One of the great, abundant blessings (among a slew of blessings) that my team and I were served last month in Indonesia was having a couple motorbikes to be able to tool around town with. We were mostly within walking distance of local shops and the intercultural school we went to, but that didn’t diminish the significance of having our own bikes, our own access to adventure and freedom.
For those of you who have never been in an Indonesian city, let me give you some background info on motorbikes: they fill in the cracks and they are good at it. One of our contacts told me they’re like sand, and it’s not unusual for a motorbike to come within an inch or less of a truck 10 times the size of the motorbike. It’s not unusual for a motorbike to miss-calculate the space between cars and be forced to slow down before getting boxed in. It’s not unusual to hear motorbike horns going off every 4 or 5 seconds, alerting trucks, cars and SUVs that they are there and to not cut them off. In truth, I was always mezmorized by the motorbikers. What crazy surroundings they were in, yet they drove with impossible ease. Always so calm. Never flinching. No frantic head turning. Sometimes no rearview mirrors! Just ease and calmness and balance. It confounded me to no end, but it also gave me an odd respect for them. They knew they could die, but they did it anyway.
When we were loaned a motorbike, my first thought was “if they think we’re taking this thing out of our gated-fence community, they’re crazy.” One of my teammates recalled a horror story where she saw an infant and their mother get violently thrown from a motorbike. I believed her. Nevertheless, something deep down in me wanted a chance to drive one. I wanted a challenge, wanted to be daring, wanted to know the secret of the calmness of the motorbikers. Reckless Krista was getting a little restless.
But I waited for my time. I was looking for a more purposeful opportunity to drive it than for simply going to the store. I wanted a little more special of an occasion, a trip to remember (cue Mandy Moore). So when we went to go walk around a Kampung (term used to describe a village of local Indonesians) with one of the teachers from the school and needed to take the motorbike to get there, I (felt like I) all but yelled my enthusiasm to drive, and I thought, “Thank you, Lord! This is it! Time to show my teammates how cool I am.”
So I straddled the bike, pushed the kickstand up, and with the caution of a 5 year old child cradling a newborn, I gingerly backed it out of the driveway. Man, that sucker was heavy!! Certainly, this was not like my roadbike back home. Confidence waning a little, I angled the bike, donned the helmet (shout out to you, Mom), put the key in the ignition and turned.
Nothing.
Great…I was already stuck. I guess I had given a fairly obvious appearance of confusion because it wasn’t but a couple seconds later that I was asked if I needed help. After being instructed on how to turn the bike on (which is like a 3-step process, btw), Alissa (one of my teammates) climbed on the back.
What happened next was surreal.
Slowly, I began to turn the right handlebar backwards (because, like, isn’t it obvious that turning a handle backwards makes the bike go forward?! I mean hello, people…so elementary school), and as I did, I started moving forward! (Hey! What do ya know!) But in a 1/2-second exspance of time, I was suddenly going too fast! And I started to freak out, searching for the brake, but lurching ever forward until I finally lurched right into our neighbor’s car!
Thouroughly embarrassed and oooh so glad I had my helmet on to cover my rose-colored cheeks, I (laughing to/at myself out of surprise, exasperation and mortification) readjusted the bike towards the middle of the road, asking Alissa if she was alright. Suddenly, a quiet neighborhood had become as unsafe and risky as an overcrowded city street. I wondered whether we’d make it to the destination alive. This bike and I were off to a rough start.
But, after reassuring the team I still wanted to do this (the recklessness and determination talking for me), we tried again. I basically floored it, discovering it was easier to go faster than slower, which left our teammates standing in the street with concern written on their faces. (Side note: I think it would have been interesting to hear their conversation after we shot off.)
Driving through a gated neighborhood.
So there we were, wobbling about atop a motorbike in Bandung, Indonesia! So crazy! So alive! So VERY not smooth. At the security points and speedbumps (and turns), it was a struggle. I kept imagining us falling over, and we almost did.
The first time I got off the bike, at the place where we were to meet up with the teacher to go to the village, I profusely apologized to Alissa. “I’m sorry I almost killed you,” I said. Her response (having been in the Marine Core for 5 years)? “Well, it wouldn’t be the first time that’s almost happened.” We laughed. I realized that she was the perfect person to bring along on this maiden voyage.
The rest of the day, it was a series of “getting use to things”. We came within a foot of some cars, I almost made the same brake/acceleration mistake I had at first (this time it would have been in front of a whole crowd of onlookers), we had to drive on the left side of the road (and it really was as trippy as I thought it would be) and my turning got less jerky. We even started going faster and faster on the straight stretches!
No, it wasn’t quite how I’d envisioned it would be to drive my first motorbike. But I’m happy to report we didn’t die, and my driving slowly improved during our time there. By the end of the following week, I could drive with 2 other people on the seat (albeit, not entirely comfortable)!
I got a little addicted to it, honestly. Addicted to the wind hitting my face and whipping through my hair. Addicted to the video game-ness of weaving through traffic (it wasnt that heavy where our team was located but there were still obstacles). Addicted to the freedom and feeling of adventure the bike invited. Addicted to the person I saw myself as when I drove the bike: confident, aventuresome, coordinated, edgy, mysterious, in-charge.
I never thought I’d say this but…THANK YOU, LORD, FOR MOTORBIKES IN INDONESIA!!
Me looking how I felt (so cool) on one of the two motorbikes people loaned us.
