Nowtopian

Just as incredible as you might imagine”¦ maybe more so”¦ Wild bikes, warm people, a sweet scene late in the ride when a woman sat on her boyfriend’s handlebars facing him, with her arms wrapped tightly around him in a loving embrace, her head buried on his shoulder, while he pedaled along in the ride. Riding through Rome, through thousands of years of history at every turn, is simply incommensurable! Nothing like it”¦

In just a few days in Rome I have been so welcomed, and so warmly embraced, it’s almost embarrassing, but in fact it has been the thrill of a lifetime! I have more than 50 new friends, and I’m sure there are at least several thousand more whom I will meet eventually. Rome could be a second home, without doubt.

Critical Mass is an unusual prism through which to experience a city. For one thing, it’s always unique in each place it happens, but on the other hand, it’s a eerily familiar experience. Well, I’ll take it from the top, knowing that I have already forgotten way more than I can remember and write down here. I headed out at 5:30 on Friday to find a small group gathering at a nearby “ciclofficina” (the local DIY bikeshops, of which there were four, but as of yesterday at the Ciemmona a fifth one announced itself) but in the dense streets of Monti here in the center of Rome, I could not find them. Luckily I was loaned a cellphone so I made a call, simultaneous to Ilaria calling to see where the hell I was, and she found me a few minutes later. There were already a group of about a dozen Spaniards there, including one fellow from Mexico, and Rebecca with her ferret in her front basket (she later that night danced to pulsing funk and Motown with the sweet animal draped around her shoulders!). The rest of our entourage soon pulled out and 30 of us or so headed towards the gathering point at Piramide. Here’s Ilaria with her sound system in tow.

At Piramide about 1000 cyclists assembled (this was the local, smaller “normal” ride on Friday night), including a bunch of us internationalistas who had already made it to Rome for the Big One to follow on Saturday. Piero, whom I’d met the night before at the ciclofficina Don Quixote at SNIA (more on SNIA in the next post), was in fine form, juggling with a bunch of friends, and a vehicle called “Ciclo Ludo Muzga Bus” decked out in several drums, getting everyone dancing a bit as we enjoyed the late sun streaming over the Pyramid (stolen from Egypt by the Romans more than 2000 years ago and rebuilt here).

Continue reading Critical Mass in Rome (part one)