Biking in Tokyo

We finally bit the bullet and bought bikes. Not just any bikes, though, hilarious foldable ones.

They fold up pretty small and are light enough to carry around.

There’s a term here, “gaijin smash”, which is when a foreigner does something uncustomary or illegal but no one stops them because they’re all too polite here.

“Gaijin smash” also describes our driving style, pioneered by Todd. We fly around at top speed, weaving in between pedestrians on the sidewalk and cars on the street. We ride up and down the ramps next to stairs where everyone else pushes their bikes.

Thank god our bikes have little bells.

It’s a blast, except when we have to ride up the huge hill coming back from dinner, or when we are carrying backpacks full of groceries. When it rains we put on our rain gear and are the only people on the road/sidewalk.

We get our train passes next week and the plan is to bring the bikes on the train with us. We’ve been told that’s not how things work, but there’s always the gaijin smash.