The sad story of my bicycle
December 17, 2005 at 9:44 AM
by Ashleigh
Before you get concerned, yes, I have it back and yes, its fixed. I found a shop that offered fantastic service (not something too normal here in Holland) and they came and collected my bike on Thursday morning, fixed it and called me the same day to come and collect it!
Unfortunately I didn't go on Thursday but I walked with the kids yesterday to the shop and collected it. I had thought it was further away than it really is, but my friend showed me a route on the map that I could walk through some buildings and under the A9 motorway which made the walk much shorter. We went yesterday afternoon in a lull between the wind and rain and managed to make it home before the next downpour.
The sad and sorry part of the story is about what actually happened to my bike. As I said before, I took it to school on Thursday morning and about three quarters of the way there the tyre suddenly deflated - and deflated completely, something which hasn't happened to me before when I've had punctures. The bike stays inside our apartment building all the time which is locked and accessible only to people with a key, or the cleaners, who come on Thursday mornings.
On the Thursday prior to the puncture I had an argument with the one cleaner man when he told me to remove my bike to outside in the rain and I asked him why he couldn't just clean around it. It wasn't amicably resolved and he was muttering away under his breath as I walked away.
Fast forward to yesterday when the man at the bike shop told me that my bike tyre had been slashed! He said there was about a 3 inch hole in the tyre and in his opinion someone had inserted a knife point or some sharp object between tyre and rim and made a tiny hole in the tyre. As I rode the bike the action of the wheels turning caused the hole to widen until suddenly it tore.
When I got home I called the bike manufacturer and he said that the tyres are a special tyre made by Shwalbe called Big Apple tyres and they are protected with Kevlar against things like glass, sticks, etc which might have caused a puncture. In his opinion my tyre was vandalised as he says its extremely rare that riding on city roads would result in a puncture.
So, now what do I do? Either it was someone in the building itself or it was the cleaning people who have access to the building. If it occurs again Brad says I need to call the police. I just feel really annoyed by the whole experience, not to mention that it isn't cheap to have my tyre repaired! The bike needs to be lifted on a pulley as its very heavy and the tubes that go inside my tyres are also expensive. The hole in the tube was so big that they couldn't just repair it either and it needed a complete new tube.
35 euros later, one and a half days of difficult transportation, and lots of inconvenience for one episode of tyre slashing.
Register the possible vandalism with the police now. Indicate that it coincided with the tiff with the cleaners, but don't lay charges. That way, if it DOES happen again, you have precedence to fall back on [since you didn't press charges, they don't need to do anything yet], rather than what may appear to be sour grapes.
December 18, 2005 12:17 AM