I’m sure that
older readers will remember Ricky Martin’s song, María: with the unforgettable
chorus of Un, dos, tres, un pasito
p’alante María. Un dos tres, un pasito p’atrás - literally 1,2,3 one step forward María,
1,2,3 one step backwards. If not, here’s a link.
Well this is how
pedestrians have to walk, or rather jump, about the pavements in Seville as cyclists zoom
recklessly towards them, making the most of their god-given right to put
everyone's life at risk – including their own. Indeed, watching a pedestrian
trying to walk along the average Sevillian
street is rather like watching someone in a
Western “dance” as the baddies shoot at their feet. Desperation, lack of
concerted coordination and the fear of imminent death or mutilation are common
to both sufferers.
And the problem
is this: enlightened Seville
(a city for people,
according to its own rather brainless propaganda) now has cycle lanes
incorporated onto its pavements, but cyclists here (indeed, anywhere) respect neither the lanes nor
the traffic rules. Speeding cyclists are a greater menace than speeding cars (at
least in general terms cars do not speed along the pavement!). Yet for some
reason, best known to themselves, cyclists do of course have greater right of
way than any other form of life.
Cycling seems to
have become a new form of Fascism. Once the wearing of a black, brown, or blue
shirt with its corresponding armband raised the possessor above the ranks of
the common herd. He – or she – became an exalted member of that class of beings who, as Orwell so famously put it, are
more equal than others. Such fascists, or communists (basically the same genus
of being) could do what the hell they liked without fear of reprisal or
punishment by the authorities. Now to be more equal than the rest of urban
humanity what you need is a bike, tight fitting Lycra, no undies and a total lack of inhibition about parading your middle-aged bag of rusty spanners around.
Once mounted
upon his or her gleaming, non-polluting charger, the rider becomes a sort of
knight in hi-viz armour, bearing down upon the cycle-less villeins with all the
contempt and recklessness of a Norman aristocrat taking a constitutional on his
palfrey among - or even over - his serfs.
“By what right?”
You may cry. “By the divine right of the non-polluting eco-warrior” Sallies
forth the reply as, bell a-ring, lights a-twinkle pedals a-whirr and bollocks a-jiggle (with a bit of luck he'll be rendered incapable of spawning any progeny) the
oppressor bears down on you. You have two options: stand your ground and get
hospitalised or jump back and let the arrogant bastard waft by unchallenged.
Teeth a-grind, we let the chevalier thunder past, as in days of yore.
In a word, most
cyclists are arrogant, selfish turds who deserve a timely stick thrust through
their flashing spokes.
And so to North Korea.
For all of the chemical weapons, nuclear bombs and avunculophage dogs that that
particularly distasteful regime might vaunt, as yet it has not been a real
threat to my life and physical integrity – or indeed yours, unless you have the misfortune to live there. The cyclist, on the
other hand, is a real daily meance and a greater threat to your, or my, existence
than the hermits of Pyong Yang. "Leave North Korea alone!", I say. Get the UN
Security Council onto the case of the cyclo-fascists.
Let us not,
however, bomb them back to the Stone Age; let us merely put them back where
they belong – on the roads, not the pavements – where they can put their own
lives at risk without risking ours - even if this will entail some damage to cars. Either that, or send the whole parcel of
them to Guantánamo and thence unleash them on the Castros.
