Thanks, chipcom

It was 20 years ago in China. The bikes are almost all one speed roadster style with bell, chain case, (mine with fully enclosed chain case), fenders. I don't think I got any lights on the bike. It's very slow riding, about 5-7 miles/hr and you have to share the bike lane with other bikers, a lot of them. We wore normal clothes not the fancy jersey and shorts we have here.

I lived in the northern part of China, so we also rode on snow and ice. Every year I got 2 or 3 crashes on ice at low speed, but embarrassing nonetheless.

One of the horrible experiences I had is to ride into a construction hole (no yellow tape around it to warn bikers) and got a lot of body parts broken at one shot.

I had only one brand new bike bought (26 inch wheel) for 120 chinese yuan for a monthly wage of 45 yuan (actually my father paid for it, even I started to earn wages). Before that I had one old bike I didn't know how old it was, functional but ugly.

It's kind of different now, but old bikes are still ridden more than the flashy new bikes, mostly because bike theft is really bad and you can't afford losing more than one bike.

I guess that covers the start of the story.

I will probably post some interesting pictures of bike commuting in China in the future.

Have a nice ride back. It's raining cats and dogs here and it could be my first riding in rain in the US.