The SXSW Play App (launches iTunes) is available and includes a podcast with me and @livestrongceo Doug Ulman. The podcast is about the Changing the World, Lives, with Bikes Core Conversation we’re presenting on Tuesday
That’s after the Mobile Social during the opening weekend. You can find the podcast under the Greater Good category in the app. It’s also available as an MP3 file.
The two dudes in the photo are from our trip to India last year.
In this photo from Reuters Pictures, a man walks with his bicycle along barbwire blocking a road near Vice President’s office in Jakarta. Anti-government protesters will rally Thursday to mark the first 100 days of President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono’s second term.
I noticed the bike is a Dahon and can’t say our commutes or rides on folding bikes have been interrupted by barbed wire. We’ve certainly seen our share of interestingness, including paved-over Hudongs in China, like the ones NYT just wrote about. Also saw the contrasts of wealth and poverty in India during our Mobile Social Worldwide.
In the Fall of 2009, Bike Hugger rode urban in London, Amsterdam, Prague, and New Dehli. Along the way we met lots of people incuding Alien8, Marc from Amsterdamize, Henry from WorkCycles, and the good people of India.
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We’ll kick off another year of Mobile Socials @fitc next month.
... Read more »Amsterdam is the back drop for the MoSos in 2010 and the kickoff of our meetups on bikes. Then it’s onto Mellow Johnnys for SXSW.
Photo: a Shepard Fairey Mural in Amsterdam spotted during the Mobile Social Worldwide.
... Read more »Replaceable derailer hangers are engineered to break, to spare the derailer, and this one did in an S&S travel case. Can’t imagine the forces within the case to do that, but break it did. Sheared right off. Discovered this back home from the Mobile Social Worldwide.
Besides dings and an ever-developing travel patina, a broken derailer hanger is a new occurence. This was on the Dahon Mu SL we took with us. I suspect it’s because the wheels and tires weren’t there to protect it. The Dahon isn’t intended to break down fully like an S&S — you fold it in 1/2 into a large case. With the recent crack down on luggage by the airlines and a very long trip, we packed the Dahons in cases I knew would pass through baggage.
Cost to repair is about $15.00 USD.
Verlyn Klinkenborg writes for the NYTimes that
there is a deeply pleasing randomness about the campus cyclists, as though one morning university officials had assigned a bicycle to every member of the Stanford community, come as you are, without considering for a moment matters of fit — or fitness.
We’ve ridden in Santa Barbara past a campus with thousands of bikes assembled in a bike parking area. That was nearly as much as we saw in Beijing at the attended bike lots. Where Verlyn sees the indivdual on a bike, we notice the bike as a connector in a global community.
... Read more »Traveling often shifts your worldview, changes perspectives, and the way you look at things. Back from the Mobile Social Worldwide, I’m just starting to parse all those thoughts into posts. I’ll get to stopping for a Holy Man and riding a Bubble of Curiosity in Delhi later.
Reading about Living Streets in Colorado, reminded me of the ride and talk I had with Brian Deegan in London. He expressed the struggle it was to get to this point with Camden’s bike lanes, bike tracks, and lights. Camden is a model for cities elsewhere, but Brian and his firm still fight politics and also public awareness.
... Read more »Dahon’s view of the Mobile Social Interbike in Vegas. We rode the Strip from the Sands to Mandalay Bay and into a VIP Tent.
We just finished the Mobile Social Worldwide and our next one is in Austin for SXSW.
Where we hang out in front of coffee shops and pubs, these two chill at a roadside market in India. Ya know watching the world go by and the occasional tourist with a camera.
More photos from the India stop in our Mobile Social Worldwide are in this photoset. Scroll down to the bottom photos. Videos and huggacasts to follow.
In our travels and Mobile Socials, we’ve seen bikes used as transportation, but not to this extent. Bikes at India truckstops are used to deliver goods and services and form a trucking ecosystem. They build trucks with bikes.
As we walked around the stop, various bikes would pass us with their loads. Need a new pair of pants or have your pants ironed? The merchants with bikes and carts have it.
... Read more »The truck stops in India form an ecosystem that builds, repairs, and services trucks. They also provide community for the drivers. The parts for the trucks, including body steel, are delivered by bikes like this Premium Gold Appl.
The owner added a lucky charm to the front fender. He makes his living with this bike.
NGOs work very hard at teaching the drivers and sex workers at these stops about preventing STDs. I’ll cover that in another post.
Read more about the Mobile Social Worldwide and view the photos.
Freeriding in India is when your bro on a scooter pushes you along to the market.
A still from riding in Delhi video shot yesterday. We’ll publish the video and other huggacasts from the Mobile Social Worldwide once we’re back in the States.
Riding in Delhi was safer than it looked because of a curiousity bubble around me. A folding bike and helmeted rider was a spectacle with cars, scooters, buses, carts following to get a closer look. Wasn’t my intent to create a scene, but then felt I’d added something to India. Bikes aren’t status symbols in India or something a business person would ride to work.
That’s an opportunity for change here and the businessmen I talked to in the hotel lobby were very curious about the bike.
Like riding in China, I just rode right into the flow. Wish I had a huge horn though. That’s what they do in India: honkity honk, honk.
Note this is another in a series of posts from the Mobile Social Worldwide.
Building materials are delivered by bike in India — brick, pipes, steel girders anything you can imagine.
Note this is another in a series of posts from the Mobile Social Worldwide.
While Prague and the Czech people comprise a culture of resistance, it’s not to the car. Cyclist there ride mountain bikes for the cobbles, hilly terrain, and to make quick escapes onto trails when the hostile drivers turn violent. As a symbol of westernization, the car dominates. They proudly make Skodas.
The first stop on our Mobile Social Worldwide was London and we connected with local cyclists, the fixie scene, and a traffic engineer. We rode haphazardly on city streets, a hot lap in Richmond, and calmed roads with cycle tracks.
Riding in London is aggressive and not for the timid. The photo sequence below demonstrates a commuter crossing a congested road into Hyde Park.
In Prague, multiuse paths include men in hats who escort girls with bows and bikes that are separated.
Uploaded by Hugger Industries | more from the Bike Hugger Photostream.
It’s a Miele with pedals — spotted this in a Meile Boutique across the street from our hotel in Prague.
Uploaded by Hugger Industries | more from the Bike Hugger Photostream.
While at WorkCycles to pick up bikes for the Amsterdam stop of the Mobile Social Worldwide, @amsterdamized showed us his photos. This collection was recently included in a NYT feature, the NY 400 celebration, and he was hanging them on the wall for a party.
Mark will sell these soon.
You see whole families on bikes in Amsterdam, including babies like this. We think she is happier than a car-seated child in a minivan with a DVD player.
Uploaded by Hugger Industries | more from the Bike Hugger Photostream.
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