasty at all.

Enrique’s bicycle

Working on an article for the sailing magazine Velejar, I arrive in Buenos Aires and head straight to a meeting with sailor Enrique Celesia for an interview with him.
It’s a cold and rainy August afternoon and for the first two hours I try to get to know more about his ideas and plans of being the first Argentinian to sail around the world solo, non-stop, along the 40th parallel south – that is, in the circle where the icebergs that get detached from the Antactica are.
And it’s amidst his musings about several subjects, among which he confesses his admiration for Vito Dumas, that I discover his attachment to cycling.
He states it’s his private means of transportation on dry land.
In the water, of course, he has the boat he’s been building for 10 years in order to carry out his project. The bicycle stays on the deck, tied to the mast. I just think that, since his next trip will be non-stop, he won’t take it with him.
But, till then, the bicycle stays close by, like a companion that helps him carry his dream on.
As I go back downtown, Enrique comes along because he has a meeting.
On the train we take at San Isidro there are also some cyclists with their bicycles. When we arrive at the imposing Retiro Station, we all get off together, but the cyclists mix in the crowd moving towards the exit. Enrique and I pass by the Sheraton Hotel, which popular movements dreamed of changing into a children’s hospital in the 70s, before the military coup.
"Qué lindo, que lindo, qué lindo que va a ser, el Hospital de Niños en el Shératon Hotel..." the crowds used to sing in the political demonstrations, he confesses.
Crossing the huge open space of the avenues surrounded by an impressive group of buildings among which the Kavanah Building outstands for its impression of solidness, we keep on walking along Calle Reconquista up to the hotel, on the corner of Tucumán, where we say our goodbyes.
The cyclists, I don’t know what destination they might have taken.
They spread across Buenos Aires, disappearing incognito into the night.

Photo: Giacomo Orlando
English Version : Renata Kabke Pinheiro

Pedalling on Water

Men of little faith who do not believe in miracles!
Come and believe!
Downhearted cyclists, who disbelieve city administrators will remember you and provide you with conditions to pedal along the streets in safety!
If a cyclist can pedal on water, as our still incredulous eyes can see, cycleways can be built, cycle paths, bicycle parking lots, everything that our little faith disbelieved.
Ye only need to have faith, much faith, and, above all, pray much, supplicate before the images of these men, most of them politicians.
They do not ask much as an offering in return for their favor, perhaps only your spontaneous intentions of vote.
We know that promises were made in other times.
But a miracle can make it all different now.
And, enlightened by a divine shine, they may be reached by a little understanding and, converted to our gospel, they will come along to help us spread it to the four corners of the Earth, pedaling along the streets of the world. Amen.

(Photo: Mat Fot)

Timeless Cyclist

For a moment, in the sunny afternoon, the heavy traffic of vehicles is interrupted.

The cyclist takes advantage of it to cross the street at the exact point where bad accidents often happen.
He does it very calmly, as if he were in a small countryside town.
Or as if, like Moses parting the waters of the Red Sea, he had a free way ahead to proceed safely.
But it’s not only the traffic that seems to have stopped.
It’s the liveliness of the Neighborhood.
It’s Time itself.
So, only this brief dateless record of this moment will remain.
As the only reference of what time of the day it is, just the light of the falling afternoon casting big shadows.
The cyclist, painting this scenery blue, seems to be still deciding his way. But for an instant, keeping himself anonymous, he becomes the center of the universe, becomes eternal and, by being timeless, he makes himself forever immortal.

Doubts of One Who Pedals

I do not know whether I pedal to write or write to pedal

This doubt, at times, makes me a little confuse.

What interest, I ask myself, can those whose focus is precisely to pedal – and whom I believe are the majority – have in what I write? But, at the same time, what interest can those who don’t even know how to ride a bicycle have in it?

It’s curious, however, that among the latter are some of those who feel at ease in this metaphysical pedaling where all trails are open to dreaming and to imagination.

Trails that, distant from the noise and the hostility of the streets, take us along paths surrounded by woods and sided by flowers. Paths where the air we breathe is pure and where we propel ourselves only with the strength of our legs, taken by an unsurmountable youth towards the last ray of light at dusk.

And when we get close, the closest we can, with the feeling that we have some sort of power over our limitations, we finally get off our bike and lay down to nap right there, outdoors, stretched on the grass, hoping that something supernatural may happen.

Unless for some reason someone wakes us up, because our sleep will be light, and maybe they will ask for our help to rescue someone in danger. Or even, because we could not really get away from the dangers of the city, they want to rob us and steal our bicycle.

-  The bike or your life! - They will perhaps still threaten us.

To what, promptly, without hesitation, protecting the bicycle with our body, we will reply offering them our life.

Photo: Anne Seltmann – Germany

English Version: Renata Kabke Pinheiro

Eternity

Can a bicycle die?

I mean, die the way living beings do, as if it were in fact a living being,

a being which has its own destiny, its own fate, a being which has within itself the principle of death…

This, certainly, never comes to our minds.

As an inanimate being, as an object, a bicycle would not be granted this condition, this status.

But there are moments when I am in doubt, moments when I see, in the presence of a bicycle exposed to weathering and facing extinction, strong evidence of life, of existence.
Not this earthly, biological, uncertain life of ours, but a life that outstands

above our weaknesses and our insignificance, like an eternal relationship between forces and lines in nature and in an ideal world.

A bicycle can die, but it dies with an unparalleled dignity which raises it into eternity.

Photo: Anne Seltmann ( Germany)

Translation from Portuguese : Renata Kabke Pinheiro

A Dream

I woke up in the middle of the night with an indefinite feeling.
I must have been in the middle of a dream, because some memories were still fresh, as if they had to do with recent events.
But they were, also, slightly disjointed memories, as memories of dreams often are.
One thing, however, was beyond doubt.
In my dream there were bicycles, lots of bicycles, but the situations they were present in were various.
Some reminded me of childhood, because there were small bicycles, some even with training wheels on to help keep the balance. There were voices, voices from other children, almost an outcry amidst which at times, in the background, I could hear someone who sounded like my mother call my name.
In others, they were “exotic” bicycles, tandems with two seats, or bicycles with only one wheel, like the ones at the circus, or with a big wheel followed by a small one, like the Penny-farthings. Again I could hear voices, but they were completely indistinguishable now, as in an audience.
And in other situations there were big clusters of bicycles, as if they were about to take over the world, or, the opposite case, lonely or abandoned bicycles and, in this case, nothing could be heard because there was a massive silence.
But what troubled me most was the vision of a kind of warehouse inside which several bicycles hanging from the ceiling were spread around or just piled over each other.
At first it could look like a repair shop, but the way the bicycles were displayed, as if waiting for something, for some happening, granted the picture a film noir atmosphere.
I tried to understand what it was about. Some place I knew but whose memory did not come to my mind?
Or some dream hallucination that can emerge in the world typical of dreams?
Or something else, a premonition, a prophecy?
Without answers to these doubts, I think I fell asleep again.
But somewhere in our world the bicycles from my vision were still there, waiting to be called up for the mission they had been destined for.
Photo Nicoamano ( Malta ) 
English Version: Renata Kabke Pinheiro