Handa Bike

Like any other Friday afternoon, the next train from Kamezaki was going to leave in 20 minutes, at 5:42pm and I was about ready to stand up from my desk, run across the parking lot to my bike and ride up the hill to the train station. This time-table would leave me about 3 minutes to park my bike, run through the wicket, up and down a stair case to the platform, just before the train showed up. The next Monday, July 16, I got back on the train at Chikusa station at 5:32am and after a few transfers arrived at Kamezaki station around 6:22am.

So far, no problem.

In a sleepy daze, I got off the train, walk back up and down the stair case, through the wicket and to the bike parking area, up to the spot where I left my bike... Only to find no bike.

I walked up and down the row bike bikes, want to another bike parking area on the other side of the station... And vocally realized; "CRAP! Someone stole my bike!"Then I realized I had to walk to work. This happened about two months ago and I've been holding out hope that I would see my bike on my walks to and from work. Handa is a small place, I been taking different routes and different times with no luck. The bike has to be somewhere, there are other train stations before and after Kamezaki, so the bike should be parked between there... You typically ride a train as close as possible to where you to go, in order to minimize you ride on my bike.

This is partly my fault too. When you live in Japan, it seems like a very unrealistic place where people don't take nothing that is not there's. I've seen people look for the owner and return coins to lost and found, it's crazy. A few months ago, I stopped putting a lock on my bike, it slowed me down, epically when I had to run to the train. This not putting a lock on my bike probably lead to it being stolen.

The good thing, this bike I got used for $20... So it's not a huge lost.