Brompton

As mentioned, I bought a Brompton folding bicycle. The model is a C-line Urban 2-speed. Even when acknowledging the fact that buyer’s euphoria is still in effect, it is great.

As you can see, it accomplishes the purpose on which my official propaganda justifying the exorbitant purchase was based: Fitting beautifully in my tiny office entryway. The not-a-nuisance-to-society-but-admittedly-illegal parking spot I had been using on the sidewalk below my office and in front of the art gallery proved unsustainable. And although my mountain bike technically fit at the top of the narrow steel staircase, using it was an ordeal. Hauling down especially.

But I admit that the folding and unfolding of the bicycle—which take less than a minute even by my unpracticed hands—pose a mental hurdle to using it. Despite being a lot of fun to execute! I love each operation, but when my brain wants me to hurry to do a thing, it erroneously cites the folding/unfolding as an impediment to quickly getting to the task. I will eliminate this mental hurdle through dogged repetition of the operations.

I am very happy with the ride itself. It feels nimble. The gyroscopic difference of the smaller wheels took about 10 seconds to get used to. Bumps do transmit a little more directly to my exquisite derrière. But since I have ample cake down there it is of no consequence.

Here is how the Brompton stands, without needing a stand. On the TMH. deck for maximum class and refinement.

An aspect of consequence is my selection of the 2-speed instead of 6-speed model. It is fine. The two gears are both useful and I get enough speed. But when I zoom from TMH. back toward Takao Station, I cannot get pedal resistance and further speed the way I did on my 21-speed mountain bike. Of course. And I wouldn’t have gotten it on the 6-speed either. Anyway, I selected the 2-speed because it meant a simpler and lighter and cheaper bicycle. The 6-speed includes a 3-speed internal gear hub, which adds to make the total weight 12.20kg. The 2-speed has the normal external gears you see on other bicycles, for a total weight of 11.35kg. Since I was planning to haul the thing up and down the office stairs, I decided to go maximally light. I could very well regret this if I end up wanting to take very long rides. For now I see myself mostly using it around town here, or on business trips, so the disadvantages don’t seem likely to yield any buyer’s remorse.

Taking a bicycle on business trips is an exciting proposition. A lot of places I go are not convenient to access by train, so I drive my own car, which can easily hold the bicycle. Once I have arrived, it ought to be the perfect mode of exploration. Verification of this assumption is coming soon—I have trips to four places in Japan in the next three months. One hope is to put a GoPro on the handlebars and share some town- or landscapes with you, Dear Reader.

I also have a trip to Belgium in March, and the Brompton is famously able to be checked as airline luggage, but I will hold off on that step until I have a longer trip somewhere international.

I bought the bicycle at Loro Setagaya, which is part of a chain of shops around Japan that specializes in folding bicycles. I read online somewhere that buying there enables use of all the chain’s locations around Japan when requiring maintenance or repairs. When I went to test ride and decide on a model at the very end of 2022, the person who helped me said that they would be doing a New Year’s promotion in which they offer a free bag along with bicycle purchase. This is in lieu of any discounts, which they don’t do.

I hate negotiating prices at shops of any kind, and eschew the practice as barbaric, but I did say to them, “If I don’t ask you for a discount, my wife will ask me if I asked for a discount, and I will be unable to answer that yes, I did ask for a discount, so I hereby ask you: ‘Can I get a discount?,’” to which they replied “I hereby reply that we do not offer discounts, but apprise you of a forthcoming New Year’s promotion in which we provide you with a free bag with bicycle purchase.” Then he and I were both relieved at the successful disposition of our respective duties.

Bags for attachment to Bromptons are neat, because they click neatly onto and off of the frame at the front of the bicycle, but at a point that does not turn along with the handlebars. This means that the weight of any luggage does not affect the nimbleness or precision of turns. It is a very big deal to my riding comfort. The options presented to me in the free bag promotion were nice, and expensive, but a little wide and overall big for my daily use. So now I have one that will hold a lot of stuff on a longer journey, but still want to buy a bag that will just barely hold the MacBook on which I now type, while riding on the frame more vertically than horizontally. I am confident that such a bag exists. Ideally there is a bag that I can use for all manner of business that also snaps onto the frame, because then there would be no transferring of items between multiple bags, which is my idea of hell on earth. That said (Have you noticed how American English speakers in recent years say “that being said” much more often than they used to? This baffles me to no end. “That said” is shorter and so much sweeter. Alas!), wearing my backpack while riding about town is not a problem during winter, which you may have heard is happening right now. But when sweat returns as a life factor, I think attaching the bag to my bicycle will become more of a priority. Don’t think I haven’t considered the idea of having a Brompton-compatible clip sewn into my beloved Arc’Teryx backpack.

Another use of the bicycle that I am determined to explore is that of primary mode of exercise. A fellow I became friends with through Twitter takes two or three bicycle rides a day as his exercise, and it is quite inspiring. I don’t intend to go full cyclist (buying a Brompton would have been folly indeed if I were), but when thinking of the finite and consumable nature of human knees, it is probably time to reduce my reliance on running as the way I get into shape after I allow my body to deteriorate into near-atrophy each winter. And this all dovetails with my stated intention to diversify the kinds of exercise I get.

A final nice thing I will tell you about is the ability to store the bicycle in my shed. Since it is expensive, locking it to itself, for example, is probably not wise. (Yes, crime exists in Japan, and includes bicycle theft.) Folding it up and popping it in the shed is not much trouble so far. And in these days of needing to reduce automobile usage, should a bicycle not receive the superior storage conditions of a shed over a parking lot? No, it should not not receive those.