Nanjing, the city I have called home from home for the last 11 years is the place where I learned to do something I swore staunchly never to do – ride an e-bike. Now, this daily transportation adventure is something that I swear staunchly as I do.
For the first half-decade in The Southern Capital, I drove a car. It’s safer, I reasoned; four wheels is always better than two. Yet after buying back all of my driver’s license points for six years in a row, endless traffic jams, and one too many close calls, I got down off my high horse and up onto my e-bike. And I have never looked back.
Because that’s part of the rules of riding an e-bike. Never look back, or sideways, or even ahead of you. If you’re a pro, you may even have a mobile phone holder attached to the front so that you can watch your favourite videos as you drive. But I am getting ahead of myself.
The nature of the typical Nanjinger’s relationship with the e-bike is quintessentially love/hate. I love mine when I need to get anywhere in a hurry. It’s outside my front door, the bike lanes are a respite and protection from larger motor vehicles out on the main roads, and with a little ingenuity, there isn’t much you can’t fit on there.
It takes my guitar, amplifier and mic stand- simultaneously. I’ve transported bamboo plants, sausage machines, dogs. You name it; one of us has probably seen someone carrying it on their trusty, two-wheeled steed, or engaged in doing so ourselves. Be honest; what is the most outlandish item you have managed to wedge onto your e-bike?
But it’s not all smooth sailing; I also hate e-bikes at times. The times they beep too loudly and startle me, or when their alarms start wailing like a Banshee because somebody looked at them funny, when they run out of battery for no explicable reason and you have to propel them home with your feet, enduring the unpitying stares of passers-by. When people spit off them, sending projectiles of biohazard into the street. The time one swerved into me going the wrong way across a busy 6-lane intersection, upending my e-bike and myself onto the tarmac before disappearing into the oncoming traffic…
Ahhh, memories.
Love them or hate them, the rise of e-bikes has transformed the landscape of urban life in The Middle Kingdom. Some of my veteran ex-pat friends here have shown me photos of Xinjiekou car-free, e-bike free, with just a spattering of bicycles blithely wheeling around the roundabout.
That was over 20 years ago, when e-bike sales were modest. In “the world’s most spectacular growth”, according to Wikipedia, e-bike sales skyrocketed from 56,000 in 1998 to 21 million in 2008 (Weinert et al, 2006). This surge in popularity was driven, in part, by the need to reduce air pollution, and concurrent bans and restrictions on fossil fuel powered bikes. For this, we are all grateful.
Another reason for the big love for e-bikes was probably the continued influx of workers from rural areas to urban centres, where the battery powered bicycles proved an accessible form of independent, autonomous transport, promising quicker commutes, reduced carbon footprints, and the freedom of the city. This low(er) cost mode of transport creates an equitable means to get to work, to study, or wherever it is that the vast populace of our city wishes to be.
And believe me, we do see them everywhere; at the top of mountains, zooming down the highway, beside hammocks and tents by peaceful lakes and duck ponds.
If there is a will, there is a way when it comes to finagling your e-bike into all and any place that may strike your fancy. E-bikes significantly enhance urban mobility. Along with the metro and public bus services, e-bikes make the city our oyster.
Unlike the metro, and buses however, e-bikes do tend to pose unique challenges in terms of safety and well being on the roads. Rules often feel more like suggestions. You won’t see a bus snaking down the sidewalk at full pelt, or the metro cutting across three other metro lines because there are no foreseeable other metros in sight. E-bikes, or their drivers, rather, tend towards the cheeky, if not the blatantly irresponsible at times.
But the seasoned e-bike rider readers know that manoeuvring around the city on two wheels is an exercise in Zen, a surrender to the universe and submission to the flow, if ever there was one.
Upon merging with the beautiful chaos that is urban traffic, one joins a cosmic dance of ebb and flow, give and take, and hope for the best. Knowing when to stop, when to go becomes instinctual, rather than mandated by any external signs or symbols. Wu Wei, the Daoist concept of non-action, or effortless action, is definitely applicable whilst captaining your e-bike; movement becomes an exercise in harmony, presence and simplicity.
I may not understand how and why it works, but it does. The rules are bespoke, each day is a new adventure.
And one thing’s for sure. Love them or hate them, e-bikes have become a stalwart part of the Nanjing urban sphere. Whether you’re swearing by them, swearing at them, or swearing on them, zen and the art of e-biking is here to stay.
