The Peace Correspondent (9 page)

Teenagers fresh off the farm drive olive drab World War II
vintage trucks as though they were still in the empty fields, attuned to the speed of their water buffaloes. The many trucks turned over and abandoned in the ditches are grim reminders of how dangerous driving is in China, so the police escort clearing traffic ahead is grudgingly appreciated.

Fujian, the next province, is cleaner and greener than Guangzhou, with fields of sugar cane and lychee, banana and kumquat trees. For many miles, eucalyptus trees line the well-paved highway. Motorcyclists experience their surroundings more intensely than car riders, with the wind whistling past their faces and every bump in the road felt in the handlebars. Here, they inhale the smells of rural China: exhaust fumes, gas, oil, vegetation, wood smoke, manure and night soil.

Riding by Xiamen airport is like passing a baker's oven, as the temperature rises rapidly, there is a powerful smell of jet exhaust and aviation gas, then the roar of a jet engine as a Dragonair plane climbs into the darkening sky. Then, on the long bridge over the river, the temperature drops rapidly as a cool, stiff wind buffets the riders. It is a change of seasons in just minutes.

Minor breakdowns, flat tires and adjustments force frequent stops. A gang of motorcyclists in denims and jeans is a menacing sight, but none of these people has seen Marlon Brando or read Hunter Thompson, so curiosity prevails. Barefoot peasants leading cows to pasture or heading to work in the fields stop to stare at the gleaming bikes. A stern-faced traffic cop who has been difficult to deal with breaks into a huge smile when he is asked to pose aboard Dave's big orange and white Heritage.

Sportsters with 1 1/2 gallon gas tanks are city bikes requiring frequent refueling. It is a delicate operation; the riders get frantic whenever a local gas jockey splashes a few drops on the highly polished tanks or chrome. Many take the hoses themselves and very gently tip them into the tank, being exceedingly careful not to spill gas on their beloved metal steeds.

At rural gas stations, thousands appear from nowhere to gather outside protective steel fences to stare, as though we were
zoo exhibits. One well organized station with a long red banner announcing “Warmly Welcome and see off the Members of Hong Kong Branch, Haley Dawson Motor Car Association Through Our Country,” has set up a little table with cookies, candies and drinks for sale. Pretty young highway patrol women pose for photos like models at a motorcycle show.

Despite the strict schedule, the bikers run late, riding long after dark, the police car's flashing rooftop lights leading a half mile line of red taillights, like a string of Christmas decorations. On day two, after a number of tense near misses in the dark, the convoy rides in formation through Shantou City to line up in a row in front of the Shantou International Hotel. Police and staff stand guard over the HK$3 million worth of fine machinery, cordoned off with a red velvet rope like some gala Hollywood affair.

A bone-weary and saddle-sore bunch of riders gathers for dinner that night. David, a Hong Kong Chinese Harvard graduate, keeps bikes and sports cars in San Francisco, Vancouver and Hong Kong, and flies light aircraft. He is most passionate about biking. “It is three-dimensional, so you are more with the environment,” says the property developer. “When you lean into the curve, you really feel it. Car driving is two dimensional.”

“If you are on a motorcycle, you know what is going on, you are one with the machine,” he adds. “With a Harley, you feel each bang of the cylinder, the tappets. You can feel the air sucking into the carburetor. A car is too complicated.”

In the grey light of dawn, the bikers are outside before a growing audience polishing chrome, gunning their engines, the brackbrackbrack shattering the silence. Lightly touched breakfasts of strange Chinese concoctions sit uneasily in their stomachs and lunch is many miles and long hours away.

It is another clear morning, and the bikers never face rain the whole week. Peter, an executive with a major German corporation, says this is fortunate, because most of the riders lack experience driving on wet roads. “When it rains, a Hong Kong Harley
rider takes his Porsche to work,” he adds.

One of the ladies is caustic about bikes and bikers. “Nobody was cleaning their bikes yesterday morning when there was no one to see them,” the Harley wife remarks.

“I came to see China,” she adds, zipping up her leather jacket. “To me, a bike is just a big mess of metal. It is not a toy for boys but for middle-aged, middle-incomed men.”

The crowd of onlookers held back behind the velvet rope has grown to hundreds as the bikers prepare for the dramatic departure. An old biker once described to me the technique, the style of swaggering out to his bike in front of the locals in any small town, which always attracts a crowd. “You pull on your jacket and gloves real slowly, deliberately, ignoring everyone. And when you look at the crowd, you look right through them, focus about three feet behind their eyes. It really spooks them.”

After posing for a photograph before the big banners welcoming the Harley group, riders and passengers mount up, 24 big muscle bikes revving their engines, the deep-throated Harley rumble echoing along the street. The main street through town is blocked off, TV cameras are rolling, escort cars and bikes with flashing red lights start their wailing sirens. Reed blows his whistle for this grand motor cavalcade to take off before the thousands of spectators now lining the road - but a wisp of a desk clerk runs out of the hotel to accost him. He waves his hands, signaling cut your engines. Someone has not handed in a room key and she is not letting the procession go without it. They find the culprit and, somewhat anticlimactically, depart.

The showy bikes don't come through unscathed, though. Going through a small town with heavy traffic, a rustic driving a tractor hauling a huge load cuts across the road despite the police car almost sideswiping it, then runs down Reed in the lead bike. He goes down sprawling over the dirt road, kicking up a huge cloud of dust. Police have trouble keeping back the hundreds of onlookers that appear from every shop and house. The gleaming bike is scratched, the turn signals twisted off but Reed
suffers only a bruised elbow, thanks to his red protective suit, which fellow riders call his Full Body Condom.

