Travelling by Bike: 'We May Not Be Fast'
By Kaka Chio

"Travelling by foot is too slow, the schedule might be limited; travelling by car is too fast, many beautiful landscapes might be neglected. Travelling by bike is something in between. I can control the tempo; when I want to stop, I stop; when I want to go on, I go on. The tempo of the journey is decided by me," said Keith Chu, 22, a bike traveler, who organized a dozen young people in Macao to ride from Beijing to Shanghai in the Chinese New Year 2013.

Beginning of cycling
Chu has just finished his university studies in Shanghai. He had many chances to travel around China in the past four years. "My friend and I rented a bike and rode from our university to a subway station once. We spent two hours to get there, but it would take only one hour by bus. As we went to more and more places by bike, I started to feel that I was travelling.  So we planned to ride to further places." He and his friends started the journey by riding their own bikes and travelling around Shanghai. They had to spend a lot of time, energy and they might have a meal or drink, doing some errands in destinations, but Chu thought it was worth it.

People he met
When talking about the people he met in different journeys, his eyes were bright and he looked very excited. Chu took a ride from Shanghai to Nanjing in 2010. He felt grateful that he met a French guy who was also a bike traveler in his first journey. "He had decided to ride from China back to France. He made me full of courage to go to further places," said Chu.

So, cycling around the Qinghai Lake in Northwest China became his second aim then. In 2011, he achieved this goal with his friends. He met four boys in this journey and became friends with them. Therefore, he has traveled to Qinghai Province for four times. Chu believed that a real journey should include communication, not just taking photos and tasting food. He hoped that he can make some friends who know more local culture and change himself a little bit in every journey.

"Each human being should have a goal!" said Chu. When he talked about the three children he met in EBao, a town of Qinghai, he said that he wouldn't forget them. When he was riding alone along the highway in EBao and his friends were lagging behind him for a long distance, the three children encouraged him and invited him to go to their home for a rest. Chu was alert and refused at the beginning, but it was too hard to resist their invitation, so he followed them finally.

Fortunately, the children were very nice. They gave him some water and dried mutton. The children were cousins and assisted the elders to keep a herd. They had never been to other places, nor had they had  a plan to go to university. They might live the life in the way that their parents were living. They had no ideas about what their dreams were. "They had nothing, not only in terms of the material but also of the spirit. The remote village life made them have no dreams. I suppose that each person should have a goal at least!" said Chu.

Motto
Bad weather, hyposthenia or other emergency matters, all of them decided a journey to be successful or not. Chu has encountered all these problems. "You will achieve half of success if you take the first step bravely. The rest is only the insistence." This is his motto.

Life influences life
Chu teaches in a middle school. He thinks his job is full of "sharing". In addition to teaching students knowledge, he would share his travel experiences with students outside of classrooms, telling them what he saw and encountered in others places. He hopes that his students could consider more about their dreams and lives.