The past few months felt like a relentless roller-coaster ride. I found myself buried under mountains of paperwork for my next promotion—paperwork that often felt strangely frivolous in an age where the government champions paperless work. Alongside this came the emotional upheaval of sending my younger one off to foreign shores.
By the end, exhaustion had seeped into me—physical and emotional alike. There was barely any time or energy left to scroll through social media, let alone post anything. The other day, however, I allowed myself the luxury of a leisurely scroll.
Somewhere between habitual swipes, a post caught my attention—enough to make me pause, scroll back, and read it again. It spoke of a young student in Shanghai who earned nearly $40,000 over two years by teaching 700 people, ranging in age from four to 70, how to ride a bicycle. Simple. Unassuming. Transformative. Entrepreneurship redefined. You don’t always need a grand start-up idea or a glossy pitch deck, but the ability to identify a basic human need and respond to it with skill and sincerity.
Within seconds, I was transported back to my childhood, to a time when learning to ride a bicycle seemed a Herculean task. The fear of falling, the wobble, the scraped knees—all felt insurmountable. But once the balance was mastered, the feeling was nothing short of regal; you rode as though you owned the world. My father taught me to cycle, much like most of the skills I take pride in today. From driving and swimming to algebra and trigonometry, he was my steady instructor. Of course, I’m equally grateful for the culinary skills I learnt from my mother, but riding a bicycle stands apart. It was perhaps the first achievement that made me feel capable, independent, and grown-up.
Cycling to the neighbourhood minimarket in the middle of a lazy afternoon, often with no real need, just the thrill of the ride, or pedalling to school with friends to steal a few extra moments together, visiting the repair shop for a refilling of air in the tyres or getting the punctured tyre fixed, was what passed for “cool” in those days. No filters, no hashtags—just freedom on two wheels.
Graduating from a bicycle to a moped, and then to a scooter, or the much-coveted Kinetic Honda, the non-geared wonder of its time, felt like a natural corollary of growing up. It required no formal initiation, no deliberate practice; it was simply the next effortless step in the quiet, unspoken curriculum of adolescence.
But it is the memories that linger. Cooling off with an ice cream clenched in one hand, bought from a roadside cart, while manoeuvring the handlebars with the other on a hot noon; riding through dense winter fog, blowing out smoke circles in the chilly mornings; pedalling furiously against stubborn winds that seemed determined to push you back; or gliding over rain-slicked roads as a gentle drizzle soaked you through.
Moments like these settle quietly into the mind, reminding me of my first taste of independence. [email protected]
The writer is an associate professor of English at SD College, Ambala Cantt.