Fame precedes this unique cavalcade by midweek. Outside Wenzhou, TV and newspaper coverage and sponsor Esso's radio advertisements bring out tens of thousands of spectators. They line the road for many miles, laughing, some calling out “Halley, Halley,” so we feel like royalty or rock stars. George, the chapter president, gets spooked by all the people, terrified a child will run across the road and be flattened by a bike. Outside the city, two World War II style motorcycles, with sidecars flying huge flags, and some 100 small bikes from the local motorcycle club join the cavalcade for the triumphant ride into the city.

Excitement builds with the entire populace out to see the parade, and we arrive very late to a gala reception, with blinding TV lights, strings of firecrackers exploding all around the bikes and great colored balls of fireworks shooting into the sky. It is like a victory parade and a near mob scene as the bikes roll into the compound. Inside, a banner greets the HOGs: “Warmly Welcome Halle Darvision Motor Car Hong Kong Branch Asso. to pass through Wenzhou.”

Beyond Wenzhou, along the scenic coast where visitors seldom travel, the population thins and steep roads wind up into the mountains past terraced fields, waterfalls and little lakes where men fish from primitive wooden boats. “It's like riding through a painting,” developer David says. Later, the road passes through a kind of Death Valley, with traditional graves sculpted into the side of the mountain as though scooped out with a giant melon spoon.

Despite the hectic pace, there is some time for sightseeing, and one morning, we attend a kung-fu demonstration. It is more acrobatic than martial, but it impresses one of the Chinese bikers. That night, out on the town, he fools around with exaggerated kung fu fighting stances, taunting one biker's girl friend, a tiny but supple dancer. The rider, with elaborate, showy gestures, dares her, “OK, come at me.” A delicate, balletic foot lashes out,
connecting with the open mouth, splitting the lip open. The biker is still spitting blood back at the hotel, where the doctor closes the cut with three stitches.

Zhejiang, the next province, is more industrial China, where the air smells of coal, factory smoke and hot tar. Steam trains belching black smoke chug by green rice paddies; trucks haul coal to grimy factories; and ancient, long, flat-bottomed boats with curved thatched roofs put-put by at a walking pace along canals that run all the way to Shanghai.

Somewhere north of Ningbo, the tightly organized convoy is stopped at a road construction site where asphalt degenerates to dirt and two lanes narrow into one. Trucks, tractors and buses backed up for miles in either direction block the convoy's van, truck and police escort, but the motorcycles squeeze past. It is total chaos of heat, dust and the oily smell of hot engines, as one by one the bikes spurt past the mess and regroup at the roadside. But TJ, a rebel, says “Let's ride,” and zooms away from the pack.

TJ, a Chinese movie producer with long hair, a frizzy Ho Chi Minh beard and fringed leather vest, rides a big Electra Glide, a huge cruising Cadillac of motorcycles with padded armrests, running boards, windshield, radio and more lights than a Kowloon disco. He rejoices at being finally free on the road, weaving his powerful machine between tractors, bicycles and startled water buffalo. When he stops at a crossroads to ask directions to Hangzhou, Michael, an English financial consultant, roars up on his Sportster. The club brass has sent him ahead to find TJ.

“I'm supposed to tell you to stay here and wait for the rest,” he says. They look at each other, and without a word, take off together, riding without the escort for miles, breaking every rule of the club and rejoicing in the best time of the trip. Finally, like truant schoolboys, they stop at a shack-sized store, climb off the bikes, and TJ orders drinks in Shanghainese. The proprietor sets a table and chairs out on the dirt yard. When the convoy finally catches up, the lost riders are somewhat sheepishly sipping from large green bottles circled by a curious audience of hundreds.

The ride is nearing the end, and some of the bikers are getting restive. At yet another banquet, this time in scenic Hangzhou's Huagang Hotel, local officials and chapter chiefs indulge in the Chinese custom of dueling toasts with a potent, clear local maotai. George, who speaks Mandarin, thanks the hosts, the police, the Chinese people, the hotel staff, and others. Joerg, known as “Miami,” joins in with gusto. Miami is a Swiss watch company executive whose hair stands back as though he is permanently pointing into a wind tunnel. He faces a valiant, but losing battle with the maotai, and is waving his chopsticks around like conductors' batons.

A three-piece Chinese classical band begins playing traditional music on a small stage at the front of the room. Miami joins them, conducting with his chopsticks, and soon he has them playing a jaunty Oh Suzanna. Then Miami starts tumbling and doing handstands, his legs flying in the air as he hurls himself across stage, while the Chinese officials look on, straight faced. Later, the one-man Swiss acrobatic team is spotted wrapped in a towel wandering around the hotel corridors looking for his room.

Next morning, in the parking lot, Miami eyeballs another rider and moans, “You look like a piece of shit.” He complains he is aching all over. “My skeletal is banging like an old Harley.”

Eight days after leaving Hong Kong, at dusk on a Saturday, the HOGs reach a blue highway sign: Welcome to Shanghai. They have ridden an arduous 2,300 kilometers through country that few foreigners see. For the last time, they assemble the convoy and ride into China's largest city on a freeway cleared of traffic. Ahead waits a noisy reception at the Olympic Hotel, with a lion dance and children in theatrical makeup bearing bouquets for each rider. Then the riders will fly home and swap the leathers for business suits.

At twilight, just outside the city, an immense, roaring shape zooms by low overhead, lights flashing, as a jetliner settles into final approach to Shanghai international airport. It left Hong Kong just hours earlier.